“Let’s redefine what success looks like in the cannabis industry,” Dasheeda Dawson, New York City’s first “Cannabis Czar” told the largest B2B conference for the U.S. cannabis and hemp industry on Thursday.
In the keynote address to open the three-day Cannabis World Congress & Business (CWCB) Exposition in New York’s Jacob Javits Center, Dawson laid out her plans to make cannabis into an industry that “allows social equity businesses to scale while significantly maintaining their ownership as leaders, innovators, and changemakers.”
Equity is giving people what they need, when they need it and how they need it, said the founding director of Cannabis NYC. She told the many vendors from around the world who came to the U.S. to sell products and services to the cannabis industry, “That’s what we’re prioritizing.”
Launched within the city’s Department of Small Business Services, the agency focused on helping people start and grow businesses, Cannabis NYC aims to build an interagency hub of citywide resources and services for all New Yorkers that are interested in legal cannabis.
Created to implement and build the city’s legal framework to support the goals of New York State’s historic landmark legislation, the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, Cannabis NYC is “literally executing the largest public re-education and outreach campaign focused on the cannabis industry that New York City has ever experienced,” said Dawson.
Dawson, who was appointed by Mayor Eric Adams on Oct. 12, 2022 said, “We’re demonstrating our commitment in New York City by making an investment of city dollars in a way that other cities and states are not.”
The agency will spend this summer creating a partnership with the Mayor’s Office of Equity, the New York City Sheriff’s Office, the Administration for Children’s Services, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, and the New York City Housing Authority. Working with more than 20 leaders at 15 agencies on a weekly and biweekly basis, the goal is to include everything from financing and business services to health equity and wellbeing.
“We aren’t just helping people start a cannabis-related business,” said Dawson, “We are helping people understand the plan to tap into its agricultural, medicinal, nutritional, industrial and spiritual utilities.” She said she hopes that this knowledge and government accountability will repair the social, economic, environmental, and human injuries of past policies and lead to more equitable outcomes than we’ve seen in the development of new markets in the U.S. and the cannabis industry.
Prior to being appointed the “Czar,” Dawson was the cannabis program manager for the Office of Community & Civic Life in Portland, Ore. Prior to that, she earned an MBA from Rutgers, and had a successful career centered around business development. She also serves as chair of the Cannabis Regulators of Color Coalition (CRCC).
“We’re on a mission to build an inclusive, equitable, and safe industry in New York City and make it the most successful in the world,” said Dawson. “My office is investing in equity and I also want each and every one of you to consider the impact of your investments. Not just on the personal or company bottom line, but on our society. The cannabis industry has an opportunity to write historical wrongs, to correct social injustices and to create pathways for equity and prosperity for those impacted by cannabis prohibition.”
Source: Lawrence Carrel – forbes.com
Image: unsplash.com
