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b'October 11, 2022 \\u2014 The Board of Supervisors went through a dozen recommendations from a cannabis ad hoc committee led by Supervisors John Haschak and Glenn McGourty last week, sending five of them to another committee. Supervisors received assurance that other items are already being addressed, but cannabis advocates who stayed in the chambers until after 7:00 at night complained about a lack of urgency as state deadlines loom and operators give up on ever making it through the permit process.\\n\\nMark Schaeffer, who has chimed in on cannabis policy at every step of the ordinance and now serves as the policy chair of the Mendocino Cannabis Alliance, wept as he spoke about losing his farm. \\u201cI used to say I had a ten thousand square foot farm in Comptche,\\u201d he said. \\u201cIt\\u2019s closed. Not only can I not pay for my taxes, likely I\\u2019m going to lose my land, and I don\\u2019t even have enough money to get fuel to get home. But I\\u2019m here. Why? Because I put everything into compliance. Because I believed. I believed in myself, my government, my community. Neither the county nor the state has given any of us a pathway to success. They have not given us a pathway at all. And now we perish.\\u201d\\n\\nMost of the ad hoc\\u2019s recommendations had to do with streamlining processes so local operators will have a better chance at complying with annual state license requirements.\\nBecause the county\\u2019s ordinance did not go through California environmental review, individual growers have been struggling to keep up with regulatory requirements as they are being crafted.\\n\\nAnother process that has often been described, including by the Mendocino County Grand Jury, as building the airplane while it\\u2019s flying, is the rollout of the equity grant program, which was designed to aid cannabis business owners who were harmed by the war on drugs. The committee\\u2019s first recommendation was a three-part reiteration of Board direction to align the county\\u2019s program with the state\\u2019s requirements. Applicants have complained that the county has been stricter and more meticulous than the state, out of fear that the state could reclaim funds that were improperly awarded. Haschak laid out his position. \\n\\n\\u201cI know that there have been issues that have gone on and on and on, for six months, a year, about trying to clarify whether a solar panel is the right size, whether the number of jars is right for the business, and that kind of stuff,\\u201d he said. \\u201cAnd if it\\u2019s allowable by the state, then we should just go with it and move on. Because the way I see it is, the role of the (Mendocino Cannabis) Department really needs to be getting people to their state licensure.\\u201d\\n\\nCannabis Department Director Kristin Nevedal said she believes she is already implementing that direction. She added that, although there have been bottlenecks in the equity grant program and very few awards have actually been made, no one has been outright denied at this point.\\n\\nNevedal secured another nearly $18 million in grant funds to help local cannabis business people: the Local Jurisdiction Assistance Grant Program. She described her planned approach to applications for that grant, which she hopes will save her department from multiple rounds of review, and circumvent the need to bring in outside contractors.\\n\\n\\u201cI think that these will come to us, this is the hope, review ready,\\u201d she said of the upcoming grant applications. \\u201cAnd if they aren\\u2019t review ready, we will not be issuing an award, and folks can make corrections and apply in the next round. And I\\u2019m thinking the rounds for grant applications will be short. Thirty days. We\\u2019ll announce ahead of time, it will open for thirty days, it will close, we\\u2019ll do reviews, we\\u2019ll award, we\\u2019ll announce another opening.\\u201d\\n\\nNevedal told supervisors that she expects the cannabis department\\u2019s upcoming move to the Willits Justice Center will help remedy some of the department\\u2019s shortfalls \\u2014 but she\\u2019s not sure exactly how long the move itself will take.\\n\\n Another proposed simplification involved several steps that have not yet been completed. The ad hoc recommended that the cannabis department provide a \\u2018no objection\\u2019 status for every document or requirement that it\\u2019s referred to a state agency, after the agency has been unresponsive for thirty days. But this is problematic, when the county does not have a contract with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the main state agency responsible for environmental review and approval. Nevedal said her department has referred about 100 sensitive species and habitat reviews to CDFW, and that a contract is on its way to being finalized.\\n\\n\\u201cIt came to us as an unsigned document,\\u201d she said of the contract. \\u201cSo we\\u2019ll work it through approvals at the county level. Once it\\u2019s signed at the county, I\\u2019m sure CDFW is eager to sign it so that we can pay them for the reviews they have conducted\\u2026and they have staff waiting to conduct further reviews. So I think they\\u2019re just as eager as the county to move this contract forward and resume work.\\u201d\\n\\nAnother layer of procedural difficulties involves vegetation modification, or the removal of trees and shrubs from grow sites. Growers have complained that their permits have been denied or terminated if they\\u2019re suspected of removing trees for cultivation purposes, even if it\\u2019s for fire safety or because the tree was dead or dying. Haschak explained the ad hoc committee\\u2019s recommendation that the Board clarify some exemptions, and establish what kind of evidence is required. \\n\\n\\u201cIf we\\u2019re all in agreement that tree removal has happened because of defensible spaces, for health, for safety, for the tree mortality crisis that we have going on, and I think that we really need to be clear on what the parameters are,\\u201d he said. \\u201cBecause what we\\u2019re having is, we\\u2019re having a lot of, well, five years ago, I look at this satellite imagery, and I see that there was something there, and we don\\u2019t know exactly what it was, but there was something, and so it was removed, and so now you\\u2019re into the veg mod issues.\\u201d\\n\\nSupervisor Ted Williams complained repeatedly that recommendations were not \\u201cshovel ready,\\u201d with plans to implement them with budget and staff.\\n\\nDuring public comment, Susan Tibben, a frequent commenter on cannabis policy, recalled her experience planting trees in San Francisco with a group called Friends of the Urban Forest. \\u201cWe did not know what that soil was going to be, until we stuck that shovel into the dirt,\\u201d she told the Board.'