SAUGUS — Town Manager Scott Crabtree’s office finalized a request for information (RFI) for cannabis dispensaries seeking to open in town and will issue it next week.
Once the RFI is posted, dispensaries will have 30 days to respond, Crabtree told the Board of Selectmen at their meeting Tuesday night. The RFI, Crabtree said, would ask interested parties to supply the town with a location, specifications for the property, an operations plan, as well as what agreement they propose to reach with Saugus, and proving they adhered to all state regulations.
Responses will then be reviewed by a committee comprised of Police Chief Michael Ricciardelli, Fire Chief Michael Newbury, Crabtree, the town’s purchasing agent, a member of the Planning Board, Director of Public Health John Fralick, and the building commissioner.
The committee will review responses for 30 to 60 days, Crabtree said. The timeline put forward by Crabtree indicates that the Board of Selectmen will not have any proposals before them until at least March, if not later, a delay from the late February schedule he had initially told the board to anticipate.
The issuing of the RFI represents a key first step in the process of Saugus welcoming recreational marijuana, after Board of Selectmen Chair Anthony Cogliano led the charge for Town Meeting to amend the town’s zoning bylaws to allow for dispensaries last May. The amended zoning bylaws were approved by former Attorney General Maura Healey’s office in November.
The zoning bylaws allow for three dispensaries to open their doors on Route 1, so long as they are more than 1,000 feet away from the nearest school, park, or playground.
Dispensaries are also required to host community outreach meetings in Saugus before they can submit applications to the Cannabis Control Commission. At least four companies have already done so, and two more community outreach meetings are slated to take place.
Community outreach meetings have been held for potential dispensaries at 24 Broadway, 1393 Broadway, 1268 Broadway, and 44 Broadway, and the properties slated for discussion next week are 1529 Broadway and 181 Broadway. The property at 1260 Broadway is also under agreement, Cogliano said.
Cogliano told The Item in December that as many as 20 applicants could come before the Board of Selectmen seeking S-2 licenses to open in Saugus. Thus far, he has served as moderator for each of the community outreach meetings held in town, and he said he will continue to do so, so long as the companies ask him to.
With so many applications to work through, Cogliano said the board was going to take direction from the Police Department, and would heavily scrutinize security plans.
The board would like to see “prior experience in the business” and for the location to be a “good fit for the neighborhood,” he said.
