Borough getting look at its first cannabis store business proposal since it changed rules
WOODBURY HEIGHTS — An Allentown, Pennsylvania company is the first to attempt a cannabis retail business in the borough, which rewrote its zoning regulations last fall to make that possible.
Shiv Prasa LLC is scheduled before the Planning and Zoning Board on Monday night. A retail cannabis business is a “conditional use,” not a “permitted use,” where the store would open at Elm Avenue and Route 45.
The company was set to come before the board in February, seeking a straightforward conditional use approval and a site plan approval. It plans to convert a former bank branch at 30 Elm Avenue, an area zoned as a Highway Commercial district.
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However, Shiv Prasa had to cancel that hearing to advertise a revised public notice. The revised notice acknowledges its proposal does not comply with two local regulations.
The Borough Council in May 2022 voted to open the town to cannabis manufacturing in its Light Industrial zone, but no other type of cannabis business. The council also authorized a cannabis transfer tax and a cannabis use tax, both set at 2 percent of an item's value.
But in November 2022, the council redid that ordinance. The amended version allowed cannabis retailers in the Highway Commercial Zoning District.
Still, even in that district, a cannabis store cannot be within 1,000 feet of any school. The hearing will look at whether the site is too close to St. Margaret Regional School, a pre-kindergarten through eighth grade school at 773 Third Street.
Attorneys for the company are claiming the ordinance is not specific on how to measure the distance. They suggest the elementary school is “approximately 955 feet” away, at least at one point.
The company also wants to exceed limits on signs, as well as obtain variances from parking and landscaping requirements.
In February, two opponents of the proposed store appeared at the municipal building unaware of the hearing cancellation. One woman held a handmade poster reading, “Weedbury Heights.”
The 3,364-square-foot former bank is owned by N&N Real Estate LLC, a Philadelphia company. It has an agreement to sell the roughly half-acre property to Shiv Prasa, if the proposal is approved.
The board meeting starts at 7 p.m. Monday.
Joe Smith is a N.E. Philly native transplanted to South Jersey more than 30 years ago, keeping an eye now on government in South Jersey. He is a former editor and current senior staff writer for The Daily Journal in Vineland, Courier-Post in Cherry Hill, and the Burlington County Times.
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This article originally appeared on Cherry Hill Courier-Post: Cannabis store distance to school a question for borough board Monday
