In a coup for Orange County, a repurposed prison will soon become a hub for medical/recreational cannabis cultivation and production.
Mid-Hudson Correctional Facility, along with several other prisons, was shuttered in July 2011 by then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Fat the time, former Warwick Town Attorney John Hicks called Town Supervisor Michael Sweeton, urging him to buy the prison’s 150 acres scheduled to be added to the state’s surplus property list. “Don’t let this opportunity slip by,” Hicks advised Sweeton. “The property is too important to let sit and rot.”
Sweeton paid heed, gathering a cohort to form a local development corporation (LDC) and borrowing $10 million to buy the property. It was a move that has proved to be a fortuitous one.
Fast forward 11 years to Sept. 9, 2021: Ben Kovler, the founder of Chicago-based Green Thumb Industries, was joined by Sweeton and other state and local dignitaries at the groundbreaking for GTI’s first cannabis growing facility in New York on the former prison grounds, which was renamed Wickham Woods.
GTI now joins Citiva, Urban Xtracts, Kaycha Labs and Phyto Pharma Labs, companies in various stages of development on that part of the prison property set aside for the Warwick Valley Office & Technology Corporate Park. There was $2 million spent to install water, sewer, electricity…
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In a coup for Orange County, a repurposed prison will soon become a hub for medical/recreational cannabis cultivation and production.
Mid-Hudson Correctional Facility, along with several other prisons, was shuttered in July 2011 by then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Fat the time, former Warwick Town Attorney John Hicks called Town Supervisor Michael Sweeton, urging him to buy the prison’s 150 acres scheduled to be added to the state’s surplus property list. “Don’t let this opportunity slip by,” Hicks advised Sweeton. “The property is too important to let sit and rot.”
Sweeton paid heed, gathering a cohort to form a local development corporation (LDC) and borrowing $10 million to buy the property. It was a move that has proved to be a fortuitous one.
Fast forward 11 years to Sept. 9, 2021: Ben Kovler, the founder of Chicago-based Green Thumb Industries, was joined by Sweeton and other state and local dignitaries at the groundbreaking for GTI’s first cannabis growing facility in New York on the former prison grounds, which was renamed Wickham Woods.
GTI now joins Citiva, Urban Xtracts, Kaycha Labs and Phyto Pharma Labs, companies in various stages of development on that part of the prison property set aside for the Warwick Valley Office & Technology Corporate Park. There was $2 million spent to install water, sewer, electricity…
