City Councilman Marqueece Harris-Dawson is proposing that Los Angeles do its part by instituting affirmative action for those hoping to get a foot in the door of the local cannabis business scene. "I want a very aggressive licensing system going forward," he says.
"We are taking actions that we believe are affirmative," Harris-Dawson says. "They affirm our belief in social equity and the great injustice and travesty that was the war on drugs."
STATE BY STATE: California Cannabis News
In an impassioned letter addressed this month to his City Council colleagues, the representative of much of South L.A. proposed a pilot program that would recruit minorities as licensed cannabis entrepreneurs, establish tech-style marijuana business incubators for people of color, create a "worker retention program" and lobby the state for further decriminalization, including support for ending "the loophole that punishes 18- to 20-year-olds for simple possession."
