The Inconvenient Truth About Cannabis Reporting

The Independent’s recent story “Santa Barbara County to Crack Down on Cannabis?” misses the mark with an anti-cannabis bias and disregard for facts that run contrary to the reporter’s desire to portray the upcoming Board of Supervisors hearing as some kind of war between bucolic grape growers and profiteering cannabis farmers.

To create drama and tension in her narrative, Melinda Burns amplified the propaganda of a neo-prohibitionist organization that has filed multiple lawsuits against the county. The story also overlooked the tremendous benefits that legal cannabis farming has brought to our county and the fact that a vast majority of Santa Barbarans support it. This is both irresponsible reporting and a discredit to the Independent’s reputation for accuracy and fairness.

When the Board of Supervisors tasked its Planning Commission with suggesting changes to the current cannabis ordinance, Board Chair Gregg Hart stressed that all suggested changes should be “evidence based,” meaning backed by science, research, and objective facts. What the Planning Commission returned with, however, is a bureaucratic process that only appeases a small but vocal group of cannabis naysayers rather than fulfilling the direction of the elected representatives of the people. The Planning Commission’s recommendation that Conditional Use Permits (CUPs) be required for all cannabis projects would throw the entire county development process into disarray while creating absolutely no benefits to the general public.