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OPINION: No Cannabis Zoning Permits in Our Neighborhood

OPEN LETTER TO THE SONOMA COUNTYBOARD OF SUPERVISORS

My wife and I live on a 2.5 acre parcel on a quiet residential street in unincorporated Sebastopol. We have lived here for 25 years. We raised our daughter here. This is a neighborhood filled with children.

Then, last year the owner of an adjoining parcel brought large earthmoving equipment onto their 2+ acre parcel, graded and paved a very large area, and built a massive (2880 square foot) greenhouse for the purpose of commercial cannabis cultivation. All this was done swiftly and illegally. A number of neighbors filed complaints and the building was red-tagged. The owners of the greenhouse are now applying for building permits and a Cannabis Zoning Permit. Based on your recently drafted County Cannabis Ordinances, they could potentially get them.

I respectfully suggest that in approving and implementing many of these Cannabis Ordinances you have violated a public trust. In allowing a large commercial cannabis operation to be built in a neighborhood such as ours, you will have enriched one grower at the expense of the well-being, peace of mind, and security of an entire neighborhood. You will have brought noise, activity, potential crime, glare, and odor into an otherwise quiet and safe community.

Please consider the ways in which these Ordinances have failed our neighborhood:

Patrick Ball, and our many Sebastopol neighbors

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