Page 6 - Sonoma County Gazette November 2018

ORDINANCE cont’d from page 1
County staff and supervisors have visited residential homes which sit 125 feet from a cannabis grow building and experienced first-hand the odor, noise and blight nuisance. However, the County continues to ignore these issues.
Sonoma County’s current cannabis ordinance states:
“Medical cannabis uses shall not create a public nuisance or adversely affect the health or safety of the nearby residents or businesses by creating dust, light, glare, heat, noise, noxious gasses, odor, smoke, traffic, vibration, unsafe conditions or other impacts, or be hazardous due to the use or storage of
Environmental Impact Report (EIR). The entire program must be halted until a thorough EIR can be conducted.
materials, processes, products, runoff or wastes”.
2. Donate to sosneighborhoods.com. We need to cover many costs including printing, mailers, website maintenance, legal action, lobbying.
The County is ignoring its own ordinance regarding protecting residents’ safety, security and right to enjoy their private property.
3. Write to the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors voicing your concerns and objections to this failed policy.
Four fed-up families in Petaluma, who were negatively impacted by noise and odor from a neighboring cannabis business, had to file a lawsuit against their grower for County officials to finally take action and shutdown the cannabis site. (SEE No Pot on Purvine).
For further information and to receive all supporting information for the details outlined above: contact info@sosneighborhoods.com
Ironically, the county recently issued a press release proclaiming progress
to “right the cannabis ship” with cannabis operation shutdowns and
assessing fines. There are now two full-time employees to enforce all county- wide cannabis land use codes. Yet we still have cannabis cultivators in the middle of neighborhoods who have no county-issued use permit to operate. Neighborhoods adjacent to the high value cash crop continue to have concerns about the self- monitoring water consumption and insufficient fire road access.
Save Our Sonoma Neighborhoods (SOSN) is a grassroots group of Sonoma County citizens advocating to improve Sonoma County’s Cannabis Land Use Ordinance that currently endangers Sonoma County residents, their homes, property values, environment and safety. We call for a moratorium on all new cannabis permits until a new ordinance is drafted and approved, one which supports the interests of ALL Sonoma County residents.
NO POT on PURVINE
SOSN demands the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, the Planning Commission and staff fully address all of our neighborhood concerns, and suspend all cannabis permitting until a new ordinance can be drafted and approved. The new ordinance must support the interests of ALL Sonoma County residents, not just those of the Commercial Cannabis Industry.
Call to action:
1. Get engaged in our cause and learn more. Like us on Facebook and join sosneighborhoods.com This impacts all Sonoma County residents.
This will become everyone’s problem if we don’t speak up
now.
achieves temporary restraining order protection
Sonoma County’s Board of Supervisors deliberated on October 16 and
voted on a revised cannabis ordinance that provided several more favorable conditions for growers, including increasing use permits to 5 years prior to recognizing that such a business should not be 10 or 300 feet from a bedroom window (as is allowed today), allowing an additional 25% cultivation area for propagation, and allowing variances to park setback requirements for growers. This makes it much easier for commercial cannabis facilities to be located very close to all our parks. The Board did vote to require new applications to be
on parcels of at least 10 acres, but will grandfather in all permits and pipeline applications on smaller parcels.
A group of Sonoma County residents has filed a lawsuit to shut down
an illegal pot grow and cannabis tourism operation in the Purvine Road neighborhood. The suit alleges that the unlicensed grower is transforming a peaceful stretch of the Petaluma Dairy Belt into an unlawful cannabis event venue, corporate retreat and cannabis tourism destination.
This pro-grower proposal strengthens a cannabis business’ position inside neighborhoods and closer to schools and parks, before addressing neighborhood compatibility and public health and safety
Neighbors also object to steps by the owners to turn the property into a cannabis event venue and retreat. Group dinners, featuring cannabis-infused food and cocktails, are hosted in a barn which the owners renovated for that purpose. The property is advertised online, for a minimum fee of $8,000, as
a “private retreat” for up to 250 guests, with overnight accommodations and event-related offerings, such as furniture rental, staff and catering.
The County wants residents to prove and argue that living within a few feet of cannabis plants negatively impacts their home and life -- for residents to “have a voice in the permit process.”
Neighbors are asking the court to halt these activities as illegal under both state and local law. Named as defendants in the lawsuit are the San Francisco- based property owner and cannabis operator, Petaluma Hills Farm, LLC and Sonoma Hills Farm, LLC; their owners and officers; and the cannabis tour operator, The Sonoma County Experience, LLC.
Who will win that battle?
Those who don’t know how to navigate government process - or the beneficiaries and consultants to cannabis revenue and county tax revenue?
On October 18, the court issued a temporary restraining order prohibiting the defendants from cultivating cannabis without a license and permit; hosting cannabis events or engaging in cannabis promotional activities; sponsoring non-cannabis events without an event permit; and operating the property as a vacation rental or bed and breakfast. A further hearing is set for November.
We believe that Sonoma County officials are NOT protecting its residents from cannabis related crime in neighborhoods, fire risks and environmental damage due to lack of code enforcement:
1) Commercial marijuana facilities do not belong in residential neighborhoods regardless of zoning: They belong in industrial zones.
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are residents of Purvine Road and a neighborhood advocacy group, No Pot on Purvine. Phoebe Lang, one of the plaintiffs, said the neighbors took legal action when it became clear that their once-quiet neighborhood was under attack. “We cherish the beauty and tranquility of rural Sonoma,” she said, “and will fight to preserve our peaceful way of life. Purvine Road is no place for tour buses full of party-goers.”
2) Fire safety practices are not being followed by Sonoma County officials: Despite suffering one of the state’s deadliest and largest wildfires in October 2017, Sonoma County is completely ignoring road and fire safety issues by allowing commercial marijuana businesses to operate in remote areas accessed by narrow, winding one lane roads which places residents’ lives at risk. This violates common sense.
Britt Christiansen, another plaintiff, added, “I want to raise my family in the country, not next to an event center and tourist stop. I love the fresh air and quiet evenings. I love knowing all my neighbors. All that will be lost if the cannabis tourism operation at 334 Purvine Road continues.”
3) Sonoma County is ignoring environmental laws in its unyielding
support of the cannabis industry: This County’s most flagrant disregard
for environmental laws is its purposeful and deceptive use of a “Negative Declaration” for the Medicinal Cannabis in County Cannabis Ordinance enacted in 2016. County officials claim by bringing illegal growers “out of the shadows and into the regulated market”, the impact to the environment would be positive.
Attorney Kevin Block of Block & Block LLP is representing the neighbors. “None of my clients is against legal cannabis,” he said. “But illegal cannabis, and cannabis tourism, are a different kettle of fish. Illegal operators must be shut down in order for legal operators to succeed. And the ban on cannabis tourism should be kept in place until the County can thoroughly study its detrimental neighborhood and environmental impacts.”
Instead of shrinking the illegal sector while growing the legal one, the ordinance has simply added one on top of the other. And now the County is expanding the scope of cultivation and manufacturing to include recreational marijuana in addition to medical marijuana; this should trigger a full
“We will be filing a code enforcement complaint with Sonoma County shortly,” Block continued. “The County has tools and resources that are not available to my clients as private citizens. We want and expect the County to be our full partner in ending the illegal activity on Purvine Road.”
6 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 11/18
The grow, located at 334 Purvine Road, has been operating without a permit since 2017. According to neighbors, tourists regularly visit the property on “cannabis experience tours,” arriving on buses to view the cannabis operation and eat and relax at picnic tables in the cannabis field.