Forest Park Review
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Forest Park will soon get its first cannabis dispensary.
Parkway Dispensary is likely to open next month.
Parkway Dispensary is a product of the 1937 Group, a vertically integrated company that grows cannabis and distributes it to more than 170 Illinois dispensaries.
The 1937 Group opened Parkway Dispensary in Tilton late last year to sell its own products. The Parkway in Forest Park will be the business’ second location, and the first and only dispensary on Madison Street following a village council vote to cap the number of dispensaries along the corridor.
The 1937 Group bought Doc Ryan’s in September, after a different dispensary was set to buy the building and pulled out of the deal in March 2023.
Earlier this year, construction started to turn Doc Ryan’s bar, which has been on Madison Street for about 70 years, into the Parkway Dispensary.
“It was important to retain as much of the character of the space as possible,” said Ambrose Jackson, chairman and CEO of the 1937 Group. Though, the building’s interior got a facelift.
The inside of the building is two floors, with the lower level housing Parkway Dispensary. Jackson said the second floor will host a separate business, although the 1937 Group hasn’t yet settled on one. The layout, he added, will be open, including a skylight leading up to the second floor.
“Natural light in a dispensary is something that is not common,” Jackson said. “When folks walk in, I think they’ll be wowed by what they find.”
‘A more inclusive cannabis environment’
The 1937 Group was created after Illinois’ 2020 Cannabis Social Equity Program, which provides finances to social equity applicants.
Based on Chicago’s South Side, the 1937 Group is minority- and veteran-owned. It’s named after the Marijuana Tax Act of the same year, when the federal government criminalized the drug that has disproportionately affected people of color.
Despite similar rates of cannabis usage, Black people are more than three times more likely to be arrested for marijuana than white people, according to a 2020 report by the American Civil Liberties Union.
“Looking at the history of legalization, we see that there has been a lack of diversity,” Jackson said. “We started the 1937 Group in order to fill that void and help to try and prompt a more inclusive cannabis environment.”
The 1937 Group will bring this vision to Forest Park, an area the company knows well, Jackson said. Its 52,000-square-foot manufacturing facility is in Proviso Township.
“We already have a presence in this area,” Jackson said, adding that they have a strong following throughout Illinois. “There’s a number of reasons why we’d want to come to Forest Park, but the first one being we want to make sure our customers can find us and access our products in a safe and convenient way.”
Jackson said Parkway Dispensary’s opening will likely take place in July, although it depends on factors like when the state can do inspections.
The dispensary has onboarded a general manager, who is starting the hiring process with the rest of the management team.
Sonia Antolec, the 1937 Group’s chief legal counsel, previously told the Review that Parkway Dispensary will employ about 25 employees, and wants to hire as many as they can from Forest Park.
“There is a real need in that area for a dispensary that’s locally owned and operated and represents the community,” Jackson said.
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