Land use conflicts arise from uncertainty about regulations, impacts
Steve Imbibo says he just wanted to retire when he and his wife bought land in the remote Palmer Creek area, east of Healdsburg. Instead, the retired construction estimator is becoming an expert in rural land use.
“This is a remote area, but it’s a neighborhood,” said Imbibo, describing the rugged area off Mill Creek Road where a permit to grow cannabis on a 73-acre parcel is under review by the county. “Commercial cannabis doesn’t belong here.”
The essential conflict Imbibo and others are running into is that county regulations favor growing cannabis in remote areas that may have little utility otherwise.
According to “Save Our Neighborhoods,” a volunteer countywide organization that has sprung up in response to cannabis permit applications, the decision by the county to treat cannabis as agriculture and not as industry is behind the problem.
“Is asking 5,000 illegal pot growers to come on out of the woods and set up shop in our rural neighborhoods – next to our schools and parks and homes – helping?” reads the Save Our Neighborhoods website. “Is allowing commercial pot labs to setup in our pristine bucolic back country roads helping?”
Rural neighbors are concerned that increased traffic from recreational cannabis farms — and the planting, cultivating, trimming and processing that they require — will damage the rugged landscapes, use up scarce water resources and invite crime into areas that have little access to law enforcement support.
Imbibo said he believes that industrial zones are the best place to grow recreational cannabis and he is concerned that a regulation that favors existing growers has backfired.
He says that small, outlaw growers who existed for years in remote areas are being used “for cover” by outside investors who come in and take advantage of the regulations to claim an existing use. “They throw a bunch of plants in the ground and they qualify as existing growers,” Imbibo said.
In this area, similar concerns are voiced by neighbors in the area of Los Amigos Road and Limerick Lane, who fear a five-acre cannabis farm may soon be approved off a private lane, inviting crime.
One neighbor, who asked to remain nameless due to fears for her family’s safety, wrote in an email: “We have been assured by the grower … that they will have 24/7 (unarmed) security guards, 8-10 foot fencing and 24/7 video surveillance for their protection. What about my family? Where is our protection?”
Other rural neighborhoods are reporting permit applications and grows planned in the Chalk Hill area, Alexander Valley and elsewhere in the hilly areas west of Healdsburg.
Growers are also expressing frustration with county regulations, with some saying that the rules are too onerous and taxes and fees too high.
Even some county officials agree. Tony Linegar, the county Agricultural Commissioner, says that the combination of state and local regulations is having an unintended impact. “If the overall goal of the marijuana program was to favor a corporate, big dollar, new money industry then we have succeeded,” said Linegar, at a public forum last month.
Meanwhile, Save Our Neighborhoods and cannabis advocates are taking their concerns public. Both sides of the issue are planning to attend the April 10 Sonoma County Board of Supervisors meeting.
