Changes sought to pot policy

Industry leaders and lawmakers say rules favor corporations. B3

SACRAMENTO — California’s new rules allowing marijuana cultivation favor large corporate farms despite a promise in Proposition 64 that small growers would be protected, according to a group of state lawmakers and marijuana industry leaders who called Monday for the policy to be changed.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture issued emergency rules last month that allow small and medium-sized farms as large as a quarter acre and 1 acre, respectively, to get licenses for the first five years. That five-year head start for small farms was promised in Proposition 64, the initiative approved last year by voters that legalized growing and selling marijuana for recreational use.

Individuals and businesses can get only one license for a medium-sized farm, but the new rules do not set a limit on how many small-farm licenses can be obtained by one person or business.

That could allow a corporation to assemble a 20-acre farm by obtaining 80 licenses for a quarter-acre each, opponents worry.

Democratic state Sens. Scott Wiener of San Francisco and Mike McGuire of Healdsburg, Assemblyman Jim Wood (D-Healdsburg) and the California Growers Assn. asked for swift action by the state agriculture department to change the rule.

“This is clearly a broken promise,” McGuire said. “For two years, every discussion has included a cap on cannabis grows and the Department of Food and Agriculture needs to fix this massive loophole they have created. This last-minute revision rolls out the red carpet for large corporations to crush the livelihood of small family farmers.”

With cultivation licenses set to take effect next month, the lawmakers also promised legislative hearings on why the rules were drafted to disadvantage small, mom-and-pop farms.

“California only has one chance to get this right, and it is already on the wrong path with this last-minute change that flies in the face of what the backers of Prop. 64 promised,” said Hezekiah Allen, executive director of the California Growers Assn. “This single decision will hand over the California marketplace to multinational corporations and a wealthy few at the expense of thousands of growers who are ready to play by the rules and provide economic opportunity in communities that until recently were criminalized or — at the very least — marginalized.”

The industry estimates there are about 3,500 independent growers on track to get a state license in the first half of 2018. Allen’s group estimates that number could grow to as many as 15,000 by the end of 2020, but not if large corporate farms are allowed in early.

Agriculture department officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the complaints.