In a funding dispute between state lawmakers and California\u2019s Gov. Jerry Brown, the enforcement plan for California\u2019s black market is coming up short.<\/p>\n
Last month, Brown\u00a0unveiled a sweeping enforcement plant<\/a>\u00a0to deal with the state\u2019s continuing illicit market, which is currently held afloat easily by out-of-state demand, high taxes within the state and an entry bar too high for long-time providers. Brown\u2019s plan needed $14 million in funding in order to create five teams in the state attorney general\u2019s office to investigate California\u2019s illicit market.<\/p>\n But in California\u2019s current budget plan, which legislators are voting on this week, the $14 million is not included,\u00a0according to the Los Angeles Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n So how did Brown\u2019s proposed crackdown funding fall through? Right now, two competing narratives are emerging from the state capitol in Sacramento. According to the Department of Finance spokesman, the legislature simply didn\u2019t approve it.<\/p>\n However, Kevin Liao, a spokesman for Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon,\u00a0gave a different version of events<\/a>\u00a0in a statement on the matter.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cThe Assembly supports these cannabis enforcement units and proposed the units be funded through the General Fund due to concerns they are an ineligible use of Cannabis Tax Fund dollars,\u201d said Liao. \u201cThe administration rejected that proposal.\u201d<\/p>\n The\u00a0California Cannabis Industry Association<\/a>\u00a0told the Los Angeles Times they were disappointed by the loss of funding.<\/p>\n \u201cSince the rollout of the state licensing framework earlier this year, CCIA has consistently maintained that additional resources are critically needed to ensure that lawful cannabis businesses can successfully compete in the California marketplace,\u201d said Amy Jenkins, a legislative advocate for CCIA.<\/p>\n Jenkins also told the Times that the state had to do something about the current \u201cbarriers to entry\u201d to the legal marijuana industry, including high taxes, regulatory fees and an extreme lack of local authorization, \u201cwhich are significant impediments to compliance in the regulated marketplace.\u201d<\/p>\n We reached out to the\u00a0National Cannabis Industry Association<\/a>\u00a0for their take on what effective enforcement would look like. For the NCIA, it\u2019s still too early to make any calls on the subject in California.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think I can answer that until the state has more time to gather data on the regulated and illicit market after the legal market has been active for a while,\u201d NCIA Media Relations Director Morgan Fox told Cannabis Now. \u201cIn general, we should be eschewing any regulations that don\u2019t benefit consumers, providers and public safety, and should be trying to keep licensing fees as low as possible and moving away from arbitrary license caps.\u201d<\/p>\n NORML\u00a0<\/a>Executive Director Erik Altieri believes wider access to the market for both consumers and businesses will solve a lot of problems.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cWith the implementation of legalization and regulation in California, it only makes sense for the state to shut down unlicensed and illicit operators, as they do with any other industry,\u201d Altieri told Cannabis Now. \u201cHowever, it likely doesn\u2019t require a $14 million investigation to discover that fair taxation rates, consumer-friendly pricing and easy access to safe and high-quality merchandise will drive customers out of the black market and into state-licensed businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n California is well below initial tax revenue projections for the year. At the time that Brown first brought his new enforcement plan up in mid-May, total legal cannabis revenue had only totaled\u00a0$36 million for the state coffers. Budget expectations for the first six months of the year were originally expecting $185 million of total pot revenue.<\/p>\n \u201cCannabis is now a legal and regulated product in California, so it needs to be treated that way,\u201d Marijuana Policy Project Spokesman Mason Tvert told Cannabis Now. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSWAT teams do not need to go busting down the doors of unlicensed operators, but authorities do need to enforce the rules to ensure the system works. If people were illegally producing whiskey and bootlegging it all over the state, authorities would shut them down as a matter of protecting public health and safety. The situation is not much different with marijuana, except it is a lot more difficult right now during the transition from an illegal to a legal market,\u201d Tvert said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>,\u00a0do you think California should crack down on its illicit businesses?<\/p>\n The post California\u2019s Illicit Market Crackdown Budget Goes Up In Smoke<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
In a funding dispute between state lawmakers and California\u2019s Gov. Jerry Brown, the enforcement plan for California\u2019s black market is coming up short. Last month, Brown\u00a0unveiled a sweeping enforcement plant\u00a0to deal with the state\u2019s continuing illicit market, which is currently held afloat easily by out-of-state demand, high taxes within theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1143,4588,148,3471,50,3568,90,1419,146],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26950"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26950"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26950\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26951,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26950\/revisions\/26951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: California\u2019s Illicit Market Crackdown Budget Goes Up In Smoke<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"