Tag

Assemblymember Jim Wood Archives – Humboldt Green

1 Degree Consulting

SB 67 Cannabis Licenses Fact Sheet

By Government

Senator McGuire and Assemblymember Wood have introduced SB 67 as a short term solution to alleviate the significant backlog of annual license applications. The following SB 67 (McGuire) fact sheet was provided by Christopher Nielsen, Legislative Director.

Summary
Cannabis licensing authorities (State Depts., for example)
were authorized to issue temporary licenses until January 1,
2019, that are valid for 120 days and may be extended for
additional 90-day periods at the discretion of the licensing
authority. Due to the processing time for annual licenses
being much longer than expected, thousands of temporary
licenses are set to expire in the coming months before their
annual licenses are considered and/or processed. SB 67 will
provide licensing authorities the ability to grant extensions
until they process the annual application backlog for the
estimated 10,000 temporary licenses.


Background
The state’s licensing authorities, the Department of Food
and Agriculture (CDFA), Dept. of Public Health (DPH),
and the Bureau of Cannabis Control (BCC) were able to
issue four-month temporary licenses to applicants, with
opportunities for 90 – day extensions. The temporary
licenses required proof of local authorization and entitled
the holders to engage in commercial cannabis activity
without completing the annual licensing application
requirements, including CEQA review.
At the end of last year’s session, the legislature was made
aware the local CEQA review was going to hold up the
issuance of annual licenses going forward. To buy more
time for the locals to conduct CEQA reviews, the
legislature passed SB 1459, which authorized a licensing
authority to issue a provisional license to an applicant if theapplicant holds or held a temporary license, demonstrated
substantial compliance with CEQA while local review was
still occurring, and the applicant completed all other
portions of the application. This provisional license
authority sunsets on January 1, 2020.


Problem
The temporary license was intended as an intermediary step
while the state and local jurisdictions managed their own
efforts to come into compliance with the cannabis
regulatory structure. However, due to the significant
amount of annual license applications that came in during
the fall of 2018 after the legislature adjourned, there are
over 10,000 temporarily licenses currently in the system
that will be eligible for a provisional license.
This massive volume of temporary licenses creates the real
risk that not all provisional annual license applications can
be processed prior to temporary licenses expire. CDFA,
DPH, and BCC have been working diligently to address the
sheer volume of licenses that came in prior to the
temporary license authority was lost, but there is no
guarantee they will process all the applications prior to
temporary licenses expiring. For example, over 1000
temporary licenses issued by CDFA are set to expire in the
month of March 2019 alone, with thousands more over the
following months.
In a time where the golden state is working overtime to
bring the cannabis industry out of the black market and into
the light of a legal regulatory environment, we can’t afford
to let good actors who want to comply with state law fall
out of our regulated market just because timelines are too
short and departments have been unable to process
applications in time due to the sheer number of
applications.


Solution
SB 67 allows CDFA, DPH, and BCC to extend temporary
licenses held by licensees while their annual application is
being processed so long as the annual application was in
before the temporary expired and one of the following
applies: The application is being held up by the local
authorization. The application is delayed by the lake and streambed alteration review process. The application is within its period where applicants are provided 90 days to correct incomplete applications.
Further, SB 67 requires any licensing authority who uses
the extension authority to provide certain metrics to the
legislature about how the provisional annual applications
are being processed. SB 67 creates a short-term solution do
avoid an impending crisis, and this reporting will allow the
Legislature to have a fuller conversation about licensing
through the 2019 legislative session, as SB 67’s authority
expires January 1, 2020. Additional discussions – about a
longer term fix to the backlog – will be advancing in a
parallel effort in the coming weeks and months.

Senator McGuire and Assemblymember Wood have introduced SB-67

Cannifest Logo with tagline

Humboldt Green Has High Hopes for Cannifest

By Events, Media

As the weekend of what would have been Cannifest’s 4th year approaches, Humboldt Green Events has high hopes for the state of temporary cannabis events in Humboldt County, despite having to manifest a new location and date for Cannifest 2018 due to new regulations.

Under the Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUCRSA), temporary cannabis event licenses are only issued for events held at County Fairgrounds or District Agricultural Centers. Humboldt Green reached out to Redwood Acres Fairgrounds and Humboldt County Fairgrounds to hold Cannifest 2018 since they are basically the only two venues in Humboldt that are currently legally allowed to host cannabis events. Unfortunately, it worked out that Cannifest cannot could not be held at either of these State approved locations.

What happened to this year’s Cannifest?

Redwood Acres Fairgrounds in Eureka has been the home of Cannifest for the past three years. With the new policies and regulations surrounding cannabis use at festivals, Redwood Acres informed Humboldt Green Events that their organization is postponing cannabis events for the remainder of 2018. The venue has also evolved into a growing business park that is frequented by children. Under the current regulations, if a cannabis event were to be held at a Fairgrounds location, no one under 21 would be allowed on the premises during the event. Since Redwood Acres is frequented by families, it’s not currently a venue that we would be able to produce a 21 and over cannabis event at.

On our quest to find another State approved venue, Humboldt Green Events also approached the Humboldt County Fairgrounds to hold Cannifest 2018. The Ferndale Chief of Police responded to our request and stated that the Humboldt County Fairgrounds resides within the jurisdictional boundaries of the City of Ferndale. The City of Ferndale, by ordinance, does not allow the sale of marijuana or its by-products. Ferndale High School is also less than 1,000 feet away from the Fairgrounds. Under the current regulations, all cannabis events must be at least 1,000 feet away from school property. The Humboldt County Fairgrounds also has a no-smoking policy.

New California State Regulations on the Horizon

The silver lining in manifesting a new location for Cannifest has been the recent support from California State Assemblymember, Bill Quirk with Assembly Bill-2020 and Assemblymember, Jim Wood with Assembly Bill-2641. Both bills are in support of special temporary cannabis event permits that would allow consumption and sales at farmer market events and festivals. The aim of both bills is to make it easier venue-wise for temporary cannabis events to take place in order to discourage black market underground events that are not taxed by the State of California. The temporary cannabis event licenses would only be issued for venues approved by local jurisdictions. Producers of events would also be limited to four temporary cannabis event licenses per year.

Back in March, Humboldt Green Events sent a letter in support of AB-2020 to Assemblymember Quirk’s office. A portion of our letter was highlighted in the Times-Standard article titled Capitol Tracker: Cannabis banking, special event bills advance. In the letter, we shared with Assemblymember Quirk that by making a change to the limited venues where temporary cannabis events are allowed to take place, the State of California could provide greater opportunities to small cannabis businesses allowing an emerging industry the same opportunities granted to others, which in turn would provide financial support to local and regional economies.

AB-2020 Cannabis: local jurisdiction licensees: temporary event license was amended in assembly on April 19th, 2018 and was published to the California Legislative Information website on the cannabis holiday 4/20. According to Times-Standard, the bill was passed 13-1 by the Assembly’s Committee on Business and Professions and re-referred to an appropriations committee.

AB-2641 was introduced by Assembly Member Jim Wood back in February. The Times-Standard, reported that the bill would allow for the Bureau of Cannabis Control to grant a temporary license for special events in jurisdictions where the events have been approved at county fair events if locally approved.

What does all of this mean for Cannifest? The power of manifestation works! The cannabis community has been manifesting the path to keeping California Green and helping small businesses in the industry continue to grow by allowing for a State temporary event license to be issued for any venue expressly approved by local jurisdiction. This is huge news and a step forward for Humboldt Green Events to be able to provide the Humboldt community and beyond, a fully regulated and legal cannabis event at any venue approved by local government. This would allow Humboldt Green Events to hold Cannifest at some magical location in Humboldt or even take Humboldt’s Manifest Cannabis Festival on the road. The variety of venue options in California are endless, but each location depends on the opinion of local government and whether temporary cannabis events would be considered beneficial for their surrounding community.

Back in the beginning of 2018,  when we realized we were unable to produce Cannifest 2018 at Redwood Acres scheduled for May 5th and 6th, we felt that we had somehow let our community down despite the fact that the postponement of Cannifest was out of our hands. The cannabis community was really supportive of our announcement about having to manifest a new date and location for Cannifest. We were really hoping to be able to hold the festival at the Humboldt County Fairgrounds instead and be able to keep the May 5th and 6th dates, but come to find out our only other venue option was also not cohesive for cannabis events. The news of the two bills introduced regarding temporary cannabis events is really a blessing for our entire community that has been struggling to find its place in the current state of legal cannabis business. So many of our small farms that produce craft cannabis and little mom and pop shops would greatly benefit from the opportunity of being able to sell their products at temporary cannabis events like farmers markets and festivals. The introduction of the two bills are really important to the livelihood of all types of business in the cannabis industry in Humboldt and beyond in the greater State of California.

What can I do? Participate in democracy!

How can you help make Cannifest, farmers markets and other cannabis events a possibility? Call your elected officials and ask them to vote in favor of AB-2020 and AB-2641. Locate your local California representative here. If you live in the Humboldt area, Jared Huffman US Congressman serving California’s 2nd District is your representative. You can contact him by email or by phone at (707) 981-8967.

The Green Team at Humboldt Green Events appreciates your love and support as we continue to adjust in this new legal cannabis frontier. Stay tuned for updates about our next move with Cannifest on our Facebook or Instagram pages.

– The Humboldt Green Team, Producers of Cannifest