Garden State Botanicals, a new corporation formed by pharmaceutical veteran Pat Nasshorn of Margate, will make a presentation to the governing body at a special 6:30 p.m. meeting Monday — being held in advance of a Thursday deadline to apply to the New Jersey Department of Public Health.
Nasshorn told the Press she spent 40 years in the drug industry as a marketer and strategic planner for Johnson & Johnson, Merck and Bristol-Myers Squibb, and wanted to open the dispensary to help those in need of medical marijuana.
She said she has been an advocate since her husband died five years ago of brain cancer at 61 and had little access to the drug.
“I was researching then and I was seeing a lot of interesting studies of cannabis for the symptoms and the anxiety aspect but I was not able to get it for him,” Nasshorn said. “This opportunity presented itself.”
Freehold Borough Business Administrator Joe Bellina said Garden State Botanicals wants to open the dispensary in a building at 195 Throckmorton St., which is a small warehouse less than a mile from downtown Freehold. Nasshorn said she would lease with an option to buy.