An Iqaluit cannabis store is facing opposition from city staff over its proposed move to a new location before its current lease expires.
Kevin Ikeno, who co-owns Higher Experience with his former wife Frances Ikeno, asked the city to rezone a property at 609 Mattaaq Cres. to allow a cannabis shop to operate there.
It’s approximately a 30-metre move from the store’s current location at 70 Fred Coman St., according to a report on the agenda for Tuesday evening’s planning and development committee meeting.
“The proposed site is within the same building as residential units and close to a daycare and school,” the planning report says.
It’s not an “appropriate distance” from schools and what the report called other sensitive areas.
The proposed location would be 134 metres away from a playground, 133 metres from Nakasuk School, and 15 metres from Pairivik Daycare.
The new site is “literally across the street” from the store’s current location, said Frances Ikeno in an interview Tuesday.
She said the company faced the same questions from council before opening at its current location — too close to a school, too close to a playground — that it faces now.
Council approved the rezoning then and it should do so now for the new spot, she said.
For the time being, she said, the company is taking things “step by step” and will decide how to proceed after council makes its decision.
Higher Experience’s lease on its current site is set to expire in August.
The Ikenos have had more than a three-year history of legal fights with their landlord, Northview Residential REIT.
They took Northview to court in 2024, alleging they had a verbal agreement with the property company’s regional manager to extend the lease. Northview argued that the deal was invalid, but a judge sided with the cannabis company and ordered the lease to be extended until August 2026.
