You Can Now Have Cannabis Delivered to Your Burlington Home
Burlington's Select Board didn't move to block cannabis home delivery after a new MA law made it the default — even in towns without dispensaries.
A new Massachusetts law is changing how residents across the state can access cannabis — including in towns like Burlington that have long prohibited dispensaries within their borders.
H.5350, An Act Modernizing the Commonwealth's Cannabis Laws, signed by Governor Healey in April, allows marijuana deliveries to any municipality in the state unless a city or town specifically opts out. For Burlington, which has prohibited cannabis dispensaries since recreational marijuana was legalized by the state in 2016, the new law created a question the Select Board hadn't faced before.
Burlington's prohibition on recreational dispensaries was reinforced when voters rejected a referendum at the April 2025 election that would have lifted the ban. But when Town Administrator John Danizio brought the delivery question to the Select Board Monday night, the board opted to take no action — meaning home delivery from licensed dispensaries in other towns is now allowed by default in Burlington.
The board's reasoning was practical. Board member Sarah Cawley was the first to push back on the idea of petitioning the state for a waiver. "I just see no issue," she said. "We got a lot of people reaching out saying they did not want a dispensary in Burlington — increased traffic, distasteful, quality of life, property values. Having it delivered from a different town does not seem like a big deal to me."
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Licensed dispensaries handle delivery through their own staff, Cawley said, not third-party apps like DoorDash, and state regulations require the product be delivered to a person, not just dropped at the door.
That was enough for board member Nick Priest, who compared the process to an online purchase delivered to a private residence rather than anything resembling a retail cannabis presence in town.
Member Joe Morandi summed it up in even fewer words: "I could care less one way or the other. I don't smoke. I could care less whether you get it delivered, don't deliver it, smoke it, grow it, throw it in a pipe. Do whatever you want with it."
Board member Mike Espejo saw it differently, though he didn't push hard for a vote. "I have no issue with cannabis sales or a dispensary in the town," he said. "I don't even see any need to do this. However, the town told us they do not want cannabis sales in our town." He said he would support a an opt-out waiver, but the motion never came.
"I would argue that this is not a sale in the town," Priest said. "This might actually be an overstep of governance — saying you can't have something bought and delivered to your home because we say so."
Delivery was a recurring talking point on both sides of last year's recreational cannabis referendum debate: proponents argued that since residents could already order cannabis delivered from dispensaries in neighboring towns, Burlington was missing out on tax revenue without any real public safety benefit. Opponents made the mirror argument — that delivery already existed, so there was no need to invite a dispensary into town at all. In their way, both sides were right. And today, nothing has changed.
Danizio had presented the board with a path to maintain the prohibition: petitioning the Cannabis Control Commission for a two-year waiver. But without a motion from the board, that process won't move forward, and while the town's recreational dispensary ban remains in effect, cannabis delivery to Burlington residents is now permitted under state law.
