Agenda Item
5g) Discussion and Possible Action Including Certification of the Mendocino County Referendum Petition Protesting the Ordinance Adopting Chapter 22.19 - Commercial Cannabis Activity Land Use Development Ordinance and Amending Chapter 10A.17 - Mendocino Cannabis Cultivation Ordinance and Chapter 20.242 - Cannabis Cultivation Sites
(Sponsor: Assessor/Clerk-Recorder)
In answer to several board members’ expressed concern that if we rescind Chapter 22.18, we have to start all over on a new ordinance, and that it would allow for even more water hauling, hoop houses, and even more illegal grows, you are right, but only in the fact that as it currently stands, 10A.17 does allow unregulated water hauling, hoop houses, and other unfortunate negative impacts. Those impacts have been inherent since the original ordinance was first approved. However, not only is it possible to make changes to the 10A.17 ordinance, it is absolutely necessary in order to fix the mess this cannabis program has created since its inception, changes that the small, legacy growers, who have been waiting for years to legalize, understand and want.
You “can’t amend 10A.17,” you say? Please read the “Recommended Action” printed in your own agenda for today’s meeting, which says you have two possible choices: “Either (1) repeal the ordinance adopting Chapter 22.19 . . . and amending Chapter 10a.17 . . . or (2) submit the ordinance to the voters at the next regular election.” It doesn’t take a high-priced attorney to understand what that means.
Please, please do your job, do your homework, do what Sonoma County and others are doing to get the cannabis industry right: Rescind 22.18/19, make the necessary changes to 10A.17, and begin searching for qualified environmental scientists and other experts to create an Environmental Impact Report that serves the specific needs of this county. You have the money, which is obvious in the many ways you have found to spend it, and which are revealed in several separate items in today’s meeting. Now please rescind 22.18/19 and get to work on amending the original ordinance. Thank you.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CTztAn5rySG/
Good Afternoon Supervisors,
Sheila Jenkins, Steering Committee member for the referendum
According to our referendum attorney, the board has only two options: to rescind 22.18 or put the ordinance to a vote. The board does not have the choice to make changes to 22.18.
We are in agreement with the board and with the Mendocino Cannabis Alliance that the processing of the Phase One, legacy growers should be a priority, and we are open to amending 10A.17 to allow for discretionary land use processes which would further that aim.
We also agree that 10A.17 could be further improved by the addition of protections to prevent trucked water for Cannabis grows and the rocking of soils for hoop houses.
Water is, I think, our number one concern and more needs to be done to protect our existing wells and watersheds.
The county seems to be at cross purposes with this - it has been urging the conservation of water, while at the same time, it has been handing out hoop house permits by the thousands. These permits usually require large inputs of water and the excavation of large areas.
Since our rivers and lakes are running low and choked with both silt and toxic algae, I think that more needs to be done to minimize excavation. And the automatic issuance of well permits without knowing the availability of water within each water basin needs to come to an end, too.
Groundwater data for each water basin must be available and hydrological studies must be required before the issuance of well permits. We don’t have this data because we don’t have an EIR, and we agree with CDFW that we need an EIR!
Humboldt county has identified every watershed and set a limit on the number of Cannabis sites and wells for each watershed. We could do this as well.
So, 10A.17 could be amended or a new ordinance adopted to address these, and other concerns, and we should do so as soon as possible.
I urge you to rescind and not waste time and a lot of our money on a ballot.
This community does not want a corporate cannabis model or an expansion. And they do not want to be asked to sacrifice their views, their safety, or their way of life for this industry. So, we need to design a more respectful process that includes the community, and a more protective and sensitive cannabis ordinance that the community can support.