Seattle – At present, Mayor Bruce Harrell signed three payments into regulation to deal with fairness within the hashish trade by serving to foster a extra various trade and supporting hashish retailer employees.

Mayor Harrell was joined by Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda, who helped develop the laws and sponsored the payments in council. The payments had been additionally developed in partnership with hashish trade stakeholders and staff.

WATCH: Mayor Harrell indicators laws to enhance fairness in hashish trade

The next payments had been signed into regulation:

• CB 120391 – Expresses the Metropolis of Seattle’s intent to: have interaction in hashish fairness, expungement of hashish convictions, fairness work and funding, and develop a wants evaluation for wants throughout the workforce and hashish trade 
• CB 120392 – Advances fairness in hashish licensing and expands licensed actions 
• CB 120393  – Requires employers to take motion to develop job retention, safety, and stability throughout the hashish trade 

“I’m more than happy to see that this joint effort between my workplace, the Council, FAS and neighborhood stakeholders has resulted within the passage of this suite of payments. This can be a first – however crucial – step towards fairness lengthy overdue within the hashish trade,” stated Mayor Harrell. “The work nonetheless to come back will spotlight further alternatives for enchancment in our present system, and I sit up for the suggestions that end result from the Hashish Wants Evaluation. This work received’t be straightforward, however I consider collectively we will foster an open dialog between employees, neighborhood members and trade leaders to determine frequent priorities and align on efforts to advance our shared values of fairness and restoration.” 

“This Hashish Fairness laws units us on a path in the direction of restoring harms created by the Conflict on Medicine, and Metropolis and State insurance policies,” stated Councilmember Mosqueda. “Due to the coalition of advocates – together with UFCW 3000, the Freedom Challenge, Black Excellence in Hashish – and due to Mayor Harrell’s staff, we’re taking the primary of many steps in the direction of insurance policies that middle employees, these harmed by the Conflict on Medicine, and displaced Black medical marijuana license holders. As one of many first areas to legalize hashish, we additionally have to step up on implementing fairness and reparations within the hashish trade.”

Whereas hashish licenses are regulated and distributed on the state stage, the brand new laws permits the Metropolis to take tangible steps to enhance equity and alternative within the trade each now and as further licenses are awarded. Because the state begins to allocate social fairness hashish licenses throughout Washington, this laws would guarantee Seattle is located to finest improve native fairness efforts. 

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING:

“We see this bundle of laws as a primary step on a journey to proper the wrongs of a system that has harmed black and brown communities – from these arrested and prosecuted who may have their convictions expunged, to the black enterprise house owners who had been wrongly shut out of the authorized market after voters handed I-502, to neighborhood leaders who’ve tirelessly advocated for hashish {dollars} to be invested to these most impacted, and to the budtenders who each single day threat their lives going to work as a result of armed robberies as a result of our federal authorities has didn’t reform our banking system,” stated Matt Edgerton, Hashish Division Director, UFCW 3000. “These employees, organized and unorganized, should be protected, and to have the ability to entry trainings that allow them to achieve success, advance their abilities and develop the trade as a complete. That’s who this laws has at all times been about and whose voices now we have sought to middle in our advocacy.” 

“We’ve appreciated the chance to work constructively with Mayor Harrell and the Metropolis Council on the three ordinances addressing the necessary situation of hashish fairness in Seattle,” stated Adán Espino, Government Director, Craft Hashish Coalition. “We all know that that is only a begin, and there might be additional work on this subject over the following 12 months. We sit up for working with the Mayor’s staff on the truthful, even handed, and considerate hashish fairness wants evaluation course of that these ordinances got down to set up.”