BUSINESSES BACK MARIJUANA BILL, BIZSMART
Weed-question support attracts industry money
The battle over the Massachusetts ballot question that would legalize marijuana is attracting more than $100,000 from businesses that could stand to benefit from what could become a lucrative new market in the Bay State.
A vast majority of the more than $2.5 million in contributions to Yes on 4 has come from New Approach PAC, a nonprofit national political committee pushing for marijuana legalization nationwide — but at least $115,000 has been donated by existing businesses in the marijuana industry, according to a Herald review of campaign finance records.
4Front Ventures, a Bostonbased consulting firm for dispensaries across the country, has donated $28,500 to Yes On 4 and its original committee, Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol in Massachusetts.
Kris Krane, president of 4Front Ventures, said while his business would likely benefit from legal marijuana, his donations were made for philosophical reasons.
“I do think it probably is going to be good for business,” Krane said. “But it’s not really what motivated us in terms of our financial contributions.”
4Front Ventures has also donated office space to the Yes on 4 campaign.
“I’ve really dedicated my entire life to reforming cannabis laws and ending cannabis prohibition,” he said.
Happy Valley Ventures and Reardon Development Group, affiliated businesses that share an address in South Carolina, have contributed $55,000 to Yes on 4.
Happy Valley Ventures has applied for a medical marijuana dispensary in Massachusetts. The company did not respond to a request for comment.
Other business contributors include dispensaries in Colorado and Illinois, the founder and chief executive of a Massachusetts marijuana testing facility and a marijuana industry trade publication. None of those organizations or individuals responded to requests for comment.
Jim Borghesani, a spokesman for Yes on 4, said donations from the marijuana industry are a small portion of the committee’s receipts.
“If you look at the actual industry contributions, it’s a very small percentage,” Borghesani said.
Still, a nascent marijuana industry could be attractive to entrepreneurs or investors interested in the possibility of a booming new business.
In Colorado, legal marijuana has become a $1 billion industry, and a report by Arcview Market Research estimates the legal marijuana industry could rise to $22.8 billion by 2020.
“There are definitely people who get into it because they see it as the next big industry, the green rush, and are more motivated by money than by philosophical opposition to marijuana opposition,” Krane said.