Cannabis Decriminalization Offers Opportunity for Reparations

The legal cannabis industry has almost everything; billions of dollars in sales, hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue — fuel for schools, drug-abuse programs and police — and thousands of new jobs. What it doesn’t have is meaningful diversity. The green rush is still overwhelmingly white, and everybody knows it — nobody (honest) is denying it. Sam Kamin, a University of Denver law professor, told the Associated Press that this isn’t a new problem and that solutions are elusive. “It’s a problem that has been recognized but has proven to be relatively intractable,” he said. The cannabis industry doesn’t yet have the kind of (embarrassing lack of) diversity data published by Silicon Valley firms, but according to a BuzzFeed report published last year, Black people — who are four times more likely to be arrested for petty marijuana crimes than white people — own about 1 percent of the country’s legal pot shops. But quantification is almost unnecessary: Look around at a cannabis business conference or entrepreneurs’ summit; the investors, the founders — they are almost all white, and they are almost all men. The same people who escaped punishment for using and growing cannabis during prohibition are the ones taking control of the industry — and the people who went to jail are merely customers. It’s not a new story, but that’s the thing with systemic inequality — it’s entrenched. It doesn’t go away. It’s embarrassing, awkward and inconvenient. Most of us would like to forget about it and think about other things. And that’s why we have things like homelessness and poverty. In the industry’s defense, this isn’t by design, There are no explicit policies banning Black people from cannabis industry participation… at least not directly. Indirectly — there absolutely are. People convicted of a drug-related felony, such as growing or selling cannabis — now a highly marketable skill — will find it more difficult to obtain a state license for marijuana commercial activity in most states. And as the ACLU has said repeatedly, Black and Latinos are much more likely to be arrested for cannabis than their white peers. The AP tells the story of Andre Shavers, who was arrested with a quarter-ounce of cannabis in Oakland, California, in 2007. Possession of cannabis is supposed to be the absolutely last thing on police’s to-do list in Oakland, where voters made marijuana crimes the lowest priority for police in 2004. Shavers spent five years on felony probation. A criminal record makes securing a minimum-wage job difficult — have fun obtaining a bank loan or attracting investors to start a business. Most states are issuing precious few licenses to recreational or medical cannabis dispensaries and growers, reserving opportunities for people with political connections. Again, it helps to be a white man: 65 percent of elected offices in the country are held by white men, who make up 31 percent of the population. Which means the marijuana industry has made it. It’s as American as Silicon Valley, which…

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