Anticipation high as California rolls out retail pot sales

LOS ANGELES – Californians may awake on New Year’s Day to a stronger-than-normal whiff of marijuana as America’s cannabis king lights up to celebrate the state’s first legal retail pot sales.

The historic day Monday comes more than two decades after California paved the way for legal weed by passing the first medical marijuana law in the U.S., though other states were quicker to allow recreational use of the drug.

But finding legal pot may be a challenge in the first days of recreational sales in California. Only about six dozen businesses received state licenses to open on New Year’s Day. Shops are expected to be open from the hamlet of Shasta Lake south of Oregon to San Diego.

Will Senn says anticipation is high, and he expects a crowd at his Urbn Leaf shop in San Diego.