A win for Big Sur cannabis growers – Voices of Monterey Bay

Big Sur cannabis growers won the right to prove themselves legitimate on Tuesday. On a 3-2 vote, the Monterey County Board of Supervisors ordered county officials to create a pilot program that would allow open-air cannabis grows in the Santa Lucia hills around Big Sur. And supervisors said they’d like the program approved by the end of the year. Supervisors John Phillips and Simon Salinas voted against the proposal.

In a strange twist, county law-enforcement officers showed up at the hearing to oppose the pilot program, but their testimony unwittingly provided fodder for proponents.

In response, Big Sur farmers and three of the five county supervisors said that legalizing the Big Sur operations — and holding those operations liable to county rules and regulations — shouldn’t prohibit law enforcement officers from pursuing growers who operate outside the system.

And Peter Brazil, an attorney representing Big Sur growers, told supervisors that legal Big Sur farmers are likely to report growers who aren’t playing by the county rules because the illegal operators would have an unfair market advantage. “You will be deputizing these people,” he said.