Goleta to Appeal Winchester Canyon Cannabis Farm
'White Light Cannabis Cultivation' Proposes 17 Acres of Nursery and Outdoor Grow
Pot plantations envisioned for Winchester Canyon Road raised objections from the City of Goleta in 2019, while the county was finalizing its cannabis rules, with the city advocating for a mile between grows and homes. Now that a cannabis farm just outside city borders has received a county approval, Goleta has signaled its intention to appeal the project.
The applicant, White Light Cannabis Cultivation, plans to plant 17 acres in cannabis at 222 Winchester Canyon Road, both in nurseries and outdoors. The 349-acre property is roughly a half mile from the Winchester Canyon and Winchester Commons neighborhoods along western Cathedral Oaks Road, and it logged complaints for cannabis odor in 2019 and 2020. The canyon is also known for the occasional drift of hydrogen sulfide, a gas that is “extremely flammable” and “highly toxic” and whose “effects can occur even at low concentrations,” said Peter Imhof, the City of Goleta’s Planning Director.
Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) carries a distinctively heavy, rotten-egg smell from the sulfur it contains. Dangerously, the human nose soon adjusts to the smell, which has led to deaths in industrial refineries during accidental releases. The property had permits connected to oil well and gas exploration in the 1980s, and Goleta’s last well-publicized hydrogen sulfide release in 2016 was traced to an agricultural well being drilled in Winchester Canyon. People all the way out to the Ellwood Bluffs, about a mile and a half away, were made ill and reported headache and nausea.
