It has been five years since Massachusetts legalized the sale of recreational marijuana, but the equity goals built into the 2016 ballot approved by voters still have not been fully realized. Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission chair Steve Hoffman and Shaleen Title, a former commissioner who co-authored the Massachusetts ballot question on legalization and who now serves as CEO of the Parabola Center, joined Jim Braude on Greater Boston to discuss.
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A program was set up to help Black and Latino entrepreneurs gain access to financing, but the Boston Globe found that just 8% of companies that that opened marijuana facilities are owned by people who participated in that program.
“We’ve made a lot of progress... but we’re nowhere near where we need to be” Hoffman said on the equity goals.
Title says that there are some simple, concrete solutions to address the inequity, like host community agreements and a fund for social equity financed by a new cannabis tax.
“The cannabis committee and legislature really need to decide, are they going to implement those fixes, or are they going to continue with inaction,” she said. “Which, in that case, they’re really proactively deciding that this multi-billion dollar industry is going to be for wealthy white men and big tobacco.”
WATCH: Can the Mass. cannabis industry fulfill its equity promise?
