Turlock considers allowing industrial hemp businesses. What would rules permit?
Turlock officials Tuesday took a step toward allowing industrial hemp businesses to extract cannabis chemicals from the crop and manufacture products such as infused oils within city limits.
The City Council passed the first reading of an ordinance regulating hemp and may approve it at the next meeting on Sept. 22, creating requirements for business licenses and conditional use permits.
Inquiries from interested businesses prompted staff to draft the industrial hemp program rules, City Manager Toby Wells said Tuesday. While Stanislaus County created cultivation regulations for the federally legal crop last year, Wells said few state laws deal with preparing hemp products like cannabidiol (CBD) lotions.
If approved, the ordinance will set up random testing to check that products contain no more than 0.3% of THC, the active ingredient in marijuana, a staff report reads. Other requirements laid out in the draft ordinance range from security cameras to odor control to waste management plans. The program would allow industrial hemp businesses to apply for licenses and permits in the general industrial, heavy commercial and business park districts, but ban them from downtown.
Historically used for rope and canvas, industrial hemp is a cannabis plant like marijuana and oil extract from the crop has medicinal qualities. Compared to marijuana, it contains higher concentrations of CBD and lower amounts of THC, which makes people high. The Farm Bill in 2018 declassified industrial hemp as a federally controlled substance, meaning it is legal nationally.
As for cultivation of industrial hemp, the ordinance would prohibit growing throughout the city. Turlock resident Jesse Henrich urged the council to consider allowing personal cultivation in a public comment. Identifying himself as a previous owner of Dry Lake Wellness, a shuttered medical marijuana dispensary, he said people with cancer or autism would benefit.
“I have a lot of patients that wish to grow their own medication, do not wish to break the law and wish to work with the city,” Henrich said in the meeting. “In regards to 6,000 patients that talk to me on a weekly basis, we’re asking to work with the city instead of having the city making us criminals yet again.”
Turlock’s first recreational marijuana dispensary, Firehouse, only opened in August after the city previously banned the sale of weed. While Mayor Amy Bublak has voted against marijuana businesses, citing federal law, she joined the majority of the 4-1 vote on the draft hemp ordinance. Council Member Andrew Nosrati cast the sole opposing vote.
The council did not add any changes allowing personal cultivation before passing the first reading. California residents 21 and older can grow up to six marijuana plants inside a household under state law, but White said the law does not include hemp. Permitting private citizens to grow six industrial hemp plants would not yield significant medicinal benefits because CBD is typically extracted from large volumes of the crop, White added.
“It’s easier to take a straight agricultural product and say, ‘Hey, that’s something that’s more appropriate for the county and for large swaths of land than it is to have something in a neighborhood,’” White said.
Turlock isn’t the first Stanislaus County city to consider local hemp regulations. Riverbank banned the outdoor cultivation of industrial hemp within city limits in February, according to council meeting minutes.
This story was originally published September 11, 2020 at 4:00 AM.
