My name is Marcus Johnson-Smith. I'm the co-owner of KG Collective, a permitted cannabis retail business at 701 Mt. Auburn St. in Cambridge, MA. We are also pre-certified with the state of MA for cannabis home delivery. We are a majority minority, and women owned business, all from the neighborhood.

Our business is several weeks away from commencing business, after over 3 years of city permitting, delays, covid-19, construction and other circumstances outside of our control. Nonetheless, we are excited to finally open in the community my founders and I grew up in, and the neighborhood I currently call home. 

It has come to our attention that there is another dispensary group (NOT from this neighborhood) proposing to open a cannabis business 1000 ft. away from our business (5 retail business doors down) and less than 1000 ft. away from a school facility on Belmont St.

Strawberry Hill is a very small community. It's a community I grew up in going to Haggerty School in my youth. It's a community my partners and I were raised in for 18 years before we all went to Northeastern University. It's a community I coached youth baseball in while I was in college. It's a community I call home today, in my adult years.

The neighborhood DOES NOT need 2 cannabis businesses and we need your support to let our representatives know that we OPPOSE having an additional cannabis establishment 1000 ft away from a cannabis business already permitted and preparing to commence operations within weeks.

If you are in opposition to another cannabis establishment opening in the Strawberry Hill neighborhood of West Cambridge, please sign our petition.

Thank you.