new jersey stashed more than 4.6 million

dollars in tax revenue from the sale of

recreational cannabis in just the first

two months of the marketplace opening

the total sales between april 21st and

june 30th was a cool 80 million dollars

give or take a few

industry leaders say the market's

performing exactly as they expected and

they believe it'll grow as more

businesses come online and the cost of

cannabis comes down

but getting more people of color into

the marketplace remains both a goal and

a challenge one program in jersey city

is providing training to teach black

indigenous and people of color critical

technical skills to succeed in the

cannabis market melissa rose cooper

reports as part of our ongoing series

chasing the dream looking at justice

poverty and economic opportunity

dispensaries can accept credit cards

with no problem a true be false

will be

going across state lines federally

the race is on to see who can be the

first to answer the question right but

instead of competing against each other

these adults are actually learning

together taking part in the inaugural

class at minority cannabis academy here

in jersey city we're an adult learning

academy really centered around workforce

development and job placement so we're

doing we're bringing 25 students in from

jersey city

newark irvington teaching them bud

tending and horticulture they're meeting

twice a week it's an eight-week hands-on

program students are taught by experts

in the cannabis industry learning all

about the different strains of marijuana

and what it takes to work in a

dispensary brendan robinson co-founder

and president of minority cannabis

academy says the program is a way to get

black and brown communities who are

often left out involved in a growing

industry that could ultimately create

generational wealth when you look at the

industry as a whole we have less than

five percent ownership in it right when

you walk into these dispensaries across

the state you don't see the same

representation in cannabis that i saw

growing up right there's so many of my

peers saw growing up and when we've

suffered uh we look at the world on

drugs the way we have over the last 60

70 years you got to go back and

understand that this coming to new

jersey being legal

it's it's our duty to make sure our

people are involved in it and i want to

be able to come back to their future

classes to basically give a testimony

siobhan boyd has dreams of owning a

dispensary one day boyd uses cannabis to

help with back pain and as an emt worker

sees firsthand how it can help others

one patient she stopped taking her lupus

medicine she always lets me know you

know like i'd rather smoke or eat rather

than take this medication a doctor

giving me because it's pulling her hair

out it's making her lose weight it's

making her gain weight she's retaining

water

with cannabis she feels as though it

balances her out julian landryn has been

taking cannabis to relieve his anxiety

for about seven years and believes it's

the best form of treatment for him i've

sought out therapy

so i've actually talked to a medical

professional about that

while that definitely serves its

purposes as well

i feel like for me

the plant

you know

will at least allow me to

take care of the matter at hand

immediately as opposed to waiting for my

next therapy session now mandarin is

excited to know more about how cannabis

works and the future possibilities the

industry can bring for him

and i myself come from the finance

industry right now but

i definitely wanted to educate myself a

little more on the ins and outs of

everything and possibly even transition

into another industry so i saw this

opportunity as a great way to really

take that first step but what i love

about the students is that they have

already expressed the fact that when

they get done the program they want to

come back and help the ones in the next

program and that's what we want to build

as an ecosystem a culture

each one teach one type of vibe and um

we're on that path the pilot program at

minority cannabis academy will end in

september plans are in the works to

start back up early 2023 with classes

running continuously throughout the year

giving members of this community a

chance to succeed in this growing

industry

for nj spotlight news i'm melissa rose

cooper major funding for chasing the

dream is provided by the jpb foundation

with additional funding from the peter g

peterson and joan ganz cooney fund

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