Let communities decide how to spend cannabis reinvestment money

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New Jersey can lead the way in making sure that the communities most harmed by marijuana criminalization benefit from revenue generated by cannabis sales. Send a message to New Jersey's elected leaders to create a more transparent and participatory reinvestment process to ensure that New Jersey lives up to its promise of fair and equitable cannabis legalization.

Message Recipients:
Your State Governor
Senate President Nicholas Scutari
Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin
Senator Paul Sarlo
Assemblymember Eliana Pintor Marin

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Your Message

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Subject

More than eighteen months ago, New Jersey legalized cannabis with the promise of investing almost sixty percent of all cannabis sales tax revenue and one hundred percent of the Social Equity Excise Fee in communities most harmed by the criminalization of marijuana. Last year, New Jersey saw the first of those funds reach the State's coffers after the industry launched. These new funds require state-elected leaders to engage New Jerseyans, so that residents can decide how the revenue should be allocated to best prioritize community needs.

Message Body

Unfortunately, New Jerseyans were not given meaningful opportunities to weigh in on the reinvestment of these funds, and residents in communities that were promised reinvestment have not seen the funds materialize. While New Jersey took an important step towards beginning to repair the harms of marijuana prohibition by creating community reinvestment provisions, the Legislature must create processes that make this step real:

• Create a public tool that tracks the funding set aside for community reinvestment and how it is being used to support new resources and opportunities, as well as an annual report on cannabis community reinvestment that tracks how reinvestment dollars are used over time.

• Listen to the demands of New Jerseyans regarding what investments they want to see in their municipalities. Community members want to see investments in resources that help people thrive, such as education, housing, employment, harm reduction, and social services, not more money for the criminal legal system.

• Institute a more participatory and community-driven process to determine how all community reinvestment from the cannabis sales tax revenue and Social Equity Excise Fee should be used, including annual legislative hearings on community reinvestment and meetings with community-based organizations.

• Establish a Cannabis Community Reinvestment Advisory Board to inform the allocation of community reinvestment funds. The board should be made up of New Jerseyans directly impacted by criminalization, through the criminal legal system, child welfare, housing, immigration, education, and employment.

This moment calls for action and leadership. New Jersey can lead the way in making sure that the communities most harmed by marijuana criminalization do not get left behind as money flows into the industry and the State's budget from cannabis sales. I urge you to work with your colleagues to adopt these changes to the annual community reinvestment allocation process, and to ensure that New Jersey lives up to its promise of fair and equitable cannabis legalization.

Sincerely,

[First Name] [Last Name]

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Let communities decide how to spend cannabis reinvestment money

Act Now

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