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By Patrick Grega

Hopes were thwarted recently when New Jersey lawmakers decided to shuttle adult-use cannabis legislation and instead potentially turn it over to voters in 2020. Leaders in Trenton should reconsider this short-sighted strategy and get to work. There is still an opportunity to get this done in the Statehouse. And while doing so, I urge our legislators to keep small, family-owned businesses top of mind.

I co-founded a micro-cultivation company with my mother when I discovered that cannabis patients in our state were not getting the quality medicine they deserved. Unfortunately, along with numerous other small businesses, I have been shortchanged by the inaction of New Jersey’s legislators. After investing in the promise of a legal adult-use market, we’re shut out of our industry entirely until legalization is the law in our state. That can happen only if legislators take up a vote now. It won’t happen for years if the decision is made by a ballot measure.

Businesses like mine currently operate in a frustrating state of legal limbo. Despite the fact that we have complied with all of the various zoning policies and state licensing procedures, our application cannot be approved until cannabis is fully legalized. Even though we have a fully functional workforce, facilities and a demand in the market, we have to wait. Countless other small businesses are in the same position. Continuous uncertainty is not the environment where entrepreneurs thrive.

The economic impact of a legal cannabis industry in New Jersey cannot be understated. Legalizing cannabis would create good-paying jobs in our state and a bonafide opportunity to make real progress toward social change. I fail to see why any lawmaker in the state would have a problem with that.

The demand for jobs in the cannabis industry is overwhelming and represents a huge missed opportunity for residents and our economy as legislators drag their feet. When my company posted our first job opening, we received more than 600 applicants within the first day. We now have nearly 3,000 applications to review, and we haven’t even opened yet.

Cannabis is one of the few industries where entry-level trimmers and “bud­tenders” can make more than the state’s mandated minimum wage for part-time work. A well-regulated market would provide opportunities for folks from the bottom to the top of the corporate ladder, and provisions in the legislation would benefit individuals from neighborhoods that have been the most underserved and disproportionately impacted by the failed war on drugs in the past.

The social justice measures included in legislation are necessary and attainable. And they shouldn’t wait. I’m committed to providing opportunities to patients, women and people from New Jersey’s impact zones whose lives have been upended by cannabis criminalization. These provisions in the legalization bill are critical to rectifying past injustices, while also ensuring the development of an exciting new industry. Why not put them in place now, rather than later?

The municipal governments we have interacted with so far have been receptive to thoughtful and productive conversations about cultivation sites in their area. As a result, we’ve mapped out a plan with elected leaders in Ewing to address production logistics that is beneficial to the town and our business — from bar-coding of each plant, to facility security measures, to safe and ethical disposal procedure.

Small businesses like mine are suffering and communities of color continue to endure unequal enforcement of unjust laws, while the politicians in the Statehouse do nothing. We can’t wait forever. We need full legalization of adult-use cannabis now.

Thankfully, my local officials understand the benefits that the industry will bring and are just as eager as we are to work toward real solutions. Why can’t policymakers in Trenton do the same?

Patrick Grega is co-owner of New Jersey Grow Solutions LLC, based in Ewing.

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