The regulatory landscape around Cannabis in Sonoma County and California more broadly is evolving rapidly. Follow our blog for the latest in commentary and analysis of the evolving issues and regulation.
How did we end up with a 45% cannabis tax break??
April 20, 2022
The Board of Supervisors approved a 45% tax reduction for cannabis operations, taking $800K from county revenue for the 2021/2022 fiscal year. Now, instead of the County funding essential services from cannabis tax revenues, as was promoted in Measure A (the legislation that legalized cannabis in Sonoma County), taxpayers will be shouldering the cost of the cannabis program instead.
Read MoreWhy is Permit Sonoma focused on expediting cannabis approvals while lacking fundamental baseline water availability data?
April 18, 2022
Permit Sonoma is spending $1M to expedite cannabis permitting - a high water intensity use frequently sited in low water availability areas. Shouldn't we be updating our water availability studies and building a better understanding of our watersheds' carrying capacity before we approve more high water uses on the basis of outdated or faulty data?
Read MoreGiven current demands and climate and supply uncertainties, can Sonoma County support another water intensive industry?
April 11, 2022
Cannabis irrigation water demand is many times higher than a single-family house or even wine grapes. It is unconscionable that we are approving more high-water intensive uses in areas that are already struggling to support existing and already permitted users.
Read MoreGroundwater supplies are not infinite - when will we take serious notice of their depletion?
April 5, 2022
Permitted uses with high water demand impact groundwater supplies and those supplies are not infinite and inexhaustible. Unfortunately, our County's Groundwater Sustainability Area reports use unrepresentative, historic data to populate their modeled scenarios leaving an optimistic assessment of our long term water supply. Meanwhile, we continue to approve high water demand uses - like cannabis - without having a true understanding of potential impacts on project-adjacent wells and on groundwater availability in the county as a whole.
Read MoreMarch 10 Water Workshop revealed uncertainties in water supply in this 3rd year of historic drought
March 25, 2022
The future of Sonoma County's water supplies seems highly uncertain as we head into year 3 of a historic drought. While Sonoma Water and Federal agencies are responding to the acute and immediate water shortages of these last few years, it seems we are still failing to take into account the longer term changes in water availability brought on by climate change. Failure to take these long term changes into account in evaluating future supply skews the picture of how much demand the county can truly sustain in the coming decades.
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