LAKEPORT, Calif. – The Board of Supervisors held a four-hour hearing Tuesday afternoon as it began the effort to establish a cultivation ordinance for medical marijuana.
During the hearing the board heard serious criticism of the staff-written document as well as praise for the document from Sheriff Frank Rivero, who called it a “fantastic” starting point.
Community Development Director Rick Coel said the ordinance allows each qualified patient a maximum of six mature or 12 immature plants on residential properties that range in size from 5,000 square foot lots up to an acre. Grows may not take place in multifamily dwellings such as apartments.
The plants can be grown indoors or outdoors; if grown indoors they are limited to a 100-square-foot area, with lighting limited to 1,200 watts. In such homes kitchens, bathrooms and master bedrooms cannot be used for cultivation.
The ordinance would require that tenants provide written permission from landlords to grow medical marijuana on rental properties.
On one-acre or larger properties not inside community growth boundaries, a total of three patients could grow up to 18 mature or 36 immature plants, according to the document.
For larger operations on a minimum of five acres that exceed those basic cultivation limits, a minor use permit would be needed, Coel said. In those cases, as many as 36 mature or 72 immature plants could be cultivated.
He said the ordinance was needed because of environmental damage occurring around the county.
Coel said watersheds are being dammed up; people are camping on rural properties without water, sewer or roads; illegal grading is being done, from terracing to doing deep cuts to build roads; oak trees are being cut down; and wildlife disturbed. Coel showed pictures of such sites he and his staff have had to abate.
In residential areas, homes are being converted to grow houses and, in the process, are sustaining major damage, he said.
Coel said many qualified patients are trying to legitimately meet their health needs in growing the plant. “We've purposefully designed this ordinance to not cause problems for them.”
He told the board, “I strongly believe that this needs to be regulated through the county's land use code.” Coel suggested that, in that way, larger growing operations would be handled through the minor use permit process, the same as wineries, nurseries, cottage industries and other similar operations.
Explaining that he and his staff are out in the field a lot, Coel explained that they get a lot of complaints about the growing operations that are popping up all over Lake County.
“We have folks coming from all over the country. All corners of the country,” he said.
Such growers' agenda is to make a buck and get out, Coel said, adding they're not invested in the community. “It's not benefiting local patients.”
Coel said the ordinance wasn't suggesting following the lead of Mendocino County, which has a licensing process that charges about $7,000 in fees to each grower. The Lake County rules would have fees totaling under $1,000.
A main concern for Coel is criminal liability for county officials.
“We have the federal government breathing down the neck of a lot of local jurisdictions right now” over large scale cultivation operations and dispensaries, he said.
Different perspectives on the document
During public input, the board heard from dispensary owners, growers, patients and local officials, who offered differing opinions of the document's merits.
Middletown dispensary owner Daniel Chadwick wanted to see the guidelines raised to allow for 99 plants. He said he grows indoors, with such plants providing far less than those grown outside. Chadwick said he needs to provide the medication for his 500 patients.
Deputy District Attorney Art Grothe, who has worked narcotics cases for about 20 years, told the board that generally he supported the ordinance, specifically its plant numbers.
He said he wanted to think the process' intent is to let people who need the drug get it, and block out the commercial aspects, which he said Proposition 215 and SB 420 never meant to set up.
Grothe also asked the board to make violations for those who grow more plants than the ordinance allows a misdemeanor, which will allow law enforcement to take action. Otherwise, they will have to follow abatement procedures.
Cobb resident Mac McCullough said he and his wife and his 95-year-old mother-in-law live next door to an individual who grows marijuana on a small residential lot. He said they put up with the stench from the plants for three months a year.
“This makes us sick,” he said. “It also brings crime.”
McCullough added, “They destroyed our neighborhood.”
When McCullough hears people say growing marijuana doesn't bother anyone – as some speakers had stated during the hearing – “That's BS, OK, because it does bother people and it bothers me.”
Craig Shannon of Lake County Farm Bureau pointed out, “All crops being grown in this county are highly regulated,” explaining that local, state and federal agencies oversee water quality, employment issues, air quality and more.
Many ordinary farms have to deal with those regulations, he said. “We're only requesting that a level playing field be established.”
Bob Dutcher, a Realtor from Kelseyville, said he's also seeing people come from all over the country to grow marijuana in Lake County. He said he wanted to see residential zoning prohibited, pointing out that residential lots also don't allow for other agricultural-type uses like livestock.
In about 45 minutes of comments to the board, Rivero told the board, “I commend you for taking this topic on. It's not an easy topic.”
Like Coel, he pointed out that cities, counties and politicians are being threatened with “federal criminal liability” if they're involved in licensing large commercial grows. “You have to take that into account,” Rivero said.
On the flip side, Rivero said, is marijuana's legal uses, with true patients getting tarnished by profiteers.
Coel has taken “a very courageous stand on this,” said Rivero, noting that he and Coel had consulted extensively on the proposed ordinance.
Rivero also made clear that he didn't want the sheriff's office making money off of licensing marijuana operations, as is the case in Mendocino County.
“I don't want the sheriff's office profiting from marijuana in any way, shape or form,” Rivero said. “I think that is contradictory to our mission and what we should be doing.”
He also suggested, “We must control this and we must control it now,” telling the board, “My office needs guidance. My office needs your guidance.”
Rivero also urged the board to act in a timely manner.
In his remarks he said he believed allowing as many as 99 plants in growing operations, as other areas have done, was “excessive.”
Rivero also suggested that the planning department was the right agency to oversee the issues. He added that people who don't grow marijuana but who live near grows also needed to be respected, as they have a right to enjoy their property.
The board will continue the discussion on the ordinance at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 20.
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