When California voters legalized marijuana, they were promised that part of the tax revenue from pot sales and cultivation would be devoted to programs to teach youth how to avoid substance abuse.

But more than a year after the start of sales, there’s no money for those programs and questions are looming about how they might operate in the future.

The absence of funding is “really sad and disappointing,” said Robert Harris, a policy adviser and lobbyist for the California Society of Addiction Medicine.

Equally troubling, he added, is the lack of clear guidelines for how that funding would be divvied up, and how programs would be run and evaluated.

Many have called 2018 the Year of the Woman. And the cannabis industry was no exception.

According to a new report by Eaze, an online market place and technology platform for legal cannabis, the number of women buying cannabis in California doubled in 2018 from the year before.  

"We see a strong majority of women are using cannabis for wellness reasons like personal care and improved sleep," said Peter Gigante, head of policy research at Eaze.

The study also found a growth in the use of CBD products -- such as face and body creams and bath bombs -- among female boomers. 

The vape pen category has shown enormous growth in the cannabis industry, but not all vapes are created equal. Consumers are also beginning to show a preference in their purchasing habits when it comes to vapes as well. Kurvana has kept an eye on these trends and has managed to make a product to satisfy multiple consumers.

The police didn’t want it. Neither did local officials. But the public demanded it. And now, pot companies in California can deliver marijuana directly to your home.

Think of it as a kind of Uber Eats for the cannabis consumer.

“The public spoke loud and clear in favor of statewide delivery,” said Alex Traverso, spokesman for the state’s cannabis bureau, according to USA Today. That was after the bureau issued the new regulation allowing home delivery anywhere.

• Barneys New York is entering the cannabis industry with the opening of a head shop called The High End in its Beverly Hills store, according to The New York Times.
• The High End will offer luxe cannabis products, marijuana-inspired jewelry, CBD infused beauty products, and paraphernalia, including a $1,475 pot grinder.

This year, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival will culminate the weekend of April 20th—a.k.a. 420. But today, the city of Coachella is celebrating breaking ground on a massive new cannabis facility. The more than 40-acre facility will house cultivation, manufacturing and distribution operations. With a plan to finish all construction early 2020, city officials and industry heads hope the Coachella Cann Park will bring jobs and economic revitalization to the city.

Canndescent is looking to redefine vaping with the launch of the company’s Stylus series, a family of vape accessories and ultra-pure oils.

The first launch—which took place Jan. 28, 2019—debuted a rechargeable accessory and its matching cartridges in the company’s five signature effects: Calm, Cruise, Create, Connect and Charge, notes a statement from Canndescent, a California-based cultivator that, in 2018, was the state’s top-selling brand of luxury flower products.

The University of California at Berkeley has announced the creation of a research center that will study the effects of the cannabis industry on the state. The new center will analyze the impact that cannabis production has on the environment and society, including communities that grow cannabis. The policies and regulations enacted to control those impacts will also be studied.

The Cannabis Research Center will be led by co-directors Van Butsic and Ted Grantham of the UC Berkeley Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management. Grantham told campus media that California’s evolving cannabis policy should be guided by science.