READY TO GROW
Trenton businessman seeks to open medical marijuana facility
TRENTON » A Trenton businessman who had his drug possession and distribution charges legally erased has formed a new company hoping to get licensed to sell legal pot.
Tracey Syphax has submitted an application with the New Jersey Department of Health seeking to obtain a highly coveted license to operate a medicinal marijuana dispensary here in the capital city.
“We are looking to have it in the City of Trenton to bring 100 jobs in the region,” Syphax said Friday in an interview. “We believe we put together an application that really puts us in a strong position to be granted a license.”
The owner of Phax Group Construction received a total pardon from former Republican Gov. Chris Christie last December, which expunged Syphax’s decades-old criminal convictions, which he said “paved the way” for him to pursue a medicinal marijuana license.
Syphax formed a new company, TrentonMetro, which has a team dedicated to creating jobs and opportunities in the capital city through the manufacturing of weed for medical purposes.
In July, Gov. Phil Murphy announced his administration wants to expand patient access to medicinal marijuana by granting licenses to six new applicants interested in operating a New Jersey pot business. Syphax, CEO of TrentonMetro, hopes his company will receive one of the two licenses that will be granted to applicants in Central Jersey.
“We don’t want to miss this opportunity,” he said. “The science is pretty much in on medical marijuana.”
If granted a license, TrentonMetro will “grow pure cannabis varietals and hybrids in state-of-theart facilities staffed by the world’s very best horticulturists,” according to the company’s marketing materials. “Our goal is to establish a safe, efficient, and world-class medical marijuana cultivation, processing and dispensing facility for the sale of high quality, low-cost and medically-effective cannabis products in the City of Trenton.”
Trenton Mayor Reed Gusciora has been a major cheerleader in promoting the city as an ideal location for marijuana cultivation. Syphax has talked with the mayor about his TrentonMetro ambitions, he said, adding City Council is expected to introduce an ordinance next week that calls for Enterprise Avenue to be designated as a cannabis area.
TrentonMetro proposes a 50,000-squarefoot cultivation facility and 7,000-square-foot retail facility that would employ approximately 105 full-time workers who earn between $30,000 to $100,000 per year with benefits.
The facility would not only benefit cancer patients and veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder, “We could spur economic growth in the capital city,” Syphax said, adding his company would also provide employees with “entrepreneurial training” so they could learn how to create “successful businesses.”
The state required interested applicants to attend a mandatory pre-application conference Aug. 9 in Trenton’s War Memorial building, which Syphax attended and was dismayed, he said, by what he saw.
“We had 1,000 people from all over the country in the War Memorial but only 5 percent African-Americans in the audience. People just didn’t know there was a meeting there. Trenton needs to become an informed community.”
Inspired by what he saw, Syphax coined a slogan for TrentonMetro: “As Trenton grows, the community knows.”
“In order to grow our community,” Syphax said, “we have to know what is going on in our community.”