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Wait not over for Bonnyville pot shops

Although the moratorium on retail cannabis licenses has been lifted, it could still be quite some time before a store opens their doors in Bonnyville.
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Construction is moving forward on Canna Canaba’s Bonnyville location, and they hope to get the location approved by the AGLC in the future.

Although the moratorium on retail cannabis licenses has been lifted, it could still be quite some time before a store opens their doors in Bonnyville.

Prior to the province putting applications on hold, two businesses were looking to set up shop in town: Canna Cabana and The Hive.

Canna Cabana is currently in the process of completing their build at their 5506 50 Ave. location. The Hive, however, won’t be moving ahead with construction at their 5504 50 Ave. spot until more is known regarding the situation.

The freeze was put into place back in November due to a shortage of recreational marijuana.

As a result of the increase in the cannabis supply, the Alberta Gaming, Liquor, and Cannabis Commission (AGLC) announced on May 30 they’re now accepting new retail license applications and will be issuing five more each week.

Jason Kostiw, government and public relations specialist with Canna Cabana, noted their Bonnyville location is a couple of weeks away from having construction complete. The building will need to be inspected by the AGLC before being put into a queue of stores waiting to receive their license.

According to Kostiw, there’s roughly 110 stores waiting to get the go-ahead from AGLC, and licenses are being issued on a first come first serve basis.

”Currently, Canna Cabana has nine stores in the queue that are ready, and they’re open right now as cannabis accessory stores. Unfortunately, Bonnyville isn’t one of those stores because the build hasn’t finished yet.”

As a result of the uncertainty surrounding the local location, Kostiw said there’s no concrete open date at this time.

”Depending on the timeline, we might look at opening Bonnyville as an accessory-only store while we wait on AGLC license so we can get people into the store and introduce them to the concept, who we are, and what we’re all about,” he detailed.

For Kyle Sargent, owner of The Hive, hearing about the license freeze put all of his plans at a standstill.

”We were just getting the renovations begun, and we just completely stopped, because there was just no point in going ahead if we couldn’t get our license,” he noted, adding they were roughly 40 days away from completion.

Before moving forward, Sargent wants to wait and see how the AGLC is going to handle the situation.

”I know the other franchises have other pools to source their income from, whereas, I would just be a ma and pop shop. So I’m going to have to wait until it’s a for sure thing until I go and spend a bunch of money on something that’s going to get my legs kicked out from under me like in November.”

With the latest announcement, Sargent is hopeful that the “pipeline for cannabis is starting to fill up” and it’s promising for businesses looking to open up their doors.

Town of Bonnyville council approved the development permits for both the Hive and Canna Cabana during an Oct. 23, 2018 meeting, after both businesses met the requirements set by the municipality for cannabis retailers. Clarity Cannabis also showed interest in opening up shop in Bonnyville with their own permits being approved in December.

The Nouvelle reached out to Clarity Cannabis for an update, but didn’t receive a reply prior to press time.

The AGLC has said if the stability in inventory takes a drastic downturn, they will consider reinstating the moratorium.

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