California Fish & Wildlife Dept Closing Down Cannabis Grow Operations With Legal County Permits Or Those Applying For Them

Local “Emerald Triangle” newspaper the Press Democrat reports on yet another layer of confusion. We imagine the state wildlife and fisheries are  accessing public data and then using it to enact closures. Not the best way to encourage compliance or business we’d suggest

Here’s the report

California’s push to legalize and regulate the cannabis industry, a phased rollout with local and state government rules in development, has hit a snag in marijuana’s famed Emerald Triangle region, where a series of state law enforcement operations has targeted growers with county permits or others who have applied for them.

The California Growers Association, an industry group, said it is tracking at least 15 cases of cannabis farmers whose plants have been eradicated by state Fish and Wildlife wardens in Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity counties.

The issue has caught the attention of California lawmakers who are calling for wildlife officials to work with municipalities and avoid undermining local efforts to get cannabis farmers to participate in the newly legitimized industry and follow the relevant laws.

“We have an industry here that has for four decades operated underground, and that’s not totally the fault of the cultivators — the state never did come up with regulations until now,” Mendocino County Supervisor Dan Hamburg said. “We have to make it attractive for people to get into the system, and things like this make people say, ‘Hell no.’”

The conflict reflects the intersection of state agents carrying out their mandate — to protect natural resources — with the efforts of local officials who are trying to persuade marijuana growers, many of whom have been operating outside the law for years, to come forward and legitimize their businesses.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/7296256-181/raids-of-emerald-triangle-marijuana?artslide=0

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