This is largely the doing of the State legislature’s Black caucus. They held up legalization for years in a political climate where both the leftists and moderates/liberals agreed it was the right thing to do, because the Black Caucus wanted the first licenses to be reserved for Black people. The State did what was legal in reserving them for “justice involved individuals,” but the damage was done and the rollout has been slow as all hell because of it.

Here’s a 2019 write up from the NYT about it.