First post on the_donald as I'm from Illinois and it deeply hurts seeing my home state perpetually blasted all over reddit. For the record, Illinois deserves it because of the level of corruption ingrained within.
I have worked in multiple sectors and I saw this financial monstrosity coming years ago. On a distant yet similar note, my family could have applied for a license and create a cultivation center for marijuana...would this have solved ALL the problems Illinois faces?..absolutely not. Would this have helped though?..absolutely. We even came up with a plan to connect and assist the the retirement system, education system, and even help veterans coming home by allowing a stimulus grant for them. Eventually Illinois will allow marijuana for recreational purposes and I wanted to ensure Illinois was redirecting funds or have a plan to help the state in that way. Kind of like Colorado now. Not have a system to help the 'good ol' boy' club.
I'm stealing this paragraph from an article that explains why me, my family, and my veteran friends couldn't afford something like this, despite how great it sounds:
“For cultivation center applications, it helps to have large-scale agricultural experience,” explains the next speaker, Steven Cooksey, MedMen’s director of licensing. A history of growing wacky tobacco in particular will boost your case—but that experience better not have come in Illinois, because that would be a felony, taking you out of the running. Would-be ganjapreneurs do need plenty of the other green stuff, however, because proof of sizable liquid assets ($400,000 for dispensaries; $500,000 for cultivation centers) is required and there is a hefty nonrefundable application fee ($5,000 for dispensaries; $25,000 for cultivation centers). Once permits are issued, pot businesses must also provide evidence of good-faith money in the form of a surety bond, letter of credit, or escrow account ($50,000 for dispensaries; a cool $2 million for cultivation centers).
Because this is Illinois, other factors could come into play, such as the need to kiss the rings of local bigwigs. At this moment, politically connected lawyers and consultants are scrambling behind the scenes—and charging retainers of up to $10,000—to introduce aspiring cannabis capitalists to local officials and influencers (such as prominent physicians or chamber of commerce leaders) whose support could juice an application. “If you can show you’ve spoken to city officials and there’s some reasonable expectation that you [have support] in that community, it can go a long way,” says one consultant, who requested anonymity so as not to jeopardize the applications of his clients."
So if I was rich and connected, I could have an opportunity to help the state out but that kind of goes against every reason why I wanted to do it.
Illinois is corrupt to the core.