Posted on 11/01/2009 11:52:04 AM PST by Steelfish
Marijuana Growers Upend Hard-Luck California Town
They flock to Hayfork to bask in the sunny, cool climate and the permissive rules on medical pot farming and possession.
An abandoned truck in Hayfork, Calif. Pot farmers are filling an economic void left by the logging industry. The unemployment rate in the county was 15.9% in September. (Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times / October 31, 2009)
PHOTOS: Trinity County, Calif.: 'Pot paradise'
Alana Semuels November 1, 2009
Reporting from Hayfork, Calif. — Education has long been preached as a way to keep kids away from drugs. It's the walk to school that has Supt. Tom Barnett worried.
This hardscrabble Northern California town has become a hotbed for medical marijuana farming. Kids stroll much of the year past pungent plants flourishing in gardens and alleys.
The red-and-black clad Timberjacks football team moved its halftime huddle on a recent Friday night to avoid the odor of marijuana smoke wafting over the gridiron from nearby houses. Some students talk openly of farming pot after graduation, about the only opportunity in this depressed timber town.
"It's not a subculture here," said Barnett, who heads the Mountain Valley Unified School District. "Marijuana is drying in their houses. It's falling out of their pockets."
Los Angeles isn't the only place struggling with repercussions unleashed by its permissive medical marijuana laws. Here in Trinity County, cannabis cultivation is upending the rural culture and economy of one of the state's most hard-luck regions.
Drawn by the sunny, cool climate -- and a local ordinance permissive of medical marijuana farming and possession -- big-city refugees have brought a decidedly urban edge to hamlets such as Hayfork, about 60 miles west of Redding.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Been through there a few times. However, Garberville would have been my first thought as a pot hub.
Just like peasants in third world nations.
Some of my family camps at Hyampom several times a year...
Depressed, no doubt, because the radical greenies shut down the timber industry as they have done in most of the northwest. Got to hand it to the folks that stayed; they are surviviors and entrepreneurs even if the are breaking current federal law.
Lumberjacks...not Timberjacks...another reason the North should secede! Southern Cali knows very little of it’s Northern better 1/3.
Like the criminalizers aren’t the criminals. Just more demonization from the controlled media as people are insulted by their projections and drop their subscriptions. Why does’t the LA Times do a poll of Californians to see how well their demonization is holding up?
When the LA Times wants people to have an opinion, they will give them one.
Where are the enviros to stop this eco destruction??? Must be scared of violence.
It still is...Garberville (southern Humboldt) has always tried to keep it on the downlow. Now, with Arcata, it has really spread and people there are very scared. Before it was kind like low key.
I have family and friends that live there and never before have they ever feared the growers there until now. I lived in Eureka for over 20 years until I moved to Southern Arizona about 3 years ago.
It is totally out of control. People now are arming themselves because of the increased home invasions. You also have people from the big towns like LA the Bay Area going up there and trying to take over. This is a powder keg ready to explode at anytime.
The so called town leadership are ignoring the potential and ineviable drug war over turf that is going to erupt as the pie gets smaller.
The growers in Southern Humboldt and somewhat in Orleans kept mostly to themselves.
Now Hayfork. Wow.
Interestingly, the crop is only profitable because it’s still illegal.
If and when it is fully legalized, large operations will drive down the profit margins as on all other agricultural products. Small operators won’t be able to turn a profit at all, much less a big one.
Yeah, they grow crops that people want, give a good return, and aren’t owned by huge agri-businesses.
If anyone could grow it in all fifty seven states it might be slightly more valuable than dried pine needles on the open market.
And without a dime in taxpayer subsidies. Heck, the marijuana laws might be the only U.S. farm program that works.
The elect councilmen, mayors and sheriffs that see things their way. Usually by overwhelming 70+% margins.
Combined with favorable state law and, now, favorable federal enforcement priorities, this is emerging as the new agricultural center of the state, if not the country.
Easily a $20bil/yr business in CA alone.
Yeah, and they don’t have those darn subsidies either.
Yeah, and a lot less people would be thinking and worrying about it too.
Quite true. It would be as mundane as tomato plants in the garden and a beer in the fridge.
Pity they turned off the water in the southern half of the state, or California would still be the garden state.
End the failed war on pot.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.