Nuns fail to block new Atlantic City pot dispensary just feet from convent

Catholic nuns in Atlantic City, NJ, have lost out on their bid to block a cannabis dispensary just 150 feet from their convent, as local officials seek to make the area the pot capital of the East Coast.

The Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, which acts as the city’s planning agency within the tourism district, recently approved two planned dispensaries, including the one by the convent, a business that would take the place of a former dry cleaner.

Members of the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal Convent on Mississippi Avenue in the gambling mecca had argued that they host classes — including some for teenagers — and sobriety meetings at their location and therefore should not have a dispensary so close.

They added to the CRDA that they were concerned about crime escalating in the area as a result of a new dispensary, too.

“I’m actually Dutch, so I grew up in a country where marijuana was legalized, and I’ve seen a lot of things over the years,” Sister Joseph Van Munster said at a November hearing, according to a transcript obtained by the Press of Atlantic City.

She said there were already problems in the neighborhood with illicit drug and alcohol use and argued that a new dispensary could be harmful for those dealing with substance abuse issues and working toward recovery.

But the CRDA approved the application for the proposed new dispensary near the convent. New Jersey law does not prohibit cannabis dispensaries from opening near such sites as it does with schools.

Neither the convent nor CRDA responded to Post requests for comment Monday.

The approval of the pot dispensary near the convent was the second time the board has OK’d such a business in Atlantic City despite concerns from church officials, according to the Press.

Over the summer, members of the Chelsea Baptist Church spoke out against a planned cannabis business about a block away — but that, too, wound up being approved by the board.

“They don’t want them anywhere near the casinos, but they don’t care where else they go,” Pastor Tom Weer told the Press in September.

He claimed the board simply told church members to install video cameras or hire a tow truck company to keep unwanted vehicles off their lot when they expressed concerns about people smoking weed near their place of worship or committing crimes.

“It seemed to me at the meeting they were all gung ho,” Weer said of board supporters of the move. “As far as we know, if it’s there, we just have to put up with it.”

The CRDA rarely disapproves applications for new cannabis businesses in Atlantic City, which has already approved applications for indoor weed farms, a woman-owned dispensary inside a former church and Amsterdam-style cannabis lounges.

Mayor Marty Small Sr.’s administration sees these new businesses as a powerful economic engine, potentially bringing in new jobs and new investment into the city.

“My focus is to make Atlantic City great, to make Atlantic City the East Coast hub for cannabis,” Kashawn “Kash” McKinley, the city’s cannabis czar, told Delaware Online.

Per capita, the cannabis businesses that had already received approval as of April would make Atlantic City the densest cannabis city in the state, according to the outlet.