Lawmakers in Washington are considering legislation that would create additional cannabis licenses for social equity applicants after regulators implemented changes last year aimed at getting more minority-owned businesses into the industry.
Senate Bill 5080, sponsored by Sen. Rebecca Saldaña, would create 100 licenses to grow and sell cannabis.
“[The Washington cannabis program] really set it up so that the people that can participate were people that had deep pockets or access to a lot of money,” Saldaña said, according to a KING 5 report. “And so, what we said is we weren't going to do any more new licenses until we looked at social equity.”
Roughly 92% of Washington’s cannabis licensees are white, the news outlet reported, with only 4% of the state’s cannabis dispensary licenses awarded to Black business owners.
Last year, the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board (LCB) tweaked the state’s social equity program to allow applicants with prior drug-related arrests or those who reside in areas with historically higher drug conviction rates to receiving licensing priority, KING 5 reported.
RELATED: Washington Establishes Social Equity Support Programs
Regulators also voted to allow roughly 40 unused or revoked cannabis licenses to be awarded to social equity applicants, according to the news outlet, although many of those licenses are located in areas that prohibit cannabis sales.
If passed, S.B. 5080 would allow those licenses to be used in other locations, KING 5 reported.
While the bill makes its way through the Legislature, the application process opened March 1 for Washington’s social equity program, according to KING 5, and the deadline to apply is March 30.
