A plan to move a medical marijuana dispensary from Little Rock to Jacksonville has fired up elected officials in north Pulaski and Lonoke counties. There are supporters, including the mayor of Jacksonville, who helped pick out the dispensary’s new location and has promoted the store’s potential benefits. There are the opponents skeptical of the cannabis industry, including a pair of state legislators who cited community pushback in their neighboring town of Cabot.
Then there’s Sherwood Mayor Mary Jo Heye-Townsell.
The Sherwood mayor opposes the dispensary relocation — not because she opposes medical marijuana, but because she wants to protect a local business and the tax revenue it generates for her city. Natural Relief Dispensary, located at 3107 E. Kiehl Ave. in Sherwood, has long been one of the top-selling dispensaries in the state, but a new competitor 13 miles north in Jacksonville could threaten its sales.
Heye-Townsell said it’s her responsibility to protect Sherwood businesses, and that includes the dispensary.
“We’re quite proud of our dispensary,” Heye-Townsell said, citing the store’s local ownership and community partnerships.
On Aug. 20, the state Medical Marijuana Commission will consider Greenlight Little Rock’s request to move from 7303 Kanis Road in the capital city to 7418 T.P. White Drive between Jacksonville and Cabot in north Pulaski County. The location carries a Cabot address for post office purposes but is a part of Jacksonville thanks to a 2011 annexation. The dispute over the proposed move has been on the marijuana commission’s plate since early this year, but it has repeatedly delayed making a decision.
Natural Relief Dispensary in Sherwood has benefited from its location near U.S. Highway 167. It’s the only dispensary on the route between Little Rock and Jonesboro. The store is consistently among the top two selling dispensaries in the state and sold 5,647 pounds of products last year. The city of Sherwood collects plenty of sales tax revenue from those marijuana sales (although state law prevents cities from knowing exactly how much they collect from any single business).
The mayor credits the dispensary, which opened in March 2020, with helping the city’s finances during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we did quite well once the dispensary went in when the economy took a dip,” she said.
Sherwood’s budget is largely reliant on city and state sales tax collections, Heye-Townsell said. By the mayor’s estimation, sales taxes account for 65% of the city’s revenue.
U.S. Census data shows Sherwood’s median income is significantly higher (and its poverty rate lower) than neighboring Jacksonville and North Little Rock. But, Heye-Townsell said, the city doesn’t have an air force base or an industrial park like Jacksonville to boost the city budget. Sherwood’s population of about 33,000 puts it below the threshold to receive certain federal funding as well, she said.
“We’re more of a middle class community,” she said. “We’re in a situation where we’re not a rich community but we’re not a poor community, so we end up missing out on things other communities can take advantage of.”
To protect Natural Relief Dispensary’s future, Heye-Townsell sent a letter to the Medical Marijuana Commission arguing against Greenlight’s relocation to Jacksonville. She said the change would place two dispensaries in neighboring cities with small populations and leave Little Rock, the state’s largest city, with just two stores. Heye-Townsell also said Natural Relief Dispensary has local management, which she contrasted with Greenlight Little Rock’s out-of-state management company.
Natural Relief is owned by four Arkansans, two people from Florida and one person from North Carolina. Brian Faught of Cabot is the majority owner, with a 50% stake in the store. The dispensary does not use an outside management company, according to commission spokesman Scott Hardin.
Greenlight Little Rock is owned by Matthew Summit and James Barnes, both of Little Rock. The store is managed by the company Greenlight, which has operations in six states.
Those arguments aside, it was clear the mayor’s goal was to protect Sherwood’s economy. “The success of our dispensary is a vital revenue stream we use to provide city services,” she wrote in her letter to the commission.
Is that a compelling argument to deny the dispensary’s relocation? Not in the eyes of Jacksonville Mayor Jeff Elmore, although he said he understands Heye-Townsell’s position.
“She’s trying to keep those tax dollars that are there but, at the same time, this is actually a private business that is seeking to move from one location to another,” he said.
Elmore questioned where cities should draw the line on competing for private businesses. “We’re not taking your customers just because you have a McDonald’s and we put in a McDonald’s,” Elmore said.
Elmore said in a letter to the commission that he helped Greenlight’s management find a suitable location and noted that the spot meets state and city requirements. Elmore said the location is part of the appeal for Jacksonville residents, since the dispensary would be on the edge of town and not in the heart of downtown.
Two Republican legislators from Cabot, state Sen. Brian Evans and state Rep. Ricky Hill, spoke out against a potential dispensary in the area in November, citing community pushback and unnamed negative impacts. But folks in Jacksonville have been positive about the idea, Elmore said.
“Everybody that I have talked to, from business leaders to pastors in town at various churches, nobody is opposed to it,” he said.
Elmore sees dollar signs in the dispensary too. He estimated a Jacksonville dispensary would bring in $150,000 to $250,000 a year in tax revenue. The money would help the city fund capital projects, like a new fire station and a replacement for a fire truck damaged due to flooding.
The additional revenue would be “a huge shot in the arm for us,” he said.
As the home of the Little Rock Air Force Base, Jacksonville is home to a large population of military retirees whose service may have left them with qualifying conditions for the state medical marijuana program. Having a dispensary in Jacksonville would be convenient for them, he said.
Regardless of the arguments for or against the dispensary, Elmore said the people of Jacksonville, not opponents in other cities, should be the ones who have a say in what happens in Jacksonville.
“It’s sad for our city to be in the middle of that where you have multiple others who don’t want it to happen for those reasons,” he said. “But then it’s punishing the people of our city and limiting economic development here in Jacksonville.”
Heye-Townsell said she has a good working relationship with other mayors, including Elmore, but said she’ll be at the Medical Marijuana Commission next month to oppose the dispensary relocation if she needs to.
“If I need to go to protect a Sherwood business, I will go to protect a Sherwood business,” she said.