Marijuana farmers cry foul after rural Ca. county legalizes pot farms, taxes them, then bans them - Entrepreneur Generations

Calaveras County (Wikipedia map)

Marijuana farmers in Calaveras County, California, say they feel betrayed after county supervisors took the much-needed tax revenue from their farms and then banned them.

Calaveras (pop. 45,000) was devastated after the 2015 Butte wildfire left millions of dollars of damage. After medical marijuana was legalized in 2016, county supervisors saw marijuana farming as a way to bring in revenue and lured pot farmers in with friendly laws and cheap land. The gambit paid off: the county earned nearly $10 million from a cultivation tax, and $3.7 million in registration fees in less than two years. But soon after, some anti-marijuana supervisors were elected to the five-member board. In January 2018 they voted 3-2 to order growers to cease operations by June.

"The county’s stance has some growers feeling betrayed. Cultivators say they started businesses here with good intentions and want to provide tax revenue to the government. Now, they feel officials have stabbed them in the back — after taking their money," Sarah Parvini reports for the Los Angeles Times. "The debate here reflects a different side of the mania that has swept the state since the sale of recreational marijuana rolled out in January. As some places move to position themselves as pot havens, more conservative counties have decided they want nothing to do with cannabis — either selling it or growing it."

Residents offered different reasons for supporting the ban. Some say they dislike recreational drugs and think funds earned from marijuana farming are "dirty money". Others say they fear gang violence and worry that open marijuana cultivation will encourage more illegal operations. One woman said gang members grew marijuana illegally on an nearby property and were storing guns and other illegal drugs there. The sheriff says there are about 1,000 illegal pot farms in the county, and doesn't have the money to keep track of them all. And Dennis Mills, an anti-pot county supervisor, says he worries that the pesticides used in grow sites could flow into the watershed and contaminate the Mokelumne River. Mills says he also worries that allowing pot farming would ruin the county's rustic character, and argues that the ordinance that allowed it was always meant to be temporary.

But marijuana farmers argue that the money the county earns from pot farming could pay for resources to help protect the environment and beef up law enforcement. Not allowing any legal farms at all opens the door to more illegal grow sites, more gangs, and less revenue from the county and local businesses. Marijuana farmer Prapanna Smith told Parvini that illegal growers won't buy equipment and supplies at local stores: "The underground guys are going to buy elsewhere and bring it in. . . They're not going to the Ace Hardware."

Marijuana growers and their supporters are trying to push out the anti-pot supervisors, and many also plan to file suit.






from The Rural Blog http://ift.tt/2CRVPO9 Marijuana farmers cry foul after rural Ca. county legalizes pot farms, taxes them, then bans them - Entrepreneur Generations

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