What we stand for, why now, and what we are asking from the candidates who want to lead California.
California legalization carried a promise — that the people most harmed by prohibition would have a genuine place in the industry that followed. Our members took that promise seriously. They applied, verified, invested, complied, and built. What they have built belongs to their communities as much as it belongs to them — jobs, tax revenue, neighborhood anchors, families with real stakes in California's future.
We believe the regulated cannabis market should work for small businesses, families, and communities. We believe compliance should be rewarded. We believe the illegal market should be confronted, and that the people who chose the legal path should not be made to compete against those who didn't.
For too many of our members, the social equity program has moved in the opposite direction of its founding promise — compounding regulatory burdens, escalating taxes, and a legal market squeezed on one side by corporate consolidation and on the other by an illegal market the State has been increasingly slow to address. A recent state proposal entertained taxing unlicensed operators — treating the black market as a permanent fixture to be managed rather than a problem to be solved. Meanwhile, equity licensees who followed every rule continue to bear the full weight of compliance.
Our members invested their savings and their lives into this industry on the State's invitation. They deserve a government that holds up its end.
SECA is a formal advocacy body representing California's social equity cannabis community. We are calling on every candidate for Governor of California and Mayor of Los Angeles to commit to the following:
We support the candidates who show up for us. We make that decision together.
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