Fighting for the voice of minority cannabis businesses

Kaliko Castille first came to the Minority Cannabis Business Association (MCBA) as a volunteer helping with policy work. He’s still a volunteer, but now he leads the group, working closely with lawmakers in crafting key marijuana-related legislation. 

In a recent interview with The Hill, Castille, 35, detailed work done by the group to get specific language into the bipartisan Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act (SAFE) that would allow legal cannabis businesses to use banking services. 

“We got our community financial development institutions added to the base text of the bill, and we did that because we believe that those institutions have a big history of actually working with minority communities,” he said.  

Lawmakers couldn’t get SAFE across the finish line in 2022. But Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are hopeful they’ll be able to finally pass the legislation — which the House has already approved a handful of times — in this Congress.

In the cannabis space, Castille said, “it’s hard to not look at a social equity program anywhere that started since 2015 that hasn’t had some sort of DNA or an input from MCBA and its network.” 

MCBA was launched by Jesce Horton and Tiffany Bowden eight years ago to help advocate for minority-owned businesses, emerging entrepreneurs and the policies to help their communities. 

Castille, who identifies as Native Hawaiian and Latino, said he met Horton at a trade show before later volunteering on MCBA’s policy committee. 

“This was the time when it was majority white people and very few Black and brown people at these events,” he said. “So he, Tiffany and others saw the need to sort of start this organization and to make sure that we had a voice at the table.”  

Castille got to work helping craft model legislation at both the state and local level. He was soon elected vice president of the board, which now consists of 15 members, and then president a couple of years later.  

He also runs a digital marketing communications firm known as ThndrStrm Strategies, which he founded in 2020, that has served MCBA, along with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and the office of the Oregon State Treasurer.

But he describes his work as MCBA president as that of a “full-time volunteer,” noting that the board is an “all-volunteer” team. “So, none of us get paid for the work that we do.”

Castille’s role on the board is just one of several he has taken on over the years, including launching a bid for the Oregon state House last year. He didn’t win the seat but feels he did “pretty well” for a candidate with “no name ID.” 

“We weren’t supposed to sort of do anything in that race,” he said, but the experience was critical in showing him just what he “could put into a campaign.” 

“For me, running for office is just an opportunity to do good and to make sure that we have people who ultimately live the experiences of the people they’re trying to represent,” Castille said, adding: “Too often we are people in politics that are not coming from the common experience of the people that we’re trying to represent.” 

It’s part of that attitude that Castille said led him to shift his direction in college from history to political science — and eventually dropping out for an opportunity to help spur change. 

“It was the summer of 2012, and legalization was on the ballot in Washington, Colorado, as well as here in Oregon,” he said. “But the Oregon initiative was struggling in terms of fundraising. So, a friend of mine and myself started a political action committee to basically raise money for legalization out here.” 

Since Colorado and Washington became the first states to legalize recreational marijuana use in 2012, more than 20 others have followed suit. 

“It took sort of advocates — it took people sort of taking the leverage of direct democracy to get those things done, because we couldn’t depend on our legislators,” Castille said. “I think legislators are always going to be behind the curve, because they’re looking to see where the polling is and where the support is.” 

“Issues ultimately get moved forward by people who are not thinking about the next election; they’re thinking about getting something done because it’s the right thing to do,” he said.  

But as the cannabis industry has grown in the years since, Castille and other advocates have seen glaring differences in what types of Americans are benefiting in certain spaces, and the communities that have been disproportionately burdened under federal prohibition.   

A 2020 report from the American Civil Liberties Union showed that Black Americans were more than three times as likely to be arrested for marijuana offenses than their white counterparts. 

And Black Americans are underrepresented in the country’s growing cannabis industry. A 2021 report from Leafly found that Black Americans accounted for only 1.2 percent to 1.7 percent of all cannabis company owners, despite making up about 12 percent of the country’s population.  

In recent years, Castille said states such as New York, New Jersey, Minnesota and Illinois have taken strides toward social equity on the issue, but no one has found “the silver bullet at this point.” 

“I think the most important part is that people — I think largely [thanks] in part to the work that we’ve done — now understand that they need to be writing policies in a way that benefits minority entrepreneurs in communities that have been disproportionately impacted,” he said.  

“That will sometimes mean making hard decisions and sometimes mean upsetting people with a lot of dollars behind them,” he said. “But ultimately, that’s what we’re going to have to do in order to get to an equitable outcome.”

—Updated at 10:45 a.m.