Sacramento Discusses Rule Changes to Promote Minority Cannabis Businesses

[dropcap class=”kp-dropcap”]I[/dropcap]n an effort to promote diversity in the cannabis industry, Sacramento officials are considering raising the cap on the number of cannabis dispensaries in the city.

Sacramento enforced a strict 30-dispensary limit since 2014 and has refused to add any more—until now. When the state of California legalized recreational cannabis, most of the city’s 30 medical cannabis dispensaries began selling recreational cannabis as well. According to Malaki Amen, CEO of the California Urban Partnership, none of the 30 dispensary owners are black. “Not one of the current 30 are owned by an African American,” said Amen. “And so we would like to have, as part of the process going forward, looking at how we can achieve parity in the dispensary licenses that are issued.”

In August, the Sacramento City Council unanimously voted to approve the Cannabis Opportunity Reinvestment and Equity (CORE) program, which offers business coaching and a break from the permit fees associated with becoming a licensed cannabis business for those who have been arrested for a non-violent crime involving cannabis from 1980 to 2011.

However, the city still has a cap on the number of dispensaries that can be in operation, rendering the CORE program ineffective. Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg defended the CORE program despite the dispensary limit, saying that if one of the existing cannabis dispensaries is shut down, a CORE program member would receive preference to take over.

Regulations enacted in 2010 prohibit dispensaries from being located near schools, churches and tobacco shops. However, those restrictions have since been relaxed. The Sacramento City Council’s Law and Legislation Committee will begin to discuss plans to increase the number of dispensaries in the city, although an expansion isn’t expected until 2020 at the earliest.

“If they decide to lift the cap, there’s a lot of work to be done,” said Joe Devlin, the chief of cannabis policy in Sacramento.