Gene Hickman

Photo Credit: Joe Budd

“Small growers ain’t makin’ money no more”

My name is Gene Hickman, but everybody just call me Geno. I'm originally from Chicago, but moved to San Francisco when I was 11 and lived on Natoma ever since.

I went to high school out here. Wilson first, but that closed in ‘84, so I graduated from Mission and attended City College for two years. Still need one semester, then I'll graduate. I just made 50-years-old. I'm still here.

Growing up, I was mostly just hanging out with Rudy (Corpuz). He’s my cousin. We used to run through these alleys, getting away from the truant officer and everything, and we’d always go to this gym down the block. That was our spot when we were little.

But when the center got closed down and was gone, that's when we was gettin' in trouble. We’d be outside, blazin' up a joint, the police would come by. We'd go behind cars and get down low. After they gone, we’d fire up. You know?

Or if they did stop us, they’d dig in our pockets and see if we had anything else besides weed. If they just came up with the weed, they’d take it. That was it. We didn't really get too much in trouble over weed.

But later, we had kinda graduated and gotten older and you know, we were dealin' weed and everything else. We made good money too. But that's what got us into trouble.

I took a bullet. And got stabbed. You know, cats catch up to you, wanna rob you - that's how that happened. After that, I was done.

After I got out of the hospital, Rudy had went to jail, I had to bail him out. We were both done. And then, you know, we just talked about always startin' a center like the one we had as kids.

When he first started United Playaz, he pulled me in and we did gang prevention and I worked at the schools: Paul Revere, James Lick, all those. I used to have kids on my roster to take care of, it was all good. Spent my days gettin' them jobs and everything. It was everything we wanted. I'm so proud how they be doin' now.

A lot of my friends are dead from that life - that's not the life I want to live anymore. I did it for my family, and now if I got a chance to get 'em out of it, I don't wanna turn back to it no more.

My daughter, now she's 29 years old, and my grandson's 7. I see him every weekend. That’s my legacy. My long-term goal was to get outta the game, don't get shot at, don't have to look over my back no more, get my daughter, and raise her the best that I could. I did that.

Now, the only thing I do is cultivate. I love to grow. Right now I just got a nice plant at my house - just one plant. I like the way weed helps people. Cannabis, you keep smokin' you gon' eat. That's a good thing for people with AIDS or HIV, or cancer.  If it helps patients. I'm all for it.

But the way I see it, legalization is all about money. If they can get some money off it, tax it, they will. But it seems to be that the small growers ain't makin' money no more; the weed is gettin' cheaper and cheaper.

I would like to see the growers, the small growers, be included in the big dispensaries, so they can make some money too. It seems like the Humboldt County guys got regulated, can grow these huge amounts, so that's the only weed that they usin'. They should include the little guys some kinda way because they the ones who started it, you know? And their profits are going way down.