Among the most important races in North Carolina is the contest to see who will become the state’s next attorney general, the office that represents the state in legal proceedings while also offering legal advice to prosecutors and law enforcement across the state. 

Beginning this Saturday, Sept. 7, anyone over the age of 21 will be able to purchase and use marijuana on the Qualla Boundary.  

Beginning, Sept. 7, anyone over the age of 21 will be able to purcha se and use marijuana on the Qualla Boundary.  

While the official announcement was made at 10:22 a.m. in the form of a post on the Great Smoky Cannabis Company’s X page, the news actually broke about an hour earlier during an Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians Tribal Council meeting. At the end of that meeting, Council Rep. Richard French, of the Big Cove community made it official. 

EBCI Tribal Council has reversed its decision to ban “hemp shops” not “wholly owned by the tribe … or one of its wholly owned subsidiaries.”

Adults may soon be able to purchase marijuana for recreational use from Cherokee’s new dispensary. 

At a work session last week, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indian’s Tribal Council discussed several questions they had regarding a potential ordinance that would legalize sales of cannabis to any adult with a valid ID.

In recent years, more and more states have made the decision to legalize, regulate and tax recreational cannabis products — despite federal prohibition — but North Carolina isn’t one of them, and the General Assembly doesn’t appear to be favorably inclined to support such measures despite the filing of a House effort last year. 

North Carolina can support as many as nine Las Vegas-style casinos with gambling throughout the state, including one in the Asheville area, according to a report commissioned by the General Assembly. 

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians will establish a medical marijuana program on tribal lands even as the drug remains illegal in the state of North Carolina, following a divided vote on Thursday, Aug. 5. 

In a pair of actions taken during Tribal Council on Thursday, May 6, Tribal Council voted to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana and to stop testing Housing Improvement Program residents and applicants for the drug. 

Tribal Council voted unanimously April 1 to table an ordinance aiming to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana. However, discussion preceding the vote indicates that some version of that ordinance will likely pass in the future.