Small-scale cannabis producers seeking more control when it comes to selling and delivering their crops are getting a boost from Humboldt County’s Board of Supervisors, which has approved rule changes making it easier to do cottage industry-style cannabis business.
Changes to the county’s cannabis ordinance designed to allow “micro-businesses” to broaden their activities were approved at the board’s Nov. 18 meeting.
The changes redefine a “micro-business” as a “composite use” including non-volatile manufacturing, distribution and retail sales.
Those would have to be related to cannabis cultivation of less than 10,000 square feet.
The changes to respond to a lot of feedback from cannabis producers, including those who say they’re often underpaid by distributors – or not paid at all.
“Most of my complaints lately have been about distributors not paying the cultivator,” said Supervisor Rex Bohn, who asked County Planner Augustus Grochau if the micro-businesses will be able to sell directly to retailers.
With the changes, the county’s cannabis ordinance will allow direct off-site sales under an administrative approval, Grochau replied.
He said micro-businesses will also be able to deliver their own products as long as they have county clearance from the tax collector, but a state transport license is still needed.
Nonvolatile extraction facilities can also be approved administratively if they don’t involve customer traffic, are housed in an existing building and are associated with a cultivation permit.
The changes will help cultivators add manufacturing and retail sales to their cultivation permits without requiring a more complex and costly special permit.
During a public comment period, Ross Gordon of the Humboldt County Growers Alliance talked about the difficulties faced by craft-scale cultivators forced to rely on third party services.
“This is definitely one of the top issues, if not the major issue that farmers here are facing broadly, which is trying to sell a craft product but having to go through multiple middlemen on the way to doing that,” he said. “That means you’re not necessarily controlling the quality of your product as it moves through the supply chain, it means you’re not necessarily able to tell your story as it moves through the supply chain and it means, as I think was pointed out, you may not get paid. And a lot of people are in that situation.”
Gordon added the changes are “an incremental step in the right direction” but further help can be had on the state level, such as making it easier to sell cannabis at events, not requiring expensive insurance to transport product and not requiring around-the-clock video surveillance.
The state’s requirements on having commercial-scale buildings were also flagged as supervisors discussed how to accommodate home-based cannabis businesses.
Planning Director John Ford said his department is open to developing further changes to make cannabis production within residences easier and “otherwise, we will just seek to interpret that as being consistent with the code.”
Supervisor Natalie Arroyo vouched for extending the approach to a broader scale.
“I would love to see us have the opportunity to have more flexibility with people’s home businesses,” she said. “I think we recognize that that’s part of the business culture here.”
Arroyo added that barriers to cottage industry “affects home bakeries the same way that it does tamale makers, the same way that it does these micro-businesses.”
She supports “continuing to look at what opportunities we have to allow more flexibility and work with the state on that, and make that a clear priority.”
The micro-business permit changes were unanimously approved.