Cannabis Growing In
El Dorado County:
Understanding Vs. Fear
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Have we learned anything from Prohibition of alcohol commerce in the 1920s and 1930s?
Prohibition promotes the criminal element in our County. Criminals invest in business activity that is evasive. They sell their products on the black market for a premium to pay for their illegal behavior. Alcohol and cannabis are similar popular mild intoxicants.
Prohibition enforcement did not work in the 1930s and it will not work in El Dorado County. A better system is a legal permitting system that uses the market incentive to motivate growers to be upstanding state-law compliant citizens. Legal status creates a demarcation between citizens who are family farmers and organized crime that sell illegal drugs including opioids.
If El Dorado County (EDC) were issuing cannabis business permits then all permitted cannabis cultivation sites would be inspected by state regulators. Any problems would be corrected. Most permitted cultivation sites in the state have been inspected by state enforcement already.
Cannabis has been a part of the EDC community particularly over the last 10 years. EDC cultivators supplied the medicine for medical dispensaries in this County and in urban areas. Personal cultivators by county ordinance can only keep their medicine for themselves.
El Dorado County has the rural space and the perfect climate for cultivating cannabis. Have you noticed that property values have increased in rural areas over the last 10 years? Cannabis Growers have purchased properties in preparation for legal activity.
The El Dorado County Board of Supervisors must take action. The market is too strong for cannabis for El Dorado County to ignore. Why should El Dorado County stunt its economy and remain out of the legal cannabis while other Counties reap 100s of millions in economic activity and tax revenue?
Now with the change in state law the County Board of Supervisors have the authority and responsibility to regulate cannabis cultivation activity.
The best El Dorado County policy is one that permits cannabis cultivation, assesses fees and taxes on cannabis activity and uses the revenue to fund community programs such as road repair, First Five, youth substance education, mental health services and law enforcement.
Cannabis Growers Have Something to Prove!
El Dorado County Cannabis Growers know they have something to prove, that they are good community citizens. The El Dorado County Growers Alliance adopted a Community Commitment. Actions speak louder than words.
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El Dorado County's cannabis growers are committed to working with the community to solve problems whether they are associated with cannabis activity or not. Alliance members will:
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Protect public health and welfare
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Practice sustainable agriculture
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Preserve natural resources and watersheds
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Advocate for compassionate programs and patient’s rights
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Work for the mutual benefit of the community
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Support public safety and child and young adult access prevention
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Promote well sourced education, information and science
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Champion cannabis industry small family farms
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Lets get started. El Dorado County Growers Alliance (EDCGA) brought almost 500 toys to the Sacramento Kindness Campaign. EDCGA has contributed to the El Dorado County Food Bank. Members of the Alliance will give vegetables to Food Bank from their gardens. We are working with First Five to ensure that some portion of cannabis tax money goes to their ground breaking program that works to end the cycle of child developmental issues that are the deeper causes to behavioral problems like substance abuse and mental health.
Are there problems you suggest we work on? You see trash from illegal cannabis grows that needs to be cleaned up?
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How Do We Know the Effects of Commercial Cannabis?
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Cannabis Taxes Raised Colorado WA Oregon
In 2017 the three states raised $658m in taxes. Add six month from Nevada and the four states generated $688 million in taxes.
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Since CA launched its first adult-use sales in January 2018, the cannabis industry has provided a total program revenue of $2.8 billion, which includes $1.4 billion in cannabis excise tax, $347.4 million in cultivation tax and $1 billion in state sales tax during the course of the past 3 1/2 years. https://www.cannabisbusinesstimes.com/article/california-posts-record-sales-revenue-second-quarter/
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Join The Work to Regulate Commercial Cannabis in El Dorado County
(We may send to you issue related information or action emails.)
Send us your comments:
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What should cannabis taxes be used for? What community issues should the cannabis growers work on?
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Cannabis Is Important To El Dorado County
The State estimates that 300,000 lbs. of cannabis is already grown in El Dorado County.
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Legal commercial cannabis agriculture will be a net positive for the County. It will:
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Maintain the rural character of the county by providing income to marginal agricultural lands;
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Stimulate the county’s economy bringing $100s of millions dollars from the gray market and improving property values;
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Provide tax revenue for local ambulances, roads childhood trauma reduction and substance education programs;
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Demonstrate that growers are not gangsters but instead responsible farmers that protect the county’s environment;
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Reduce the effects of the cannabis black market;
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Utilize state based model environmental sustainability practices such as non-toxic pest control, low water use (by monitoring root zones) and stormwater pollution prevention methods and monitoring;
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Preserve the small cannabis farmers that have supplied medicine to County patients over the last 10 years.
County Board of Supervisors are Looking at their Future Cannabis Policy
The Board of Supervisors have an Ad Hoc Cannabis Advisory Committee that has been meeting for over a year. The Committee is made up of Supervisors Ranalli and Novasel. They are supported by County staff. The Advisory Committee developed their code enforcement and personal medical cannabis ordinances. They are now discussing commercial cannabis.
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Ignoring the cannabis cultivators in the county or trying to exterminate them is not a workable policy. The demand for cannabis is too large. El Dorado County is located in the perfect position to support the retail cannabis stores in large urban areas. Now is the time for the County's Growers to make the transition out of the gray market and into the fully legal Market. The only barrier to cannabis site review is getting the authorization from Board of Supervisors to allow commercial permitting process.
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The future is for the legal Market to out-compete the black market and then the black market problems will completely go away. It is going to take time to get the existing growers into the legal market but first they need the opportunity prove themselves.
Colorado Senator Gardner made a deal with President Trump for the federal government to not interfere with state cannabis programs.
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VOTE YES ON MEASURE N, P, Q, R & S ON THE NOVEMBER 6, 2018 BALLOT