“The average [New York] applicant that scored high probably spent somewhere around $5 million for that application process. … That’s reasonable for me,” says Bierman, whose company offers nationwide management services for dispensaries, cultivations and merit-based licensing applications. The company’s capital arm is a $100 million fund.

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“That’s giving you a license to address 20 percent of the [New York state] population. … To pull that feat off you’ve got to build facilities, hire people, that’s big business there. … Let’s not be surprised or naive about what this has become. States don’t want a free-market environment. That’s too hard to govern.”

He says people thinking they want to get in to an industry that’s becoming industrialized should consider pretending it’s not pot. What if, for example, Bierman asks, you wanted to get into the pharmaceutical, grocery or casino industries?

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“The barrier of entry is extremely high,” Bierman explains. “Can you demonstrate tens of millions of liquidity? Can you lock up real estate that would allow you to build a grow facility? … Can you put together a cannabis-security team? You need to demonstrate to a state that you will be secure and protect that license.”

He adds that there is much discussion in the industry on how what he calls the “completely failed drug war” has disproportionately affected people of color, and that there is a sentiment that since it has negatively affected such people for so long, they should be the ones who benefit from the commercial opportunities.

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“Morally, you can say we should make sure [people of color] should get the upside,” Bierman says. “But on the flip side, these states have a huge undertaking and have to do what’s best for the state, colorblind.”

Partnerships Key for Blacks and Latinos

Longtime African-American marijuana activist and entrepreneur Wanda James gets furious when she talks about the racial disparity among the owners of weed businesses.

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“It angers me to my core!” rails James, founder and CEO of the Colorado-based Simply Pure dispensary and edibles. “Why do white men in Colorado … get to sell a billion dollars’ worth of weed, yet a black kid in Texas selling a $24 bag can still go to jail for a felony for a year? Your zip code determines whether you are a felon or a millionaire.”

But she stresses that though the business is not cheap, it is not impossible for blacks and Latinos to get involved as long as people of color move to make sure their paths to getting in aren’t permanently blocked.

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“One, is being part of the rulemaking in every state, because they are putting barriers up,” James says, noting that in Colorado, if you had a drug felony, you couldn’t be in on the industry, but if you were a rapist, you could. “It’s stuff like that that makes no sense so it becomes dog whistle and racist because we have been targeted for the last 80 years and given ridiculous [weed] sentences.”

James says that people of color need to lobby to make sure the barriers are reasonable, and that they have the tools to navigate them successfully.

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“Let’s not think you can open a dispensary with $25,000 in the bank. We’ve got to be prepared with partnerships. It doesn’t matter that one person doesn’t have a million,” James explains, “but partnerships can be formed to take on investors and be ready to be in this industry in a big way. It does require business acumen, but if you’ve got the desire to do this, find the people you can partner with to make this happen. They’re out there. You just have to find them.”

James says wannabe marijuana entrepreneurs need to network with everyone from local officials in their city or town to members of weed-advocacy groups such as NORML, and maybe even the local Alzheimer’s Association, in that they may be interested in medical marijuana. The other major piece of this battle, she says, is getting elective officials and black clergy to stop saying negative things about cannabis and keeping people of color away from a substance that can help battle everything from cancer to autism.

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“When you look at the racism behind [the criminalization of cannabis], that’s why I become so angry at seeing so many black politicians falling into the trap of ‘Weed is keeping Ray-Ray on the couch.’ Instead of touching on drugs, touch on the black kids,” James says. “They are feeding our children into the criminal-justice system. Privatized prison systems get billion-dollar contracts.”

James also thinks that African Americans are missing out on the medical benefits of marijuana.

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“I’m not seeing black autistic children being helped with cannabis oil,” James says. “Our clergy and elected officials are telling us how negative this is so we’re believing them and not even opening our minds to the possibilities of how this helps our children.”

In Oakland, Calif., Closing the Racial Gap

But there are efforts to help close the racial gap in getting involved in legal marijuana. In May, Oakland, Calif., City Councilmember Desley Brooks got the council to unanimously pass the “Equity Permit Program” (pdf), which sets aside half of medical-cannabis industry permits for people who have lived in the city's East Oakland neighborhood or have been to prison for a marijuana-related arrest. Currently, the city has eight dispensaries with permits, and eight more are coming as the city expands its marijuana businesses. East Oakland is predominantly black, and is home to a half-dozen police beats with high numbers of marijuana arrests and imprisonments.

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“When you look around the country and see who is making millions and millions in the cannabis industry, it is primarily white men,” Brooks says. “The first people out of the box on this are the people that are likely to be successful, and when you look at cannabis and its transition to legalization, it’s like prohibition and alcohol. This is the setup for people to become millionaires.”

Brooks says one black man told her at a mixer that he was thankful someone was looking out for the community, but she notes that others who were being “propped up” to get to do what had been illegal for others are “quite upset.”

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“A part of what had been the primarily white community has thrown up an obstacle. ‘What would these illiterate black folks with no expertise in cannabis and have no money be able to do?’” says Brooks. “But there are well-informed African-American men and women who can afford this. “

Oakland’s permit program will stand whether or not California voters legalize recreational marijuana this fall.

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Back in Maryland, Zulu, the black market dealer, says he’ll continue working under the radar, and he thinks there will always be a need for entrepreneurs like himself because not everyone will want to be registered with the government as using or selling marijuana.

“People who still can’t get what they need are still going to underground stores, and that’s why the underground market never goes away,” Zulu says. “People think, ‘My dealer will come to me, and I don’t have to register with the government’; there’s distrust. I don’t want to register with the government for something I’ve been doing all my life.”

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Also in the High Society series: “Where Recreational Weed Is Legal, Should Those in Prison Get a Puff, Puff, Pass?

Allison Keyes is an award-winning correspondent, host and author. She can be heard on CBS Radio News, among other outlets. Keyes, a former national desk reporter for NPR, has written extensively on race, culture, politics and the arts. Follow her on Twitter.