MORGANTOWN — Plans are underway to build a medical cannabis dispensary at the intersection of Hartman Run and Earl Core roads, in Sabraton.
The Morgantown Planning Commission signed off on a minor subdivision request this week splitting the large corner parcel that includes Ellie’s Cafe & Hot Spot into two parcels.
The vote went 6-1 with Commissioner Katie See voting in the minority. See explained her vote was not about cannabis, but the peculiar zoning situation.
The parcel is split-zoned, with the flat portions fronting Earl Core and Hartman Run roads zoned B-2 (service business) and the wooded hillside stretching up to Mineral Avenue zoned R-1A (single family residential).
See said she would have preferred the commission clean up the zoning before creating new parcels.
Either way, a representative of the project said the small building currently on the newly created parcel will be torn down to make room for the dispensary, which will sit about 600 feet as the crow flies from an existing dispensary, at 1397 Earl Core Road.
There’s another dispensary about 2 miles away, at 3227 Earl Core Road.
Of the 100 dispensary permits distributed statewide, 14 are in Monongalia County.
There are currently six dispensaries operating in Monongalia County — up one from this time last year — with two more in the works.
This doesn’t include an untold number of businesses selling less-regulated Delta-8 products.
According to the West Virginia Office of Medical Cannabis, the number of dispensaries in West Virginia rose from 37 to 56 since February 2023.
Of that number, over half are in five counties: Cabell (8), Kanawha (8), Monongalia (6), Harrison (5) and Raleigh (4).
There are no dispensaries in 36 of the state’s 55 counties, according to the WVOMC.
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