2018 Video – Supervisors show strong support for neighborhoods So what happened after that?

April 2018 Cannabis Study Session – Board of Supervisors expressed lots of concern about protecting our rural neighborhoods from pot grows.

They sound like a group of neighborhood advocates. Whatever happened after that was a shocking transformation.

Below clip summarizes their comments from that hearing most interesting to us:

The 2 min version:

Full meeting:

Extracts (See end for full transcript)

Zane:

We have a hodgepodge of zones in our general plan and it doesn’t take into consideration neighborhoods
The people who commit the crimes in the neighborhoods don’t care if you have a permit or not
We have to do due diligence to protect these rural neighborhoods
We need to go after neighborhood compatibility and make that happen
A vacation rental is not nearly as impacting on a community neighborhood as a cannabis grow

Rabbitt

I think our county and our stakeholder outreach doesn’t do a service to our residents

When you have a couple of homes around a grow and you have these conflicts, somethings gotta give whether you have a minimum DA parcel size, increase setbacks from residents, precluding AR and RR adjacencies …. prohibit cannabis on DA parcels immediately adjacent to AR and RR zoning districts, increase distance to single family dwellings… (See more great Rabbitt words at 2:00)

“Don’t buy property and then try to get permits, but figure out what you can put on the property before you buy it”

All this talk about how this money is going to flood into the county, it’s not flooding in here

Grows should not occur next to a community where it is not wanted

Hopkins

specifically address public safety because it is a high value product

Gorin

I am a neighborhood advocate

We need to move the cultivation away from residential neighborhoods

I said before neighborhood compatibility was my number one priority

The great folks in Bennett Valley who have concerns about concentration

A beautiful community being torn up in the most aggregious way

The complaint driven process has not served us well

I came into office as a very passionate neighborhood advocate

I feel very strongly that I will work to protect the neighborhoods

Gore

Every decision we make affects peoples homes, their families their property values and we have to take that seriously

I voted to keep it out of rural residential and ag residential neighborhoods and places where you had community concerns, including my own

Full transcript for 7 min excerpt clips in which the Supervisors gave closing remarks after hearing the concerns of residents who live next to cannabis businesses.

Supervisor Zane:

“I am really concerned about the neighborhood compatibility…really pleaded with us to consider their quality of life, I think we need to relook at these zones…we have such a hodgepodge of zones in our general plan, it’s crazy making and it doesn’t take into consideration the neighborhoods so we’ve got to do a better job. I think the most important thing for me that was said today, Seargant Laduc, came up and said, the people who commit the crimes in the neighborhoods, they don’t care whether you have a permit or not. They don’t care. They are going after the product. And we haven’t done enough due diligence to protect these rural neighborhoods and some of them are small and some of them are bigger…Go after that neighborhood compatibility… we need to make sure that neighborhood compatibility happens…and our vacation rental in my opinion is not nearly as impacting on a community neighborhood than a cannabis grow”.

Supervisor Rabbitt:

“I think our county and our stakeholder outreach doesn’t do us service to our residents and part of it is our residents don’t step up early enough and there is special interest groups that will always be the stakeholders that will come to every meeting and everyone else is busy doing their work and going off and doing everything else and then they turn up and go what the hell happened. And I hope that you figured out the risk and reward part of that as most businesses do. It’s expensive to open a restaurant just as it is expensive to, I guess, to plant cultivation. But when there is a couple of homes around a grow, and you have these conflicts, something has got to work out, whether you exclude, whether you have a minimum DA parcel size, whether you have an increased setback from the residents property to the grow, whether it’s precluding AR and RR adjacencies…it’s about the minimum parcel size, increased setbacks, or prohibit cannabis permits on DA parcels immediately adjacent to AR/RR zoning districts, increase the minimum distance to parcels having single family dwellings. I mean it concerns me that. I think a lot of the angst comes about the violence, which you can’t over, um, you just can’t pass off. It’s only going to be a matter of time before that same violence occurs on a permitted site. In my opinion, the only reason it hasn’t yet is because you have such a small amount of permitted sites. Friends from back East kicked in 3 neighbors’ door and, uh, pistol whipped someone. That’s scary. And there were enough houses around that particular neighborhood that you could not tell who owned what piece of parcel on the fence lines and everything else. I think what we really need to do as a county is to push people away from the residences and have the grows out in larger, more open areas. You have to make sure that you are not going to be a detriment to the neighborhood. You know there is a 10-acre DA parcel that would be the worst one possible to plant a grow and there is a 10-acre DA parcel out there that would be perfectly fine. How do you differentiate between the two? If we just say 10 acres in the zoning ordinance, it will immediately have a fire because of the one that is not appropriate much to those who, don’t buy property and then try to get the permit but actually try to figure out what you can put on the property before they buy it. We need to figure out our own budgeting system so that we can pay for this so that it isn’t coming out of the general fund, because right now, that’s what’s happening, and again, all the talk of how much money is going to flood into the county, it’s not flooding in here. So, it’s going into someone’s pocket but it’s not here.

Supervisor Hopkins:

“Looking at evidence-based adjustments, and looking specifically at specific situations that I have seen, that seem problematic. How do you stop murders? The total lack of setbacks on indoor cultivation. And when I see a barn that is literally at a property line…what makes this incompatible with neighborhood character and then addressing that thoughtfully and sensitively. I think we really need to focus on specifically the impacts of cannabis cultivation…Cultivation are of less concern to me than the specific impacts of cannabis which I see as safety, and that’s specifically because it’s a high value, highly portable commodity… the things that might make people feel safer. But I do acknowledge that as a parent that for some, that particular aroma is something that they don’t want their kids to experience”.

Supervisor Gorin:

“I am a neighborhood advocate and I absolutely understand the concerns of the neighborhoods, both from an odor perspective and an overconcentration perspective…Trying to remove the cultivation away from impacting a residential neighborhood. And so we banned the cultivation in the RR and the AR for some very good reasons…I said at the very beginning, neighborhood compatibility was my very highest priority…Part of the conflict in that is neighborhood compatibility…It doesn’t mean that neighborhood compatibility is going to be on the backburner because as I said before, it’s number one in my priority…Very legitimate issues on setbacks…there are lots of conversations that should happen and I am excited about engaging in those conversations…And I am not losing sight of the great folks in the Bennett value, who have some serious concerns about concentration issues, trust me, I have those concerns, I have those concerns just as well…And not necessarily abiding by our environmental regulations and permitting codes on electrical conditions and grading conditions, and reporting their concerns of a beautiful community being torn up in the most egregious ways, and, the trees cutting down. The complaint driven process hasn’t served us well…resolve some of the community conflicts that we have seen surfacing today”.

Supervisor Gore:

“I both turned in a grow that was next to my house that caused me a lot of concern…One, community compatibility…some business sense and some neighborhood protections to the table.

Supervisor Rabbitt:

“Where the grows should occur, it’s not certainly next door to a neighbor who doesn’t want you next door. And I think there are plenty of properties in the county where that could be accommodated”

Supervisor Gore:

“Fortunately, every decision we make affects peoples livelihoods, their property values, their homes, their families, and we have to take that seriously… More expeditiously deals with neighborhood concerns, and business clarity…I filed a complaint, because it was a grow was 200 feet from my house…I voted, and a lot of you did too, to keep it out of the rural residential and agricultural residential neighborhoods and in places where you had community concern, and, um, including my own”.

Supervisor Gorin:

“I came into elective office as a very passionate neighborhood advocate. I feel very strongly that I will work to protect the neighborhoods”.