Facebook post from Brian
Good afternoon Sangerville, it seems like a good afternoon to discuss Cannabis. Now, I grew up in the 80’s and like a good Cheech and Chong movie as much as the next person but our current issue with Cannabis in Sangerville is on a whole different level. As I have said many times, we are not interested in interfering with the private lives of those who use marijuana legally in the privacy of their own homes or those patients with medical cards that legally use it to mitigate symptoms of certain medical conditions.
Our problem is with industrial scale commercial growing operations that seem to be proliferating Sangerville. We believe these operations have targeted Sangerville because they can buy real estate relatively cheap compared to other places and we have no real zoning laws or ordinances that in any way regulate their activities. These operations are all owned by out of state entities. They buy existing homes that they convert into grow establishments and they are taking advantage of us having no building permit process, (other than a building notice and shoreland zoning), to rapidly build cheap poorly constructed structures to grow large amounts of Cannabis.
The question is why should we be concerned with this? What they are doing is technically legal under Maine law. I say technically because we believe they stretch legal definitions, exploit loopholes and bend the law to just short of its breaking point.
The concerns brought to this office and individual select board members by multiple citizens and shared by all of us are the following:
They are a potential public safety hazard. These are large buildings with a lot of high energy electrical equipment that presents multiple fire hazards. We believe they may be using hazardous chemicals to grow and process the cannabis. They have many people living and working in the structures. We have no mechanism to inspect these facilities. We do not know if they have any fire suppression equipment, adequate egress or any form of respiratory protection if they are using chemicals. If we have a fire in one of these structures, our firefighters will have to go in and search the building with no knowledge of what hazards are present.
Waste disposal; they have multiple people working and living in these structures with possibly inadequate septic facilities. We have had complaints of large accumulations of garbage at these facilities not properly disposed and we have no way of knowing how they are managing hazardous waste products.
They devaluate the property around them.
We are having a local shortage of affordable housing which is exacerbated these entities buying usable housing and taking it out of the housing market.
They create a very unpleasant odor that can extend a great distance beyond the facility.
They do nothing for our economy; they are self-contained operations that do not support themselves by patronizing local businesses. They create no jobs and are not assessed adequately to pay taxes or fees to offset their potential cost to the community.
We have talked with other towns and the Maine Office of Cannabis Policy and believe it is past time for us to put some regulation in place.
Our first step is that we have called a special town meeting for one week from tonight on Thursday June 25, at 6:00 PM at the Grace Bible Community Room, 40 Douty Hill Rd. in Sangerville to act on a warrant article to see if the citizens of Sangerville will enact a 180-day moratorium on all new commercial cannabis operations. If passed the state of Maine will not provide licenses in Sangerville for large grow operations for six months and violation of that will be a criminal offense. We have a draft of the moratorium that will be discussed in open forum at a special select board meeting this coming Monday June 22, at 6:00 PM at the fire station. This meeting’s primary purpose will be to act as a public hearing on the moratorium so people may ask questions and seek to understand it before Thursday’s special town meeting.
Our second step is that we have created an ad hoc committee which was appointed last night by the select board to begin meeting and develop a draft ordinance that would be first approved by the select board and planning board, reviewed by the town attorney and then placed before the people of Sangerville at a special town meeting either in late summer or early fall. When we have a meeting schedule for this committee it will be posted as with all other town business all their meetings and deliberations will be open to the public.
I was very pleased to see the turnout at last night’s select board meeting where this was discussed. There were some great discussion and debate at the meeting. I also feel we fielded a diverse committee of volunteers that will well represent Sangerville. I was very encouraged to see residents that don’t typically involve themselves in town affairs stepping up to volunteer along with some of our residents that have a long history of service to the Town of Sangerville. I am confident this group will draft an ordinance that will meet the needs of our town.
I have some other news which I will post early next week as the length of this post is already quite long. Please remember the office is closed tomorrow in observance of Juneteenth. Have a great weekend everyone.
Brian