Sacramento is considering a program that would fast-track entry into the state’s budding cannabis industry to those disproportionate harmed by enforcement of cannabis laws – that is, people of color.
A vote on the CORE (Cannabis Opportunity Reinvestment and Equity) program is on Thursday’s Sacramento City Council meeting agenda.
Ensuring that large companies and investors well-positioned to cash in on legal cannabis don’t push out communities that experienced discrimination in the "war on drugs," is the main motive behind the CORE program, according to a City Council Report in support of the agenda item.
Those communities have been "negatively and disproportionately affected by enforcement of cannabis and other narcotic laws, and now face barriers to participation in an industry expected to be worth billions by 2020," city staff said in the document.
Resources provided by the program include business assistance, technical support, mentorship and fee waivers. City staff recommends these program measures be in place for two years, including a full waiver of fees for cannabis business permits for program participants.
To qualify, applicants would have to prove they are current or former Sacramento residents from low-income households who were arrested or convicted of cannabis-related crimes between 1980 and 2011, or were an immediate family member of the same; or that they are current or former low-income Sacramento residents who lived in certain zip codes between 1980 and 2011.
Businesses, such as those with 51 percent or greater ownership by qualifying applicants, are also eligible to participate.
The program, which was developed after an in-depth study and analysis of cannabis enforcement in Sacramento, carries no economic impacts, according to the report.
The Sacramento Police Department Crime Analysis Unit found that about half of all arrests for cannabis-related crimes between 2004 and 2016 were of black people, although that demographic makes up only 14 percent of the city population, according to the report.
Nationally, black people are four times more likely to be arrested for possession than white people, although both groups use cannabis at the same rate, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
“The proposed CORE program represents an expansive effort to ensure that the City’s cannabis program is balanced, efficient, and accessible to every segment of the community,” according to the report.
The "war on drugs" dates back to 1971 when President Richard Nixon dramatically expanded the size and scope of federal drug control. Nixon aide John Ehrlichman later admitted that the emphasis on narcotics was a way of targeting and discrediting his political enemies: hippies and black people.