Scott Murrison inside a hoop house full of unused cannabis growing equipment in Hayfork on Feb. 7, 2023. Photo by Martin do Nascimento, CalMatters
In 2016, when California voters faced the choice of whether to legalize marijuana for recreational use, they heard promises that it would help end a racist “war on drugs,” bring a violent illegal market out of the shadows and, by the way, bring in tax revenue. Gavin Newsom, then lieutenant governor and now governor, said so.
More than six years later, while Proposition 64 has cut arrests for marijuana-related offenses, it hasn’t lived up to its billing for the small cannabis growers in Northern California’s famed Emerald Triangle.
CalMatters politics reporter Alexei Koseff spent several days this month in Humboldt and Trinity counties. What he heard from growers, workers, business owners, local officials and others was that plummeting prices are causing the collapse of the legal cannabis market — and the economies of surrounding communities with it.
Commercial cannabis sales fell by 8% last year to $5.3 billion, according to just-released state tax data — the first decline since it became legal in 2018. And state tax revenue dropped from $251.3 million in the third quarter of 2022 to $221.6 million in the fourth quarter.
Cultivators who can barely make ends meet are laying off employees, slashing expenses or shutting down their farms. For many, the situation is verging on despair —
H/T: calmatters.org
