A Chicago lawmaker won’t allow a cannabis store in his district because the ownership group includes 10 former police officers.
Alderman Andre Vasquez said he supports marijuana retail in the 40th Ward but blocked the Kaneh Group’s proposal after residents expressed “a fundamental justice concern” with retired cops selling cannabis, according to the Chicago Tribune.
“I have questions and concerns about people who were paid to arrest people who might still be in jail for selling cannabis,” Vasquez told the Tribune.
“There’s just something fundamentally unfair and unjust about it.”
Vasquez does not plan to request a zoning change Kaneh needs to open its Releaf retail store, which prevents the shop from opening.
Should former police benefit from marijuana social equity?
In 2023, Kaneh won a license via the state’s social equity program, which is intended to help people with low-level marijuana offenses or who come from poor neighborhoods open cannabis businesses.
Kaneh said it still wants to open a dispensary somewhere in Chicago and that its ownership team is “just like any other entrepreneurs that pursue this,” partner Damone Richardson said after Vasquez rejected the zoning request.
“Our team is comprised of people who have spent decades serving the city being members of their communities,” Richardson said.
“They served their communities for hundreds of years between all of them, so I just feel like it’s their right as citizens to be able to do it.”
The group’s plans included placing 5% of the business into a “community trust” partially controlled by neighborhood residents, which would give them some ownership and profits.
It also wanted to use additional space attached to the building for seminars on specialties like pain management, postmenopausal health and orthopedics.
However, that failed to win over Vasquez’s constituents, roughly half of whom opposed Kaneh’s project, he said.
“My job is to represent our community, and our community had a problem with it,” he told the Tribune.
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