Housing Works, a New York City-based nonprofit dedicated to housing, healthcare and advocacy to uplift low-income New Yorkers, formed three decades ago during the AIDS epidemic.

Through the years, Housing Works has continued to fund their impactful social programs in ingenious ways, first by running a chain of successful Thrift Shops, and more recently by taking part in New York’s burgeoning legal cannabis industry. In 2022, they opened Housing Works Cannabis Co, the first legal adult-use cannabis dispensary in New York City and have recently opened a second location in NoMad.

“One-hundred percent of our proceeds here at the cannabis dispensary go back into our mission of helping people who are HIV positive or marginalized in other ways find housing. We also help them with job training for HIV-positive individuals and justice-involved workers, many of whom are employed at our dispensaries,” said Sasha Nutgent, Housing Work Cannabis’ Co. Vice President of Cannabis Retail.

As they’ve grown, Housing Works has established a business wing to oversee their cannabis dispensaries, Housing Works Cannabis Co, which showcases products from LGBTQ-owned, Black-owned, and small farm cannabis companies over multi-state operators, while providing stable employment to HIV-positive and marginalized workers. 

In formalizing their cannabis efforts, Housing Works Cannabis Co met some complications, especially when it came to providing 401(k) benefit continuity to their employees. That’s when they found Leading Retirement Solutions (LRS), a groundbreaking retirement benefits service provider committed to serving mission-driven, minority-owned businesses in the cannabis industry.

“Too often, cannabis employees are excluded from basic financial benefits because of federal restrictions, said Kirsten Curry, Founder and CEO of LRS. “At LRS, our commitment is to make sure organizations like Housing Works don’t have to choose between their mission and their people.”

A Continuity Problem

In 2023, Housing Works Cannabis Co began working with LRS to provide their cannabis employees stable and compliant 401(k) benefits, after they encountered an issue quite common for cannabis companies: Their pre-existing 401(k) provider wouldn’t work with their cannabis employees because of the illegal status at the federal level.

“Our cannabis employees couldn’t go under our 403(b) plan that we already had in place,” said Leonor Rivera, Director of Human Resources at Housing Works. “So, we had to quickly find an outside 401(k) provider that would accept cannabis employees.”

Not only was LRS equipped to work with cannabis companies, they provided Housing Works with a plan that could be quickly implemented. This was key. The New York City legal cannabis industry had exploded from just a few dispensaries to over 100 across the city in just a matter of years, and Housing Works didn’t want to lose momentum or employees because they couldn’t offer them 401(k) benefits.

“Really we were just like, ‘who’s willing to do cannabis right in New York State and work with our cannabis store as quickly as possible?’ Because we needed all this help fast. And LRS said, we can get this started tomorrow,” said Rivera.

Great Employee Experience

As Housing Works swiftly transitioned to working with LRS, Rivera and other members of the Human Resources team were impressed with the way LRS reduced their administrative overhead and supported employee participants. 

“I definitely trust that LRS is capable of managing our 401(k) program from A to Z,” said Rivera. “I like the idea that the employee can manage their details directly through the LRS website and that HR’s only position is to inform or educate the employees about what they need to do.” 

About two years into the collaboration, Rivera is confident that LRS can handle the complexities that come with 401(k) plans in the cannabis space. Nutgent, who has used the LRS admin portal to manage her own employee plan contributions, also notes that between the support she receives from LRS and Housing Works’ HR team, she feels her future is well taken care of. 

“My experience has been really great,” Nutgent said. “This is really something that I wanted to sign up for to support my future and it’s easy to navigate because we have really well-versed people in our HR department that help us employees figure it out.”

Equity through Benefits

As a company that was recently nominated for MJBizCon’s Advocacy Organization of the Year, Housing Works Cannabis Co knew that providing high-quality retirement benefits was an essential part of maintaining their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. After all, it allows them to support marginalized workers beyond just employment.

Case in point: Through its collaboration with LRS, Housing Works now offers all employees across its retail cannabis and nonprofit operations access to the same high-quality retirement benefits. While not the sole driver of retention, this offering has been especially meaningful for longtime employees like Nutgent, who has been with the organization for a decade.

“We wanted to make sure that whatever benefit you get in one division of the company, you have the same benefit in another division. LRS allows us to be able to continue to offer that. That is something that we are grateful for,” said Rivera, who added she would “absolutely” recommend LRS to other companies.

At present, manual payroll upload is currently sufficient for Housing Works’ 401(k) participation level, but as participation grows, a goal of Rivera’s and her team’s, they are grateful to know that auto-enrollment and payment integration services are offered to maintain a seamless employee experience.

“We don’t just service cannabis companies, we advocate for them,” said Curry. “Housing Works needed a service provider who understood the regulatory realities of the industry and shared their belief in equity, inclusion, and long?term stability for employees.”