Sonoma County's highly anticipated overhaul of its ordinance regulating the cannabis industry arrived this week before the Board of Supervisors, where debate raised and settled for now a thorny question — whether commercial cannabis farming should be governed as agriculture.
On Tuesday, a board majority endorsed that regulatory set up, over opposition from the region's largest ag trade group, while also deciding on other rules governing commercial cannabis cultivation, sales and distribution outside city limits.
The changes advanced by the board include defining cannabis as a form of controlled agriculture and classifying it as a prime crop making farmers eligible for tax breaks on their enrolled cropland. Going forward, the rules also would include cannabis in the county's Right to Farm Ordinance, which is intended to protect and promote agriculture by prioritizing it on agriculture-zoned land.
Tuesday's discussion marked the culmination of the county's multi-year effort to conduct an environmental review of its embattled cannabis regulations and subsequently revise rules after years of piecemeal tweaks failed to resolve a stalemate between the local industry and residents. While cannabis growers argued red tape and burdensome taxes have throttled their legal industry, residents countered the county needs to do more to protect neighborhoods from the impacts — including noise, odor and traffic — from nearby cannabis farms.
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