Last week I told you about our Town Council (Laytonville Area Municipal Advisory Council meeting on Jan. 22nd where we voted unanimously to support the following proposed actions on our agenda:
D.3. Discussion And Possible Action To Approve Request To The Mendocino County Board Of Supervisors To Place On The Agenda, As Soon As Possible, The Following Item: “Discussion And Possible Action To Approve That Pursuant To The County’s Cannabis Ordinance, The Maximum Area Of Cultivation Has Always Been And Remains To Be 10,000 Square Feet Per Legal Parcel, Without Any Exceptions.”
Our Council was asked to support efforts by folks who are concerned about Cannabis Department staffers action to “re-interpret” a provision in the failed Weed Ordinance.
The effect of this new “clarification” is that it would double the existing cap on cultivation areas, which has always been 10,000 square feet. There is absolutely no authority under existing law or the Mendocino County Cannabis Ordinance for anyone, including County staff, administrators, or the Supervisors to “reinterpret” where the goal is to re-write or amend, in whole or in part, provisions of the Cannabis Ordinance. Such changes would have to be accomplished by the Supes taking formal action at a public meeting.
The column I wrote last week was also published in the Anderson Valley Advertiser and Ukiah Daily Journal, among other newspapers. The AVA received a letter to the editor on the subject, which they forwarded to me.
After reviewing the letter and its attachment, I sent the AVA a note stating, “This all looks pretty damn accurate. I’ll be passing this on to a few of the folks I work with on this mess. I see it was also sent to WEC [Willits Environmental Center] who I also collaborate with. Some of this is referenced by WEC’s attorneys in their cease-and-desist demand to the BOS, which, of course, they ignored.”
Here’s the letter from the AVA reader along with the attached letter from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife sent to the County of Mendocino on October 15, 2024. I don’t know if the CDFW letter to the county was ever made public. It appears the Supervisors have another problem with their Cannabis Ordinance, though.
“I am sending this to Ukiah Daily Journal, Willits Environmental Center and Anderson Valley Advertiser. Maybe you already know about this or can get to the bottom of it? I hope I’m wrong, but it looks like public agencies pulled a bait and switch to benefit pot growers?
“It is common knowledge Mendocino’s Marijuana ordinance has been a failure. They could not issue their own permits, and then the state had to write an EIR to give them state permits. Even after the EIR was written, Willits Environmental Center and CDF&W and others still identified pretty serious problems: cannabis.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/10/appendix_feir_comments.pdf
“Here is where I get confused. Someone gave me a copy of the letter I enclose. I haven’t been able to find it anywhere else, have not been able to find out anything from the County and there is nothing on their website about it.
“CDF&W (California Department of Fish & Wildlife) is not part of the SSHR anymore, like is required in the EIR? Who is dealing with the environmental issues?
“Why is this not being made public? It seems like double-dealing. And if the state isn’t doing what it says in the EIR, don’t they need to change the EIR to say what they are doing? Can’t they get sued for violating CEQA?
“I don’t want to piss anyone off so I can’t say who I am.
“Name Withheld”
***
Here are excerpts from the CDF&W October 15, 2024 letter to Mendocino County:
Subject: California Department Of Fish And Wildlife’s Participation In The Mendocino County Cannabis Referral Program
This letter is in regard to the County of Mendocino’s (County) September 30, 2020, “Pilot Policy for Sensitive Species Review” (Pilot Policy), which has been used to implement Mendocino County Cannabis Ordinance Section 10A.17.100(A)(2) (Ordinance). This Ordinance proposed the Department of Fish and Wildlife (Department) assist the County with evaluating potential impacts to sensitive species that may result from issuance of Mendocino County Cannabis Cultivation Permits. The Department is not usually assigned a role in County ordinances and believed the County would likely informally refer projects that proposed new site expansion or were unusual or unique in terms of sensitive species impacts instead of designating a specific role to the Department via ordinance.
In mid-2023, the County began referring a number of projects to the Department for review. To date, the County has referred hundreds of projects to the Department. In many cases, the County has already issued the approval for licensing or renewal.
In late Fall of 2023, the Department of Cannabis Control (DCC) decided to act as Lead Agency and prepared a Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) in the summer of 2024 for state licensing of commercial cannabis cultivation in Mendocino County. This DEIR contemplates continued involvement of Department staff in site-specific review of cultivation sites by citing the County ordinance and stating that compliance with Section 10A.17.100(A) (2) is required.
Due to the DEIR’s reliance on the County Ordinance procedure, the Department must clarify the scope of the Department’s involvement in site-specific review of cultivation sites in Mendocino County. The Department has re-evaluated the County’s Sensitive Species and Habitats referral checklist (SSHR) (aka Exhibit A) and a large sample of the project referrals received and processed to date. In doing so, the Department has determined the SSHR requires modification. The Department’s recommended modifications to the criteria should result in far fewer referrals pending Department review and needing referral to the Department in the future. In addition, the modifications will result in changes to Department’s recommendations made to date.
The Department’s recommendations and changes to our participation in this process are stated below and in the revised SSHR (Appendix 1):
Many cannabis cultivation sites in Mendocino County have both a Department Lake and Streambed Alteration Agreement and a permit from the North Coast Regional Waterboard. While many environmental issues can be identified and minimized with these permits, they are not a substitute for a thorough site-specific analysis conducted through a forward-looking California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) process.
While many cannabis cultivation sites existed prior to legalization, numerous sites have expanded beyond the footprints utilized prior to legalization and have been allowed to persist for years after expansion occurred. Attempting to conduct a Trustee agency review after impacts have occurred will likely underestimate impacts and limit options for both minimization and mitigation.
After reviewing referrals and conducting site visits on many cannabis cultivation sites in Mendocino County, it is clear that significant environmental impacts have occurred on many parcels due to cannabis cultivation and associated activities. The existing process under the Pilot Project and Exhibit A is not sufficient to reduce most impacts to a level of less than significant, especially for sites that have already expanded since legalization or have been permitted without first undergoing CEQA review. The Lead Agency and the County should conduct their own site-specific environmental evaluation and analysis to determine if impacts are less than significant and take appropriate action to remediate any significant impacts. The Department is not the appropriate entity to conduct that review.
The Department is providing a revised checklist for Exhibit A. This revised checklist will limit the County’s referral process to only those projects that: 1) have proposed future expansion, 2) have new cultivation sites that have not yet been developed, or 3) are sites in need of an LSA due to the use of natural water sources (see Appendix 1 for more details). All environmental review, evaluation, and follow up for environmental impacts that occurred prior to legalization, or for impacts due to the expansion of cannabis cultivation sites that have already occurred, should be completed by the County and the Lead Agency. The Department is withdrawing all previous comments with the exception of those sites that are proposing to expand (and have not already) or are newly proposed cannabis cultivation sites (see Appendix 2).
The DCC DEIR relies heavily on the review of each site using the Pilot Project review process, rather than a standard impact analysis and CEQA review. The Final EIR should modify use of the Pilot Project to reflect the new Exhibit A checklist and utilize additional methods not reliant on the Department to provide environmental impact evaluations on a site-specific basis and to determine if impacts are less than significant.
The Department would appreciate the County’s adoption and use of this revised SSHR immediately. Going forward, the Department’s involvement in assisting the County with determining potentially significant adverse impacts is limited to projects involving proposed future cannabis site disturbance/expansion and entirely new cannabis site disturbance/development. Again, the Lead Agency and the County should conduct their own site-specific environmental evaluation and analysis to determine if impacts are less than significant and take appropriate action to remediate any significant impacts.
We appreciate the opportunity to work with the County to assist in effectively regulating commercial cannabis cultivation, while addressing its documented environmental impacts.
Sincerely,
Tina Bartlett
California Department of Fish and Wildlife
Jim Shields is the Mendocino County Observer’s editor and publisher, observer@pacific.net, the long-time district manager of the Laytonville County Water District, and is also chairman of the Laytonville Area Municipal Advisory Council. Listen to his radio program “This and That” every Saturday at noon on KPFN 105.1 FM, also streamed live: www.kpfn.org
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