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THREAD: Yesterday I spoke to Cat Packer, head of the LA Dept of Cannabis Regulation, about the status of LA’s social equity program, which aims to help people from communities targeted by the war on drugs get a leg up in the legal biz. #socialequity #cannabis
There was talk last week about whether LA’s social equity program had been de-funded, or if funds allocated for social equity had gone instead to pay LAPD overtime. Here’s what’s happening as Cat Packer explained it cc @msamandalewis
Packer said that in Nov, DCR requested $2 million for fee deferrals for social equity applicants from an unappropriated balance fund from expected cannabis tax revenue. The @MayorOfLA approved $250K for that, but Packer says it hasn’t hit their account to her knowledge.
On March 4, the Budget & Finance Committee recommended that the LAPD get $5 million from that same fund for overtime—the same pot of money that social equity should be paid out from. They expect that fund to add up to about $10m.
Additionally, Packer said the Budget & Finance Committee recommended the social equity program get another $1.5m from the unappropriated balance, and council should vote on that tomorrow, April 10.
So the LA social equity program *should* have $1.75m in funding “eventually,” says Packer, for fee deferrals and programming for 200 social equity retail businesses. (For comparison, a single weed startup raised $58m in a series A round last week.) qz.com/1585095/cannab…
There’s an additional $10m from the state to be split between ALL of California’s social equity programs, but they just cancelled the grant application process with no timeline. mjbizdaily.com/with-no-explan…
“The scale is real but the funding is lacking,” Packer said of LA’s #cannabis #socialequity program. “I would say that the programming itself hasn’t begun.” Here’s a bit more about the injustice these programs aid to address. qz.com/1482349/
Will be interesting to see how New York and New Jersey lawmakers try to do better.
