New Jersey Awards $12 Million In Grants To 48 Marijuana Businesses, With Focus On Aiding Communities Harmed By Drug War

New Jersey is awarding $12 million in grant money to 48 licensed cannabis operators to help them start and expand their businesses. It’s part of the state’s effort to remove barriers to entry to the legal industry, especially among people from communities disproportionately harmed by the drug war.The $250,000 award to each of the licensees represents “the largest cannabis social equity grant of its kind in the nation,” the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA) said Wednesday as it and other state and local officials announced the new phase of funding.The amount is twice what was originally planned for the grants round. Initially NJEDA was going to select only 24 companies to receive the money, but a further allocation of funds by Gov. Phil Murphy (D) allowed double that number of awardees.“It is important that we build on our efforts to support the businesses seeking to enter and grow within this emerging market,” Murphy said in a statement. “The Cannabis Equity Grant Program allows us to simultaneously expand the pool of cannabis businesses in our state while also focusing on those communities most impacted by the unethical War on Drugs.”The new awardees received so-called Joint Venture Grants, the first phase of New Jersey’s Cannabis Equity Grant Program. The money is meant to assist adult-use cannabis businesses with capital to help manage the transition from conditional licenses to annual licenses. “To ensure the communities harmed by racially-biased marijuana arrests also reap these financial benefits,” NJDEA said in its announcement, 40 percent of funds were earmarked for qualifying social equity applicants, and another 5 percent were allocated for businesses in specially designated Impact Zones.A second phase of grants, known as Seed Equity Grants, will launch later this year and be available in awards of $150,000 apiece along with technical assistance, according to the NJEDA release. Of that funding, 100 percent will be designated for social equity applicants. In addition to the monetary award, technical assistance “will provide licensure process training, assistance in building a cannabis business team, financial management, guidance on securing investors, and development of supply chain management to name a few,” the agency said.Dianna Houenou, chair of the state Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC), said the grant program “has helped to set the New Jersey cannabis market as an example for the rest of the country.”“We were grateful NJEDA stepped up to partner with us and we were able to offer our insight into the cannabis industry and to present our vision for an equitable New Jersey market—with particular concern for those who lack access to personal or familial capital, or to traditional sources of business funding,” Houenou said. “We look forward to even more targeted investment into social equity businesses and those owned by local minority-, women- and disabled veteran-owned businesses. And we look forward to supporting the NJEDA as they make that happen.”In June, CRC moved to accept requests for certain license types—wholesale, distribution and delivery—only from social equity applicants for one year beginning September 27.Commissioner Charles Barker, who led the action, said at the time that the state hadn’t done enough since legal sales began April 2022 to help entrepreneurs who have been hurt by the drug war.CONTINUE READING THE FULL STORY HERE