New Jersey’s move to legalize marijuana isn’t just a revenue maker. It will also help communities disproportionately impacted by its prohibition.
Advocates say the legislation brings an unprecedented level of community reinvestment, CBS2’s Lisa Rozner reported.
Nafeesah Goldsmith recounted police raiding her home in Neptune, New Jersey when she was a child. Cops said they found more than an ounce of pot and arrested her mom.
“I am still, right now, 12 years old taking to you, seeing those guns and hearing those voices,” Goldsmith said to Rozner.
Goldsmith’s struggling mom worked at a laundromat and sometimes sold on the side to pay bills.
“And my mother now still has a CDS charge on her record,” Goldsmith said. “There are many families and many people like my mother who have had to wear this badge of shame.”
A badge that blocked job opportunities, housing applications and even child custody. But not anymore.