This opinion was contributed by Hollister resident Catherine Eva Booth Vaughan. The opinions expressed do not necessarily represent BenitoLink or other affiliated contributors. Lea este artÃculo en español aqui.
San Benito County has an opportunity to rebuild its cannabis program, but the Board of Supervisors should not rush into expanding cultivation simply because growers are asking for more acreage.
This decision will affect neighborhoods, roads, water, enforcement, county staffing and taxpayers for years. Once large cultivation operations are established, reversing course becomes much more difficult.
The county needs to get this right the first time.
Keep commercial cannabis far away from neighborhoods
Large-scale cannabis cultivation does not belong next to residential neighborhoods.
Whatever one’s opinion of cannabis itself, commercial cultivation can bring truck traffic, employees, lighting, security concerns, odors and other impacts that neighboring families did not sign up for when they purchased their homes.
The county should establish substantial setbacks between commercial cannabis operations and existing homes and residential neighborhoods.
A few hundred feet may look adequate on a map. It can feel very different to the family living next door.
Protecting existing residents should come before maximizing the number of cultivatable acres.
Cannabis should pay its own way
The county should also resist pressure to set the acreage tax artificially low.
Growers understandably want the lowest possible cost per acre. That’s what any business owner would want.
But the people asking to pay the tax should not be the ones effectively determining what that tax needs to be.
Their perspective should absolutely be heard, but growers have an obvious financial interest in obtaining the lowest possible acreage tax. Their recommendations therefore should not be treated as neutral advice about what is best for the county’s finances.
The Board’s responsibility is broader.
Supervisors represent the taxpayers who will be left paying the bill if cannabis revenue doesn’t cover the additional government services the industry requires.
Cannabis taxation should be set high enough to realistically pay for code enforcement, inspections, permitting, environmental oversight, sheriff and public-safety impacts, road impacts, administrative costs and the additional county employees necessary to regulate the industry properly.
If the county collects a relatively small amount in cannabis taxes but spends nearly as much—or more—administering and enforcing the program, that isn’t economic development.
It’s a subsidy.
Build the infrastructure before expanding the industry
This is one of my biggest concerns with the discussion so far.
Before dramatically increasing cannabis acreage, the Board should be asking:
Do we have enough people to regulate what we’re approving?
San Benito County already has limited staff and resources.
Expanding an industry with complicated permitting, environmental, taxation and enforcement requirements without first establishing adequate staffing is backwards.
Determine the true cost of administering the program.
Determine how many additional employees will be required.
Determine the enforcement costs.
Determine the infrastructure impacts.
Then determine the tax necessary to pay for it.
The county shouldn’t approve a large expansion first and figure out how to regulate it afterward.
Stop confusing approved acreage with actual cultivation
The county also needs a much clearer system for its existing acreage.
An approval sitting on paper indefinitely should not permanently consume part of the county’s cannabis acreage allowance.
There should be reasonable deadlines for applicants to become fully licensed and operational. If an operator doesn’t move forward within those deadlines, unused acreage should eventually return to the available pool.
The county needs to know the difference between:
acreage approved, acreage licensed, and acreage actually being cultivated.
Those are not the same thing.
Without accurate accounting, the Board cannot make an informed decision about whether additional acreage is even necessary.
The Board needs to stop being so wishy-washy
The Board of Supervisors needs to establish clear policy and stand behind it.
Watching the discussion, there seems to be far too much movement depending upon who happens to be speaking at the microphone.
Cannabis growers ask for lower taxes.
Residents ask for greater setbacks.
Industry representatives want more acreage.
County departments need resources.
That is precisely why we elect supervisors—to weigh competing interests and make decisions for the entire county, not simply accommodate whichever group is making the strongest presentation that day.
Growers and farmers should absolutely have a seat at the table. They understand agriculture and the economics of cultivation better than most of us.
But when the discussion turns to how much growers should pay per acre, the Board needs independent financial analysis.
Asking the industry what it would like to pay is easy.
Determining what the industry actually costs San Benito County is responsible government.
There is no reason to rush
Perhaps most importantly, there is no emergency requiring the Board to make this decision immediately.
Cannabis isn’t going anywhere.
If it takes another several months to establish proper setbacks, calculate regulatory costs, determine staffing requirements, analyze infrastructure impacts and create a defensible acreage tax, then take the several months.
San Benito County has spent years dealing with the consequences of development decisions where infrastructure came later.
We shouldn’t repeat that mistake with cannabis.
I’m not opposed to rebuilding a legal cannabis industry in San Benito County. Done correctly, it could generate agricultural activity, jobs and meaningful county revenue.
But expansion should occur on the county’s terms—not the industry’s.
Keep large cultivation operations away from neighborhoods.
Require cannabis businesses to pay their fair share of the costs they create.
Hire the staff and establish the infrastructure necessary to regulate them.
Create firm deadlines so unused cannabis acreage doesn’t remain locked up indefinitely.
And above all, do not rush this process just because growers want an answer.
The Board of Supervisors has one opportunity to build a cannabis system that actually works.
Take the time. Protect residents. Protect taxpayers. And get it right.To paraphrase Supervisor Curro, ” I don’t want the public and future Supervisors coming up here years down the road, questioning what the heck we are doing, like we do with all of the development and infrastructure decisions of years past”
Let’s get this right. There’s no do overs.
Finally – full transparency, yes, Supervisor Zanger, I asked “Chatalina” to help with the summation of my thoughts.Â
BenitoLink invites all community members to share their ideas and opinions. By registering as a BenitoLink user in the top right corner of our home page and agreeing to follow our Terms of Use, you can write counter opinions or share your insights on current issues.Â