By Katherine Burgos, Ryan Conway, Tasnim Oyshi & Zo Terrana
Staff Writers & Correspondents
Dispensaries have an established presence in the Ewing Township community. When cannabis first became legal in New Jersey, the town was granted five licenses. In the last four years, Ewing has been home to three legal dispensaries with licensing from the New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission. An established moratorium was recently extended until the end of 2026 for new cannabis businesses.
Ewing’s Township Council initially passed the moratorium on Sept. 3, 2021. This established a one-year period in which no further applicants would be considered to receive a license. The goal was to allow the currently licensed dispensaries to make profit before they gained new competition from the remaining two licenses Ewing was granted.
“We have a bookend each time that we’ve done the moratorium,” said Councilwoman Jennifer Keyes-Maloney. “We have a group, Cannabis [Advisory] Committee, locally that kind of reviews it and then makes a recommendation to us.”
Last year, Simply Pure, Bloc and Canna Remedies were all legally operating in short distance, with the first two being located on Olden Avenue. Currently, two of them remain. Canna Remedies closed its doors on Dec. 12, 2025.
“Even though we have some distance requirements, they are within close proximity,” said Charles Latini Jr., NJ Cannabis Advisor and member of the CAC. “So given the volatility of this market and the push to go rec[reational] and the extreme costs of the bureaucracy, we wanted to give those three operators a chance to heal from those extreme expenses, and get to a point where they were actually starting to see money going the other way.”
Mayor Bert Steinmann has lauded the moratorium’s success for the township, as it has been very beneficial for both the businesses and the community, while also saying there hasn’t been any complaints from residents.
“It’s very positive for the businesses and Ewing Township,” Steinmann said. “Ewing Township does get additional revenue from the vendor. We get 2% on every sale that they do, and that’s besides the percent from sales tax. That’s the burden they have to share with us, and they have to be involved in community relations programs.”
The expenses the current dispensaries faced include initial construction that followed zoning laws, high federal tax, licensing and application fee and the Social Equity Excise Fund, which makes dispensaries pay a $2.50 fee to the state per ounce of cannabis sold. In addition to this, the businesses were also competing with the several non-licensed dispensaries in the area, which tend to sell for lower prices.
“To be honest, at first, it sounded kind of scary, but less competition is always better,” said Dailan Peck, a manager at Ewing’s Bloc Dispensary. Peck explained that while Bloc does face competition from other dispensaries inside and outside of Ewing, business has still been productive despite the uproar in price matches from other businesses.
According to an email by Latini Jr. the industry has generated over $600,000 in local tax revenue based on 2% of gross sales, which does not count property tax. “Broken down, the dispensaries are grossing $3-5 million annually,” he said.
According to Keyes-Maloney, another benefit of the moratorium is that it gives the council the opportunity to ensure local issues between the dispensaries and other businesses are resolved. In the past, there have been complaints from neighboring businesses.
“We have had some instances with businesses where we had reports of some odor,” said Keyes-Maloney. “We bring code enforcement in. They address if there’s an issue…The businesses have an obligation to clean their scrubbers out at certain intervals. As long as they’re doing that and they're maintaining their facility, it’s generally okay.”
Businesses are not the only ones with something to say as residents have expressed public safety concerns. Specifically, how that can affect public schools in the area, and if legalization was the right move. “One day I do believe we’ll come to realize that legalization was a bad idea,” said Michael Coryell, a local resident, via Facebook.
Officer Albert Rhodes, the Ewing Police Chief, explains how increase in cannabis usage creates an obstacle for law enforcement when it comes to the identification and prevention of impaired driving.
“Cannabis can remain in your system much longer than alcohol and can still be present in your system long after impairment,” he said. “The current standard is to use officers trained as drug recognition experts that run a driver through a series of observational tests relating to blood pressure, heart rate, pupil size.”
The Ewing Police Department currently has two drug recognition experts on staff due to how extensive the training is. Officer Rhodes urges people to treat cannabis similarly to alcohol when it comes to driving, and therefore, to never operate a vehicle under the influence.
“Other than that, if you are going to partake in cannabis use, make sure you are obtaining it from a legally licensed dispensary so that you know it is not laced or contaminated with unknown products,” he said.
At the Ewing Cannabis Advisory meeting on April 13, Steinmann discussed the growing impact of cannabis in the community. While calling himself a novice on the matter, the mayor expressed a desire for businesses in the area to collaborate and work together.
Simply Pure Trenton Founder and CEO Tahir Johnson attended the April 13 meeting, and preached community education as dispensaries continue to pop-up in the area. In particular, he said it was very important for people to know their legal rights.
“We can work together, not just to educate people on what cannabis is, but to also educate them on the business opportunities as cannabis now is a legal business,” Johnson said. “It’s something that people were arrested for, but now is something that’s legal. You want to educate people on their legal rights, and that this is something legal that they shouldn’t be scared of anymore.”
Keyes-Maloney highlights the importance of regulating cannabis businesses in the area. “You want to be able to control where it’s happening in your community and the reality is if you don’t, folks are going to go to different communities,” she said. “That means you lose the revenue but more importantly, if you’re controlling where things are in your town and it’s convenient, then they’re going to go to places that are appropriate and act appropriately.”
When it comes to the future of the moratorium, Latini Jr. explains that it depends on how well business is for the current operators in town. Before that happens, however, he thinks there may be a change in the ordinance and five may not end up being the ultimate number of legal cannabis dispensaries around.
“You know, in all likelihood, if it does stay to five, it stays to five but it won't be on this side of town,” Latini Jr. said. “There’ll be a geographic marker so we'll change the zoning to push it to maybe something around the airport or, you know, around the town center but definitely not on Olden for sure.”
