Pubdate: Tue, 11 Aug 2015
Source: Baltimore Sun (MD)
Copyright: 2015 The Baltimore Sun Company
Contact:  http://www.baltimoresun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/37
Author: Talia Richman

FROM HIGH SCHOOL TO 'HIGH PROFITS' IN POT

The first time Brian Rogers took a bong hit at a party with his Havre 
de Grace High School friends, he said marijuana had no effect on him.

Now Rogers co-owns a multimillion-dollar marijuana company in 
Colorado at the center of the CNNdocu-series "High Profits," and he's 
no longer ambivalent.

"It's changed my life," the 34-year-old Harford County native said.

While recreational marijuana is illegal in 46 states - including 
Maryland - Colorado has been at the forefront of the legalization 
movement. And Rogers has been at the forefront of capitalizing on it.

Rogers and his girlfriend, 25-year-old Caitlin McGuire, opened the 
Breckenridge Cannabis Club in 2010 when marijuana was legal for 
medicinal purposes exclusively. Since then Colorado has legalized 
cannabis for recreational purposes, and Rogers has expanded his 
operation, becoming known as a "marijuana mogul" on cable TV.

With Maryland's nascent medical marijuana program taking shape, 
Rogers is one of many entrepreneurs eyeing the possibilities. And, he 
says, his trajectory holds lessons for the consequences of the 
nation's drug policies. The Maryland Medical Cannabis Commission has 
released draft regulations for allowing patients to receive the drug 
from licensed dispensaries. The commission could begin taking 
applications to grow marijuana by the end of September, with patients 
potentially gaining access to the drug by the middle of next year. 
Rogers said he has high hopes that his home state will follow 
Colorado's lead, by first allowing medical marijuana before fully 
legalizing it.

"Spending a few years under the law they have in place now will 
demonstrate to Marylanders, and hopefully the Mid-Atlantic population 
in general, that regulating cannabis works," Rogers said. "It's a 
step in the right direction."

Some state legislators agree, citing the boost that fully legalizing 
marijuana would bring to the state economy. In Colorado, it was a 
$700 million industry last year, generating $63 million in tax 
revenue and $13 million in licenses and fees.

"If we were to legalize, regulate and tax marijuana in Maryland, we 
could tap into a significant fiscal resource that does not exist 
today," said state Del. Curt Anderson, a Baltimore Democrat and vocal 
proponent of legalization.

"If you look at what Colorado has collected in taxes on marijuana, 
and the jobs created by dispensaries, we're missing a big opportunity 
to put Marylanders to work and bring money into the state that could 
be used for the treatment of other forms of drug dependence, like 
cocaine or heroin."

Others, however, believe recreational marijuana would have the opposite effect.

"It affects the parts of the brain dealing with motivation and 
memory," said U.S. Rep. Andy Harris, who opposes legalization. "When 
we're competing globally, the last thing we need is a workforce not 
working at 100 percent of its ability."

The Baltimore County Republican said more research is needed on the 
impact of marijuana on health and brain development before the state 
thinks about moving forward. "Once you let that horse out of the 
barn, you can't get it back in," he said.

It wasn't a particular love for weed - Rogers describes himself as an 
occasional smoker - that set him on the path to opening a marijuana dispensary.

It wasn't the desire to someday get his own TV series. It was the 
felony charge on his record. Rogers always wanted to be a teacher at 
Havre de Grace High School, just like his dad. That's what he was 
working toward at Millersville University in Pennsylvania in the early 2000s.

The plan changed when officers arrested him after finding three 
marijuana plants growing in a 14- by 22-inch box in the closet of his 
college apartment.

"I'm not allowed to be a teacher with this conviction, and that 
changed the course of my life," he said. "Things all worked out, but 
certainly it's a one in a couple hundred thousand chance that I'm 
able to own a weed store. If I didn't, I wouldn't be allowed to work 
in a lot of different industries."

Stories of young people unable to move past criminal records for 
marijuana violations are part of what led Maryland lawmakers last 
year to decriminalize possession of less than 10 grams of marijuana.

Maryland had the fourth-highest rate of marijuana possession arrests 
in the country, according to a 2013 American Civil Liberties Union 
report, and spent more than $106 million enforcing possession laws in 2010.

"We were criminalizing tens of thousands of our own people for doing 
what our last several presidents have admitted to doing," said state 
Sen. Jamie Raskin, a Montgomery County Democrat.

Rogers has asked the governor of Pennsylvania to pardon his charges.

"I see some momentum shifting nationwide on the attitudes toward 
marijuana and that, maybe, some of the penalties are a little too 
harsh," he said. "For more than a decade, I haven't gotten in any 
further trouble, and I haven't been a detriment to society. ... Now I 
work in the cannabis industry that's regulated."

In the beginning, Rogers and McGuire worked seven days a week 
operating their store. At the time, they could only legally cater to 
the city's population of about 4,500.

"Cash was lean during those times," Rogers said. "But we had picked a 
spot right on Main Street, and once tourists were eventually allowed 
to buy marijuana, we knew this would be the place to be.

"It seemed that momentum was going that way and the state was poised 
to vote to legalize. We thought, 'What else do we have going on with 
a better chance of success than this right now?' "

When legislation went into effect on Jan. 1, 2014, legalizing 
marijuana for recreational purposes, crowds in heavy winter coats 
surrounded their bright yellow storefront.

The company made almost $50,000 during that first 14-hour business 
day under the new law - about as good as any month they'd had prior.

Since then, they've opened another shop in Crested Butte and 
rebranded as Backcountry Cannabis Co., keeping the initials they're 
known by, but no longer limiting their brand to Breckenridge.

Rogers declined to share how much his company makes annually.

"High Profits" first aired in April, with episodes running through 
June. It chronicled Rogers and McGuire through a year and a half of 
trying to become what McGuire calls "the Steve Jobs of marijuana."

One storyline involved the Breckenridge Town Council debating whether 
to kick the store off Main Street, the spot Rogers said they held on 
to despite exorbitant rent while selling medical marijuana in order 
to one day capitalize on tourist money once it was legalized.

One council member questioned what having the store downtown says 
about the identity of Breckenridge.

In the second-to-last episode, Rogers and McGuire are told they must 
pack up and move to a spot two miles from downtown where three other 
shops are located. Business has slumped nearly 30 percent since then, 
Rogers said.

Beyond the exposure a TV show would bring - they still get the 
occasional customer who says the show drew them to the store - 
McGuire said part of the appeal of doing the series was clearing up 
misconceptions.

"The people participating in the marijuana industry are average 
people like Brian and myself," she said. "We're just trying to put 
the work in to build a life for ourselves that we're happy with."

A 2015 Goucher College poll reported that 52 percent of Marylanders 
support legalizing their line of work - and Anderson says that 
sentiment is growing in the General Assembly.

When he introduced legislation in 2013 that would legalize marijuana, 
he had three co-sponsors. By 2015, he had 30.

"I give it a year or two," he said, "before we put together a 
situation in Maryland similar to Colorado."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom