With other California cities looking to jump on the cannabis cash bandwagon, a recent report from L.A. Weekly proves that despite forcing their dispensaries in to a legal gray area LA is ready to make a buck.
Los Angeles City Council President Herb Wesson is planning on introducing a motion that will direct city staffers to explore a ballot measure that would ask voters to amend marijuana dispensary rules and possibly legalize back-end cannabis businesses in town.
Herb has been hearing it a lot. SoCal municipalities are lining up to get their hands on a piece of the industry. Places like Adelanto are putting on there racing goggles, as of February they had distributed 27 permits for the large scale industrial cultivation of cannabis. This could lead to over 300,000 pounds of indoor marijuana, even at the top end of the outdoor price spectrum these days you would be looking at roughly $360,000,000. The town is primed to take a fat chunk of that in taxes, and create the jobs and other revenue to replace its fading prison industry.
The Council President is also hearing it from an industry desperate to be brought into the legal fold. Almost half of the 135 businesses allowed under the Prop D permitting structure from 2013 have joined to form the United Cannabis Business Alliance. The trade organization was put together with the purpose of pressuring LA lawmakers to rectify the situation prior to 2018’s enforcement of Governor Jerry Brown’s Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act, in what very well could be a post legalization world pending the Adult Use of Marijuana Act outcome on election day.
Jimi Devine 