CHEROKEE, N.C. — The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians owns a marijuana store in western North Carolina. On Thursday, the store stated that it will start selling cannabis products to people aged 21 and up next month.
This is when Great Smoky Cannabis Co. said it would start: September 7 at 10 a.m. The store opened on July 4 and has been selling the items for recreational use in-store and at the drive-thru to adults in the tribe or any other nationally recognized tribe. And it had only opened in April, letting people buy medical marijuana at first.
But plans were already being made to sell products to a wider audience after tribal members voted in September in favor of adult recreational use on their land and told the tribal council to create laws to govern such a market. The council worked out the specifics and, in June, approved text that made cannabis legal on Eastern Band land called the Qualla Boundary.
North Carolina law says that you can’t have or use marijuana, but as a sovereign country, the tribe can make its own rules about cannabis. Out of the states that circle North Carolina, only Virginia lets people use marijuana legally for fun across the whole state.
Thursday’s social media posts didn’t say anything else about the increased sales.
The tribe’s weed company, Qualla Enterprises, had previously hinted at a two-step plan to allow sales to adults, starting with sales to tribal members.
