As cannabis legalization spreads throughout the US
states are looking at different ways to ensure
those most affected by decades of racially biased
anti drug policies have a leg up under a special
program New Jersey prioritizes granting
licenses to dispensaries run by people with marijuana
convictions on their records. Now, lawmakers hope
that by making equity a cornerstone of their newly
legalized markets, those who don't marijuana in the
illegal or legacy market will be persuaded to go
legit.
I'm here in Trenton, which is at the forefront of New
Jersey's legalization efforts. And I'm talking to
people who are some of the first in the state to get
dispensary licenses based on past marijuana related
offenses. And there's won't be a door right?
entrance here people walking through here. It's a waiting
room. Yep.
So the eggs the door where people come in is actually
going to be right over here. Yep. So the door where
people come in is going to be over here. So imagine
people are going to so when you come in the door like
you see the receptionist you check in, check your ID. And
then inside the actual retail sales floor, we're
gonna have a number of different accessories. Like
I said, bombs, papers merchandise.
This is to hear Johnson he's a 39 year old native of
union New Jersey, who's one of the first people with a
marijuana related criminal conviction to own and
operate a Legal dispensary in New Jersey. He's in the
process of renovating an old electrical warehouse into a
dispensary called simply pure Trenton.
You know, actually thinking about every time I even
think about the reality of what I'm actually doing, it
gets kind of overwhelming. It's like I put in a lot of
work, quit my job, I did all this stuff to try to do it.
But it's like the whole time. It's like you're just
going through the motions. And you don't know where
you're actually going to end up. And I've been on this
journey for like five years now. So it's crazy man.
What is going to be here? What is this going to look
like? What's its purpose?
This part right here was always traditionally a
retail store. There was the Metro PCS before and my
grandmother's nail shop, this wall is actually coming
down. So this is going to be one big wide open floor
space.
Getting licensed is a high stakes affair. In the third
quarter of 2022. Alone, legal marijuana sales
brought in $177 million across New Jersey, the vast
majority of it coming from recreational marijuana.
Half of our city is below the poverty line have a high
unemployment rate. And we have a lot of like urban
America across the United States have problems with
gangs and in crime. This is a great way that we could
turn a lot of young entrepreneurs into a
positive economic advantage and utilizing their
experience in in in being defeated the drug war to be
Victors and being able to get real economic advantage.
Johnson is one of many applicants who are
prioritized because of his past criminal marijuana
related offenses. He said he's been pulled over and
arrested several times for small amounts of cannabis.
Now cannabis is becoming his career has always
been that response and if you really want to give back
and try to help lift people that came from similar
situations and make a difference and that's really
what I've been working at doing for years but to nail
actually be the example of what I've been preaching
about to try to tell people like you know, always
talking about, we need to have more ownership in his
business more opportunities, but unable to actually be
able to get one myself and be able to show what that
achievement looks like. You know, it's amazing.
The black market for marijuana in New Jersey
remains alive and well. Despite statewide, the
criminalization and the legalization of recreational
cannabis. This is at Fortune, a local celebrity
who goes by the nickname NJ weed man, his dispensary in
downtown Trenton does not currently have a license and
operates in a legal gray zone. Thanks to years of
court battles, both criminal and civil. It also sits
right across from Trenton City Hall. Yeah, so tell me
about your story. What has led you here?
I've been selling weed pretty much my whole adult
life. But as this whole legalization movement spread
across the country, right, I felt like the black market
is a real legitimate market the marijuana market.
So where are you in the process of becoming illegal?
I got the conditional license we've applied for
the annual license no word yet. And it might because
the obviously no I'm not complying with the
conditions. I'm not totally matched to the state. The
way it's doing the CRC board itself is trying I like what
they're trying to do. I think we're going in the
right direction. Yes, I do. I think there's more public
opinion and guys like me, forcing these issues out
there. You know, like, what are you gonna do with the
black market? We're gonna do with the legacy market. What
are you gonna do with these guys? Throw race Don't wait
like they have to deal with us now like they could come
around bust us off to that would be a political
nightmare for that. So that's
Trenton used to be home of Roebling factories that made
the steel cables for the Brooklyn Bridge. We made
Lenox China here, White House, China, we make
toilets, car parts, and all of that industry has dried
up and this is the emerging new market that will will be
here for years to come.