Leaders of California cannabis companies warned Gov. Gavin Newson and lawmakers last week that the state’s regulated marijuana industry is in danger of collapse, calling for tax relief and an improved retail market to support ailing businesses. In a letter sent to Newsom, Senate President Pro Tempore Toni Atkins, and Speaker of the Assembly Anthony Rendon, more than two dozen cannabis advocates and industry executives noted that the goals of cannabis legalization in California included ending the illicit marijuana market and protecting public safety while creating an accountable regulated industry. But four years after the start of legal sales, the “industry is collapsing.” “We need you to understand that we have been pushed to a breaking point,” the cannabis industry leaders wrote in the letter to Newsom and legislative leaders. The letter cites several shortcomings of cannabis legalization in California, including high taxation for legal operators that results in dispensary prices that are 50% more than the illicit market. Industry leaders also faulted the ability of local governments to ban cannabis businesses from locating in their jurisdictions, a situation that leaves only one-third of municipalities with local access to regulated cannabis products. The result is a market ripe for unregulated operators, with 75% of the cannabis in California coming from the illicit market, all of it untested and potentially unsafe.
Cannabis Now, Cannabis Now, 12/27/2021 09:00:00