Inside What Could Be The First Retail Marijuana Shop On The East Coast
The interior of New England Treatment Access, looking toward the new retail sales stations. Photo by Peter Brown for NETA
The first retail marijuana store east of the Mississippi could open soon in Northampton, Massachusetts.
It’s received final approval from the state’s Cannabis Control Commission, but still has to satisfy a few requirements.
New England Treatment Access has operated a medical marijuana facility in Northampton for three years and will soon start selling pot to adults out of the same location. It’s a one-story brick building near the highway.
Norton Arbelaez, the company’s director of government affairs, said that to buy pot, the first stop will be a security camera right next to the main entrance.
“So you would have to show your identification to the camera,” Arbelaez said.
And it doesn’t have to be a Massachusetts ID showing a person is over 21. It could be from New York or Connecticut.
It could also be “a passport from the EU or form from Argentina,” Arbelaez said. “I mean, if you’re an adult with a verified identification, you can come in and purchase.”