View Full Version : The "Wal-Marting" Of Weed In California
Hardrock69
07-20-2010, 10:31 AM
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20100718/D9H1MFFG3.html
Oakland pot-growing plan worries small bud tenders
Jul 18, 4:44 PM (ET)
By LISA LEFF
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) - After weathering the fear of federal prosecution and competition from drug cartels, California's medical marijuana growers see a new threat to their tenuous existence: the "Wal-Marting" of weed.
The Oakland City Council on Tuesday will look at licensing four production plants where pot would be grown, packaged and processed into items ranging from baked goods to body oil. Winning applicants would have to pay $211,000 in annual permit fees, carry $2 million worth of liability insurance and be prepared to devote up to 8 percent of gross sales to taxes.
The move, and fledgling efforts in other California cities to sanction cannabis cultivation for the first time, has some marijuana advocates worried that regulations intended to bring order to the outlaw industry and new revenues to cash-strapped local governments could drive small "mom and pop" growers out of business. They complain that industrial-scale gardens would harm the environment, reduce quality and leave consumers with fewer strains from which to choose.
"Nobody wants to see the McDonald's-ization of cannabis," Dan Scully, one of the 400 "patient-growers" who supply Oakland's largest retail medical marijuana dispensary, Harborside Health Center, grumbled after a City Council committee gave the blueprint preliminary approval last week. "I would compare it to how a small business feels about shutting down its business and going to work at Wal-Mart. Who would be attracted to that?"
The proposal's supporters, including entrepreneurs more disposed to neckties than tie-dye, counter that unregulated growers working in covert warehouses or houses are tax scofflaws more likely to wreak environmental havoc, be motivated purely by profit and produce inferior products.
"The large-scale grow facilities that are being proposed with this ordinance will create hundreds of jobs for the city," said Ryan Indigo Warman, who teaches pot-growing techniques at iGrow, a hydroponics store whose owners plan to apply for one of the four permits. "The ordinance is good for Oakland, and anyone who says otherwise is only protecting their own interests."
Council members Rebecca Kaplan and Larry Reid, who introduced the plan, have pitched it largely as a public safety measure.
The Oakland fire department blames a dramatic rise in the number of electrical fires between 2006 and 2009 in part to marijuana being grown indoors with improperly wired fans and lights. The police department says eight robberies, seven burglaries and two murders have been linked to marijuana grows in the last two years.
Reid and Kaplan also are open about their desire to have the city, which last week laid off 80 police officers to save money, cash in on the medical marijuana industry it has allowed to thrive.
Oakland's four retail marijuana stores did $28 million in business last year, and if sales remain constant, the city would get $1.5 million this year from a dispensary business tax that voters adopted last summer. A similar tax on wholesale pot sales from the permitted grow sites to the dispensaries would bring in more than twice that amount, the city administrator's office has estimated.
"Allowing medical cannabis and medical cannabis products to be produced in a responsible, aboveboard and legitimate way will be a benefit to the patients, to the workers and to the people of Oakland," Kaplan said.
Adding to the anxiety of growers - and the impetus Oakland officials have to get the grow tax in place - is a November state ballot measure to legalize marijuana possession for adult recreational use and authorize local governments to license and tax non-medical pot sales.
If it passes, Proposition 19 is expected to feed the state's hearty appetite for marijuana. Backers of creating the four big indoor gardens say the plan is not dependent on legalization, but would benefit from it.
"The reality is, this is an issue that is going to grow. I would like it to grow here. I would like it to be Oakland business and not the tobacco industry," Councilwoman Jean Quan said.
Regulating the supply side of the business would represent another turning point in California's complicated, 14-year-old relationship with medical marijuana. Although Maine, New Mexico and Rhode Island license nonprofit groups to produce and distribute cannabis, California's law is silent on cultivation other than for individual use.
Even as hundreds of storefront pot dispensaries, marijuana delivery services and THC-laced food products have flourished, the question of where they get their stashes remains murky: Inquiring is considered as impolite as asking someone's income or age.
Industry insiders usually say they rely on a variety of sources, including farmers who grow outdoors in the far northern end of the state, contractors who run sophisticated indoor operations, and customers who grow their own and sell the surplus.
Officials in Berkeley and Long Beach also are moving take the mystery out of medical marijuana production.
The Berkeley City Council last week approved a measure for the November ballot that would authorize the city to license and tax six pot cultivation sites. Companies running the facilities must agree to give away some pot to low-income users, employ organic gardening methods to the extent possible and offset in some way the large amount of electricity needed to grow weed.
Long Beach officials want to reduce the amount of medical marijuana being sold in the city that isn't grown there.
The city is in the process of trying to whittle its more than 90 dispensaries down to no more than 35 marijuana collectives through a lottery. License winners will be required to grow either at their retail sites or elsewhere in Long Beach and to open their books to prove they aren't growing more than enough to supply their members, said Lori Ann Farrell, Long Beach's director of financial management.
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 08:32 AM
Oakland votes to permit large marijuana farms
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iEfyr1l3JEtTrX-S4fmAgRFTfxcwD9H3BF7G0
By EVELYN NIEVES (AP) – 3 hours ago
SAN FRANCISCO — Oakland has moved closer to becoming the first city in the nation to authorize wholesale pot cultivation.
The Oakland City Council voted 5-2 with one abstention late Tuesday in favor of a plan to license four production plants where marijuana would be grown, packaged and processed.
The vote came after more than two hours of public comment, with speakers divided between those who opposed the measure — largely on the grounds that it would put small medical marijuana growers out of business — and those who said it would generate millions of dollars for Oakland in taxes and sales and create hundreds of jobs.
The plants would not be limited in size — one potential applicant for a license wants to open a plant that would produce over 21,000 pounds of pot a year — but they would be heavily taxed and regulated.
Those vying for one of the four licenses would have to pay $211,000 in annual permit fees, carry $2 million worth of liability insurance and be prepared to devote up to 8 percent of gross sales to taxes.
Proponents of the measure also touted the possibility of Oakland becoming the nation's cannabis capital, especially if California voters approve the legalization of recreational marijuana in November.
"Do you want to be the "Silicon Valley of Cannabis?" said Jeff Wilcox, a local businessman who wants to build "AgraMed," a 7.4-acre plant with a bakery, a lab and 100,000 square feet of cultivation space.
But Stephen DeAngelo, executive director of Harborside Health Center, the largest medical marijuana dispensary in the world, said small growers were coming to him terrified that the ordinance would mean the end of their livelihoods.
One of the co-sponsors of the ordinance, Rebecca Kaplan, said the ordinance would not take effect until January, giving the council time to come up with a plan for medium-sized growers.
Councilwoman Nancy Nadel said she worried about quality of the product, wanted environmental protections and questioned why the council was voting on the measure now if it wasn't going to take effect until January.
The measure will go before the council one more time for a final vote, but the outcome isn't expected to change.
I think the above is all well and good, but as long as it is legal to grow your own, the market is going to be limited, and I seriously doubt there will be a major Wal-Mart effect.
Heck, if I could grow my own Afghani-Thai cross-strain, why the fuck would I buy? But that is just me. Many peeps would want to be able to just pop on down to the liquor store and buy some joints, without having to go through all the trouble of being a gardener.
Thing is, as mentioned in the first article, they are not just going to grow it for smoking. They also will be growing it for edible products, and I am sure they will begin growing for industrial stuff like paper and cloth, which are WAY more durable than paper made from trees, or cotton.
Blaze
07-21-2010, 11:07 AM
If people were so inclined to grow things, there would be a serious reduction in grocery stores. :biggrin:
People who won't grow tomatoes, won't grow pot.
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 11:18 AM
VERY true. We live in a consumer society. AND, they are getting into the business of Corporate Weed Farming before anyone else. Man, the tax revenue from that is going to be extreme!
Heck, it already is just for the dispensaries that exist around Cali. Picked up the current issue of High Times the other day, and they have an article on it.
Thing is, due to the overhead of these places, they are charging 75 bucks an eighth.
Granted, it is going to be killer weed, but there will be a lot of mom and pop operations who will be able to sell their stuff for much less, and more people than not who want to grow, after growing goes mainstream, will get on it.
BITEYOASS
07-21-2010, 12:03 PM
I wish I could start my own cult/co-op community, in which everyone works on a self-sustaining farm that grows weed, food, fixes firearms, makes ammo, brews beer & wine, weekly orgies and blasts loud kick-ass music.
Blaze
07-21-2010, 12:12 PM
Manson, is that you? When did you get out of jail? :biggrin:
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 12:44 PM
Actually there ARE co-ops in Cali, whose purpose is to grow and distribute weed to medical patients who cannot afford it.
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 01:58 PM
it is gonna crush all the little guys tho. my buddy at work was gonna set sumthin' up with a friend in cali.
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 01:59 PM
" mota mart" for their disp. name.:baaa:
BITEYOASS
07-21-2010, 02:00 PM
Manson, is that you? When did you get out of jail? :biggrin:
No, I'm the re-incarnation of Jim Morrison. :biggrin:
BITEYOASS
07-21-2010, 02:03 PM
I forgot to mention solar/wind/shit powered. Fuck the grid, I want off of it.
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 02:15 PM
Wish I could get off the fucking grid.
Igosplut
07-21-2010, 02:47 PM
Wish I could get off the fucking grid.
I have a friend in Tombstone that does just that.....
Diamondjimi
07-21-2010, 02:59 PM
Thing is, due to the overhead of these places, they are charging 75 bucks an eighth.
Fuck that shit!
I can get an ounce of Canada's finest for $180.:stoned-smiley:
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 03:11 PM
$300/OZ here
Diamondjimi
07-21-2010, 03:16 PM
$300/OZ here
Ouch!
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 03:29 PM
we're gonna be in bellingham wa in a couple weeks, i have a buddy up there with "vancouver" connections.
Starwood
07-21-2010, 03:33 PM
Ahhh, Oakland. We are first at everything. Ebonics, Murders, bad NFL draft picks..now this! Starwood loves THE CITY BY THE BAY.
Seshmeister
07-21-2010, 03:40 PM
It's funny I was reading recently how during prohibition during the 1920s millions of people would go to their doctor and get a prescription for booze.
I think dope will be completely legal by around 2030...
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 03:49 PM
Hope it happens sooner than that!
Hardrock69
07-21-2010, 03:49 PM
we're gonna be in bellingham wa in a couple weeks, i have a buddy up there with "vancouver" connections.
G-13 is the shit!
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 03:54 PM
Hope it happens sooner than that!
amen! 2013 would be much nicer
PETE'S BROTHER
07-21-2010, 03:55 PM
G-13 is the shit!
duly noted:baaa:
Kristy
07-21-2010, 06:43 PM
The vote came after more than two hours of public comment, with speakers divided between those who opposed the measure — largely on the grounds that it would put small medical marijuana growers out of business — and those who said it would generate millions of dollars for Oakland in taxes and sales and create hundreds of jobs.
That's the gist of it right there. And it's not in the "millions" as it would be in the billions for the state of California which will eventually have no choice but to properly legalize it to help bailout that bankrupt shithole. If you give the incentive to the free enterprise market that anybody with a bit of hyponic gardening gear can grow their own shit, harvest it, and then sell it on a captialistic system banking the profit then you know there will be THE MAN out to change the laws in a heartbeat creating the jobs (and therefore the wages) for their own personal gain. If medicinal pot does become more widespread from state-to-state you know it'll be a matter of time before all the mom and pop dispensaries start going under.
kwame k
07-21-2010, 08:43 PM
Fuck, I hope this isn't indicative of what is going to happen in the rest of the country.......just started my grow room and we're hoping to start the 3rd dispensary here in Michigan.
.....but like everything else, Cali starts it and the rest of the country follows.......fuck, just plain fuck!
hambon4lif
07-21-2010, 09:13 PM
Fuck, I hope this isn't indicative of what is going to happen in the rest of the country.......just started my grow room and we're hoping to start the 3rd dispensary here in Michigan.
.....but like everything else, Cali starts it and the rest of the country follows.......fuck, just plain fuck!I wouldn't worry. Cali is its own country, much in the same way America is trying to make Arizona look like now. I don't see this stepping on anyones toes anywhere in the midwest.
Most importantly....it's only weed we're talking about here. It's not coke....otherwise, you'd have the CIA to deal with, and that's a whole different set of problems to cuntend with.....REAL problems IMO.
Let 'em have their kush.....it doesn't affect my lemonade stand one way or the other.
kwame k
07-21-2010, 09:39 PM
I hear ya! Everything I'm doing is 100% legal.........wouldn't be talking about it if it wasn't!
I really believe if you have a superior product at a reasonable price you'll do just fine.
Blaze
07-21-2010, 11:23 PM
Fuck, I hope this isn't indicative of what is going to happen in the rest of the country.......just started my grow room and we're hoping to start the 3rd dispensary here in Michigan.
.....but like everything else, Cali starts it and the rest of the country follows.......fuck, just plain fuck!
Actually, I think Mississippi had the first and only legal grow in America. Mississippi state ( I think) grew and grows weed for the Feds.
Blaze
07-21-2010, 11:25 PM
I am partially correct... It is Ole Miss.
(SALEM, Ore.) - It's a mixed up nation that we live in. The federal authorities like the FBI and the DEA have repeatedly stated in unequivocal terms that there are no federal laws sanctioning the possession and use of medical marijuana.
What they should have said was, it is legal for a publicly funded state university in Mississippi to grow it in amounts that would truly make the most hardcore drug dealer pale.
http://www.salem-news.com/articles/may072009/tenn_mpp_050709.php
Blaze
07-21-2010, 11:30 PM
<object width="640" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/O8omcpXVjgQ&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/O8omcpXVjgQ&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xd0d0d0&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" width="640" height="385"></embed></object>
Hardrock69
07-22-2010, 09:25 AM
Most importantly....it's only weed we're talking about here. It's not coke....otherwise, you'd have the CIA to deal with, and that's a whole different set of problems to cuntend with.....REAL problems IMO.
Yes, the CIA has a monopoly on coke distribution, which is why they are doing battle with the cartels.
At least the CIA admitted in testimony before Congress that they began importing coke over 20 years ago...
Hardrock69
07-22-2010, 09:28 AM
Here is the neat thing. This is on the subject of "As Cali leads, so the other states will follow".
Once the other states see how Cali is raking in BILLIONS in tax revenue, they are going to jump on the bandwagon like a HUNDRED MOTHERFUCKERS!
Oregon and Washington will definitely. Washington has a referendum on the ballot this November as well to legalize pot.
Nevada will not be far behind, as they already have legalized prostitution and gambling.
The Mafia will move in, as they already have the financial clout to create huge grow operations, and this will only be a legit front for them. And of course the tobacco companies will have to play catch-up, as they are already WAY behind.
thome
07-22-2010, 10:20 AM
I haven't OWNED any pot in perhaps twenty years.
I smoked 4000 lbs of the stuff back in the seventies when GREAT pot was 15$ for a 0z and a half.
I like Opiates and BOOZE I had to make the call on something and pot just had to go.
No meth ever...sept when we called it CRANK 20+ years ago.. and if I want CRAKK I will cook my own like we had to do in the MUTHER FUKKING CAVEMAN DAYS!!!
To the Mother Fiik'n POT'IL'ISM: The green bunk you guys are on is not POT it is a high speed clone.
Pot is like Cuban cigars you can have K-( KRasta .0 ) whatever you call it is still junk.
If I cant have Oaxaca I would rather not.
It's the soil and the minerals in location not the weed man.
But it should still be legal.
It never will be unless the Government opens up liscences like Private Whiskey Brewerys have recently been granted.
It will never have broad legality to hard to control the revenue.
thome
07-22-2010, 10:36 AM
Oh and P.S. I would trip to Mexico to my favorite mountain blue and smoke some any day of the week, but all those Little Generalisimo gangster homos have ruined Mexico.
You know the same MF'ers that are spilling across the borded rite now.
BOYCOTT ARIZONA YOU PUSSY BITCH CALIFORNIA!!!
Yeah like it's Arizonas Fault Fukk You... BOYCOTT POT FROM MEXICO AN MEXICAN WORKERS!!!
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrGGgggggggggggg ggggggggggggggggggggg!!!!!
PETE'S BROTHER
07-22-2010, 10:40 AM
Oh and P.S. I would trip to Mexico to my favorite mountain blue and smoke some any day of the week, but all those Little Generalisimo gangster homos have ruined Mexico.
You know the same MF'ers that are spilling across the borded rite now.
BOYCOTT ARIZONA YOU PUSSY BITCH CALIFORNIA!!!
Yeah like it's Arizonas Fault Fukk You... BOYCOTT POT FROM MEXICO AN MEXICAN WORKERS!!!
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrGGgggggggggggg ggggggggggggggggggggg!!!!!
i think you need a nap:biggrin:
thome
07-22-2010, 11:44 AM
I am kinda grumpy the last couple months perhaps you are correct.
What is the best nap medicine some old Columbian doob and NASCAR on low volume and when the chinese drop the nuke I want to be on my couch at ground zero in that state of enlightenment.
NOBODY FOR PRESIDENT
NATIONAL WEED
Nitro Express
07-22-2010, 12:48 PM
If people were so inclined to grow things, there would be a serious reduction in grocery stores. :biggrin:
People who won't grow tomatoes, won't grow pot.
Growing your own is about being self-sufficient and quality. People who want top quality and don't want to be dependant on big corporations for every go the extra mile and do it themselves. Actually much of the population want to go back to mom and pop because the corporations have fucked us over so much but the corporations own the politicians and get their way. There is a war against organic farmers who routinely get raided and inspected while the big boys put all sorts of shit in the food and get away with it.
Nitro Express
07-22-2010, 12:53 PM
That's the gist of it right there. And it's not in the "millions" as it would be in the billions for the state of California which will eventually have no choice but to properly legalize it to help bailout that bankrupt shithole. If you give the incentive to the free enterprise market that anybody with a bit of hyponic gardening gear can grow their own shit, harvest it, and then sell it on a captialistic system banking the profit then you know there will be THE MAN out to change the laws in a heartbeat creating the jobs (and therefore the wages) for their own personal gain. If medicinal pot does become more widespread from state-to-state you know it'll be a matter of time before all the mom and pop dispensaries start going under.
California is so corrupt and disfunctional they would quickly figure out how to throw the extra billions of dollars of revenue down a hole somewhere with nothing to show for it. If anything, I think the whole legislature in that state are all on drugs.
Hardrock69
07-22-2010, 02:22 PM
If they are not already, once it is completely legalized they will be.
thome
07-22-2010, 02:46 PM
KEEP POT ILLEGAL!!!
JUST SAY NO TO BIGGER GOVERNMENT!!!!
YOUR ALL RETARDED AND CONFUSED!!!!
PROBABLY TOO STONED!!!
When Uncle Sam is my Pot dealer only Facists will be STONED!!!
Does anyone own a t-shirt company
.
.
.
.
.
.
Try The Veal.......I will be here all week...........
LoungeMachine
07-22-2010, 02:59 PM
YOUR ALL RETARDED
.......
Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.....
:gulp:
thome
07-22-2010, 04:39 PM
Gatt...Ta ta ta TAMMIT LOUNGE!!!
I am sorry your band broke up but it was a great run what 3-4 years and that Pirate Hat on You so coo.. Your guys ROCKED!!! ...KILLED IT!!!
Putting the drummer on the toilet in Dream Girl... just FENOM!!!
<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/FspHU8hOxhY&hl=en_US&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/FspHU8hOxhY&hl=en_US&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>
I must say you can rock but....the new chick she just knocks it out of the park.
I hope maybe you can find a Douchebag Commercial or something worthy of you skills.
Here is the new chick I say she is gonna be the winner.
http://freecreditscoreband.com/#/band/3
Hardrock69
07-22-2010, 07:40 PM
*ahem*
Diamondjimi
07-22-2010, 07:45 PM
I haven't OWNED any pot in perhaps twenty years.
I smoked 4000 lbs of the stuff back in the seventies when GREAT pot was 15$ for a 0z and a half.
I like Opiates and BOOZE I had to make the call on something and pot just had to go.
.
Hmm, no shit!?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5l0dz5_-_Q:D
thome
07-22-2010, 08:18 PM
Originally Posted by thome
I haven't OWNED any pot in perhaps twenty years.
I smoked 4000 lbs of the stuff back in the seventies when GREAT pot was 15$ for a 0z and a half.
I like Opiates and BOOZE I had to make the call on something and pot just had to go.
Hmm, no shit!?
IMONA Translate it for you..
Sentence 1...I am broke and have been for many years.
Sentence 2...I wasted my youth and ability to function on drugs and have permenant brian.. fumckschin..malajus...whattever the words are..... DANG ######.
Sentence 3...I am a quitter and still remain a junkie all at the same time. I wish I wasn't a quitter..I could have had that going for me ..well he died but he never gave up .......................pot. Coula been somebody.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.3 Copyright © 2024 vBulletin Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved.