AUDIO:

"The Humboldt Chronicles," Sept. 22, 2022.

The following is a rough machine transcript. Click the words to skip to that point in the audio.

CHUCK ROGERS:

This is The Humboldt Chronicles. I'm Chuck Rogers with producer Larry Trask and Comet the Radio Dog. The Humboldt Chronicles is made possible by goat. Global Humboldt, Humboldt Herb & Market and MOCA Humboldt. Much appreciation for your support of the Humboldt Chronicles.

LARRY TRASK:

Big, big thanks to our sponsors and for tonight's show, we're going to revisit a format that we introduced in July -- the exciting news roundup. There's a lot going on as we turn the corner and head towards 2023. So we thought we'd run down some of the developments here in Humboldt in Sacramento and around the world

ROGERS:

And like a great vacation, we're going to start by venturing out into the world and as the show progresses work our way back here to Humboldt as things stand Currently, there are only three countries in the world, only three where recreational sale and use of cannabis is fully legal nationwide -- Canada, Thailand and Uruguay. There are a few other countries that have made possession and recreational use of cannabis fully legal but have at least some restrictions on commercial sales -- specifically Georgia, Malta, Mexico and South Africa. And of course there are many nations that have made provisions for the legal use of cannabis under a medical structure or like right here in the USA, where sale and use is fully or partially legal in some areas of the country but not so on a nationwide basis.

While it is quite frequently the case that Europe is the world's leading edge when it comes to progressive advancement, that's not the case with cannabis legalization. While most Western European countries decriminalized marijuana possession years ago, either formally or as a practical matter and most have some form of medical use programs. No European countries have fully legalized possession and recreational use, but things may be changing at least in Germany. Late last year, the newly elected governing coalition there announced that they had reached an agreement to legalize marijuana among other drug policy liberalizations and in June of this year opened a series of meetings to discuss implementation of these policies. Earlier this month, German officials and lawmakers visited the Bay Area to meet with state officials, advocates and experts to learn about the Golden State's experience with legalization. The German consulate in san Francisco tweeted quote, the delegation of the health committee of the German parliament continued discussions on lessons learned from cannabis policy and reform in Oakland California with activists, patients, industry and legal experts, informative exchanges. End of quotation.

TRASK:

You know, I was, I was surprised when I started doing research for this for the show that there were only three nations in the world where it was completely legal. I would have guessed more,

ROGERS:

I would have guessed more to like maybe a lot more. Yeah, it's surprising.

TRASK:

Yeah. You know, and I think I think it's probably the case. I know this is the case in Europe uh and it's probably the case in other parts of the world as well where it may be on the books illegal, but you're probably not gonna get sent to jail. You know, you, you have to know the lay of the local land where you can get away with it where you can, but there are also uh some countries where you are going to get sent to jail and maybe worse

ROGERS:

places where you do not want to be in jail.

TRASK:

There was a rumor and I saw this again as I was doing research, there was a rumor prevalent for awhile online that it was actually legal in North Korea. And this came from someone visited North Korea and they found a market where they were selling a hemp derivative because actual cigarettes were hard to come by in North Korea. So local farmers were chopping up hemp and selling that wouldn't get you high. Uh but but the bloggers saw that and then he started spreading this room. Well marijuana's legal in North Korea but Chuck, I'm here to tell you, I know you're planning to visit North Korea. Don't take your weed with.

ROGERS:

You anticipated my question there. I have two questions actually, first of all, given the current circumstances in the world as an American, would you be traveling to North Korea to start with? And even if somehow you got into north Korea, would you take a risk buying a hemp derivative there?

TRASK:

Uh No,

ROGERS:

no sir,

TRASK:

considering what happened to the person who tried to take a poster home. Yeah, I think, you know, I probably will stay out of North Korea, at least for a little

ROGERS:

while. Yeah.

TRASK:

Although just to close this, there are services that offer tours into North Korea. However, uh, people from South Korea and the US are explicitly not invited.

ROGERS:

Thank goodness. Would you do that anyway, though?

TRASK:

I mean there would

ROGERS:

be no guarantee that you would even come back.

TRASK:

I'd be scared of it under the current circumstances. I wouldn't. But I'm fascinated by North. Yeah,

ROGERS:

I am too. I'm fascinated by it as well. But I can think of a lot of places right now. I would rather travel to

TRASK:

agreed, agreed. Well, a little closer to home. Uh, there's a couple of things we've been keeping an eye on, or excuse me upon which we've been keeping. And I uh in Washington, D. C. You may remember in july this year with some amount of fanfare Chuck Schumer along with Ron Wyden and Cory Booker finally introduced their bill to legalize cannabis at the federal level. It's called the cannabis administration and opportunity act. And the bill would decriminalize weed on the federal level and allow states to set their own marijuana laws without interference from Washington Schumer's bill joins new york, congressman jerry nadler's more act as uh one of the two currently pending pieces of legislation. Uh the former in the House, The latter in the Senate and in fact the more act did actually pass in the House. Uh and Schumer's bill, however, has seen almost no action in the Senate bill, as mentioned, was introduced in july uh immediately following that there was a largely ceremonial hearing held by the subcommittee on criminal justice and counterterrorism. That happened a few days after it was introduced. And shortly after that, the bill was referred to the Senate Finance Committee and there it sits to this very day with no further action taken. So, to be fair, it did seem pretty clear when the bill was introduced that it was, it was kind of a political move move though, you know, widening Booker and Schumer too, I suppose, do seem sincere in their desire to see some legislation passed some way at some time in the future. But Chuck we were probably smart when we decided last july to stop holding our breasts, will something happen in the next session? I think the only thing we can know for sure is that depending on the outcome of the midterm elections, the answer to that question will either be maybe or stop kidding yourself.

ROGERS:

Yeah, exactly. And the makeup of both houses of Congress is gonna have a lot to say about that. Right? So the midterm elections, But although, you know, one thing that we talked about in the early years of this show Was whether there would be some Republicans who would see this as more of an economic issue rather than a culture war issue? And there are some, the question is, are there enough? Because especially as it gets to the Senate, uh, that's gonna be critical because they'll need more than just the 50, Um, presumably unless there's a way they could pass something with 50 or 51, but for a lot of things they need 60. And that means, you know, depending upon these midterm elections, how many Republicans can you get?

TRASK:

Yeah, Yeah. And the other factor is, and again, it depends on the makeup of both houses after the election. But there, there's sometimes is a situation in which no legislation is allowed to pass, no matter how the individual members feel, because they've adopted a policy of not letting anything pass, no matter what it is. And so, you know, we just have to wait and see. But I, but I do agree that even, uh, even within the GOP, there are members who would look favorably on this, all of their factors notwithstanding,

ROGERS:

and, and could still survive re election, uh, just hammering on this as an economic issue, right? And kind of educating their own constituents, uh, as to the fact that this has an economic impact on their, their locality. I mean, that seems to me that's the only way they're gonna get enough republican votes if they can find republicans who see it that way.

TRASK:

While

ROGERS:

we're still in Washington, we should probably mention that our own representative congressman Jared Huffman recently introduced some legislation in the House designed to help small cannabis operators, the small and homestead independent producers or ship act would, according to a press release, allow small farmers and producers to operate their agricultural businesses within and across state lines and would permit shipment directly to consumers. A direct to consumer channel is long sought after and much desired by cannabis cultivators though not to be a pessimist. This may be another instance in which not holding your breath is well advised by the way and not that this is related in any way to the aforementioned legislative proposal. But congressman Huffman is up for re election in november. His Republican opponent is Ferndale own reverend Douglas brower whose campaign web address to the best of my googling ability is 04861 lower case D zero dot w C O M H O S T dot com forward slash

TRASK:

I had a chance to spend a little time on that website a little earlier today. And I think, you know, I I think that it indicates, uh, not a tremendous amount of state GOP resources are going into this particular race. And you know, if your, if your congressman Jared Huffman, your, although you wouldn't admit it, you're probably feeling pretty calm about the election.

ROGERS:

Yeah, I would think so. And you know, one way you can, you can tell that he's feeling that way is that we haven't seen a whole lot of advertising from Huffman anywhere right. And I mean that indicates that he feels pretty safe and this district is drawn such that it's a reliably blue district at least for right now. And you know, that's so not surprising that a congressman from this district would be introducing legislation like the small and homestead Independent Producers Act. So that's what's going on in Washington and with our local congressional race. Next, we're going to go to sacramento back in a moment. You're listening to The Humboldt Chronicles. Welcome back to The Humboldt Chronicles. I'm Chuck Rogers with producer and co host Larry Trask. We're gonna take you to sacramento right now and run through kind of a digest of some of the legislation that is cannabis related that governor Newsom recently signed into state law, starting with SB 13 26 which provides for interstate commerce to and from California with other states where cannabis is legal. However, and this is a big however contingent on assurances that there'd be no federal enforcement. Of course it's still federally illegal and depending upon who's in power in Washington. Uh, you never know who might be wanting to take revenge on blue states. So I'm sure that's why that little clause is there at the end, but, but it does, it does at least set up, uh, and provide for interstate commerce when it could happen.

TRASK:

Yeah, it's a little unclear to me exactly what the practical effect of this is I think nothing really, I mean, I guess it is a signal that in some ways that California desires to engage in some form of interstate commerce. I mean, I guess it's, it's sort of the opposite of, of declaring there's no way we're going to have any kind of interstate commerce. But with, with that provision that you mentioned the proviso, I guess I should say. And, and the fact that any type of arrangement with any neighboring state would take a tremendous amount of time to negotiate and would also, one would have to assume on, on the other states part include a similar proviso, which is basically saying we can agree to whatever we're gonna agree, but nothing's gonna happen until the Feds act.

ROGERS:

Yeah, I, I see this as the state just being proactive, being ready for whatever the future might hold, uh, and having things in place so that if interstate commerce does become possible California is ready at least legislatively. The other thing that I think might be behind this, I think it also shows to, uh, cannabis businesses in other parts of this country, Maybe even other parts of the world that California is open for business if they wanted to locate here, there's already legislation on the books that would provide for interstate commerce. Should they decide to locate here? Maybe it's, uh, something that might help in business recruitment as well. I don't know. But yeah, we're a long way from interstate commerce just being commonplace. Don't you think?

TRASK:

I do believe that, Yeah, this was just one of a whole bunch of different bills that made its way to Newsom's desk and then he signed, what are some of the other ones?

ROGERS:

Assembly Bill 21 88. Another interesting one, um employers under this new legislation cannot punish penalize or terminate an employee for off duty cannabis use. So let's say someone was being tested by their employer and it was positive and that employee says, well, that was five or six days ago, you know, I I don't I don't do that at work, uh you know, I'm fine at work as you have been able to see Mr employer, so don't punish me, but maybe the employer, as opposed to it under all circumstances and terminates the employee. Um This prevents that There's also Senate Bill 1186. Local jurisdictions cannot prevent delivery of medical cannabis to medical patients. I guess, we can assume that that probably was passed to override some lok jurisdictions that are still preventing cannabis from being delivered into their jurisdiction to a medical patient, even if the patient has been using medical cannabis for some time, is under the care of a licensed physician, even uh and and ordering that cannabis from a licensed dispensary, maybe some local jurisdictions are still preventing delivery to those medical patients. So this would this would prevent that, because remember, proposition 64 allowed for a lot of local leeway, um both at the at the city and town level, and also the county level. So I think some of this legislation is the result of of 64. And you can imagine that there might be some legislators in some uh areas of counties where there are no dispensaries and it's it's specifically not allowed. But when you have a medical patient, maybe this legislation is the result of some lobbying on the part of patients and dispensaries wanting to make sure that they can at least just deliver it to a person, not that they're trying to open a commercial business there, but they're just trying to deliver to a medical patient.

TRASK:

It's kind of an interesting quirk the way that California's propositions worked. So, you you in effect had the, you know, on its face more liberal, Proposition 64 turned out to be actually more restrictive in some areas than to 15 was because, as you remember under 2 15, if you had uh if you had a medical permit, you know, if you had your authorization, there was there was relatively little that could be done to prevent you from getting your medicine. But when proposition 64 came in, it gave local jurisdictions a little bit more ability to actually prevent things like a local delivery. And there there were some jurisdictions here in Humboldt County that prohibited deliveries. And now they may have made some exception for medical, I don't remember specifically, but I do know that deliveries were specifically prohibited by some locality.

ROGERS:

And let's also recall that that's part of the reason 64 was written the way it was, because that was the way to get it passed, because 64 was not the first try. Remember, there were there were other attempts at this. And, you know, when you see provisions like this in a uh, in something that's being voted on statewide, you can assume that each little provision in there is there for a reason and it's been researched and it's been tested and it's been written with very specific language and in this case, it was the local jurisdiction. Part of it was to make sure it could pass statewide. Yeah,

TRASK:

you know, and we we hear that over and over again, when we look at specific provisions of part 64 in fact later on in the show, we'll hear someone saying, oh, that that particular tax provision was put in there just to make, make it more palatable to people who were ideologically opposed to Canada,

ROGERS:

here's another one. Assembly Bill 17 06 has to do with justice reform. It mandates courts to process record ceiling and other forms of relief for eligible cannabis convictions. So, you know, several years ago we talked on the show about expungement of records for those who had passed cannabis convictions that did not Uh include some other charge of violence, but just a basic cannabis conviction. Expungement of those records. And I think what, this is about 1706 here is telling the courts get on with it. It's been too long seal these records. Is that your interpretation? Yeah,

TRASK:

for sure. And this is another artifact of California being one of the early movers in the legalization movement, because as we've seen a lot of subsequent state bills, and I'm thinking particularly of Illinois and michigan and a few others included automatic expungement as part of the initial legislation that that legalized marijuana, because it just makes, it's so obvious if it's now legal people shouldn't still be suffering from past convictions. But when California was, you know, the second state to legalize, uh, you know, that was just not part of the regimen where it is now.

ROGERS:

Yeah, yeah, we've learned a lot since then, assembly bill 25 68 not a crime to provide insurance to licensed cannabis businesses, which of course protects those businesses, but also, uh, the insurance provider is not going to get in trouble by ensuring uh, cannabis business that is operating legitimately. So if you think of small businesses, it's scary not to be insured. So, of course, this is important. Uh, and this is a big thing for small business operators being insured, Another common sense kind of thing.

TRASK:

Yeah, and 11 more uh, well, I was gonna say one more little step, but for some people, it's a, it's a big step

ROGERS:

towards huge step treating

TRASK:

cannabis business is the same as any other business and kind of removing some of the restrictions that no other business has to deal with.

ROGERS:

Yeah. You know, and from a personal standpoint, this would also reduce some of the stress on the business owner to to know that at least they're insured at the very least.

TRASK:

Yeah. And I think, you know, as with, as with banking services, I think that uh, these businesses have found kind of creative ways to solve these problems, but, you know, should they have to be creative, why can't they just buy insurance? Same as anything like

ROGERS:

everybody else? Yeah, And outside of legislation, some other developments here in the state of California relating to Cannabis, California has taken in nearly $4 billion 2018. And in the most recent fiscal year, $817 million 55% increase over the previous fiscal year. So revenues over The last fiscal year up by 55%,,

TRASK:

which is frankly a little surprising to

ROGERS:

me. I mean,

TRASK:

that's a that's a pretty healthy increase. We've heard from many different sources that there isn't a tremendous amount of growth in, in uh, in retail. Um, but but that there has been a fair amount of growth in cultivation. So maybe that's the source of it, I don't, I don't know, I guess if you look at that figure, that's, that's both good news and bad news, depending on your perspective, you know, as a Californian and it seems like good news. We want our government to be well funded. Uh, if you are in the cannabis industry though, you may have a bittersweet feeling about the increase in tax revenue,

ROGERS:

The one who's sending that revenue to the state. Yeah, maybe a different perspective for sure.

TRASK:

And uh speaking of perspective, when we come back from the break, we're gonna get the perspective of local county

ROGERS:

official

TRASK:

about the health of Humboldt cannabis economy more on The Humboldt Chronicles when we come back, welcome back to the Humboldt products and thanks for joining us tonight. We're almost done with our trip around the world Chuck. We're back here in Humboldt County. And a couple of weeks ago you had the opportunity to talk to Scott Adair, who was the Director of Economic Development for Humboldt County. And he was he was here talking about their said's program

ROGERS:

and that's

TRASK:

an acronym that stands for Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy. So they put together this document, a kind of a planning document. And at the time they were looking for input from the community, what our, what our needs are, what are areas that we can build out, What are, what are the areas that opera offer us the best opportunity for economic growth and you had the opportunity to ask him a few questions about the health of Humboldt County's cannabis industry and here's what he had to say.

ROGERS:

What's your current assessment of the health of the cannabis industry in Humboldt?

SCOTT ADAIR:

It's concerning to me, we were seeing some economic drivers and some trends pre Covid, which illustrated to us that the market was starting to take a downward turn. It was starting to slope downwards for cannabis right before covid, interestingly enough though, Covid then um caused a slight recovery for cannabis and uh I'm not sure if there was higher demand for cannabis because of the pandemic, that's probably part of what was occurring. So it was already beginning to dip. Covid brought it back up. But it was, I think a false recovery because it was, it wasn't a natural market driven recovery, it was tied to a specific event, which was the pandemic. And as the pandemic is easing up, we're seeing the market fall again, we're looking at not just what neighboring counties are doing with regards to cannabis and not just what's happening with the state, but what's happening nationally and in other states, there are other states who are racing to advance ahead of California in this market, um and to gain market share for when cannabis is ultimately federalized, which I think we all agree it's just a matter of time, but it's going in that we hear

ROGERS:

it's inevitable, was the expectation that the unregulated market would dry up eventually, at least by now,

ADAIR:

maybe that was the expectation of some, but I don't know if that's necessarily realistic, especially with how overly regulated cannabis is. It seems to me there's a lot of speculation out there. And so here's one bear that in mind, but it seems as though the trade off in order to legalize it was to come up with um some very heavy over regulation for the industry. Uh and that was used in order to maybe appease or pacify some really strong opponents to legalization was to balance that with heavy regulation. However, it's regulated to the point that if this were another normal business industry, those businesses would not be able to survive. Um If you regulate it, to the point that, you know, like if we regulated retail, for example, to the point that we're regulating cannabis right now, we would see retailers closing up their doors left and right. And so the expectation may have been that the unregulated market would dry up, but I don't think that's possible with the way that we're regulating it, we're pushing some um, some cultivators and other, I think cannabis businesses back into their regulated illicit market because it's easier for them. You mentioned

ROGERS:

that the whole seeds idea is to take a look at what's going on, be prepared diversify. Look at uh other industries and shore things up, is that in some ways a plan b in case the cannabis industry does not turn out to be what everybody thought it might be under legalization.

ADAIR:

I don't think we've given up on cannabis and we still see it as a strong industry for Humboldt County moving forward. Especially if we can be strategic about how we can position ourselves. We're not gonna be able to compete on a commodity basis, not when we have other communities and other states who can plant, you know, 100 acres of crop. But there is opportunity, you know, you look at what napa has done with wine. Uh, there's opportunity, I think for us and there's still room for canna tourism. Um, there, you know, we have um, so much of the legacy knowledge as well behind the cultivation of that crop that if we utilize that moving forward and we're strategic about it. I think we can still, we may not be um, a large player in the market, but I'm thinking quality versus quantity. I think that's the place that we can still be with cannabis. We just

ROGERS:

need our slice of that pie. We don't need the whole pie.

ADAIR:

Right? That's right. We can have the best tasting slice.

TRASK:

And that again was a conversation that you had with scott Adair, director of economic development for Humboldt County just a few weeks ago. Uh, one thing that struck me from that conversation was just how frank he was as, as a government official about the fact that yes, there is over regulation in cannabis industry.

ROGERS:

Yeah, he was very direct on this topic and not just cheerleading, you know, I mean, he was very frank, which uh, we appreciate. And the other thing is that over the years we've had cannabis operators in Humboldt tell us Larry that we're over regulated. It's hard for us to compete. We can't even afford to be in business, We don't know how we're gonna make it. Um, but here's a county administrator confirming that, that's not just complaining, that's real, this is real and it's a problem and it needs to be dealt with because this is a big part of our local economy.

TRASK:

Yeah, absolutely, and you know, I mean, any, any regulated business doesn't like regulation and any business owner everywhere doesn't like paying taxes, but there really is a fundamental difference about the way the cannabis industry is regulated than any other industry. I mean, just the fact that a few minutes ago we were talking about legislation that just was signed, allowing them to buy insurance, right? I mean,

ROGERS:

and this is years later.

TRASK:

So, so there there clearly, there clearly is a problem. And I think we're seeing that in uh, the way that these businesses are, are struggling to compete.

ROGERS:

Yeah, and it's also clear just by their actions, you know, scott and his department having these public meetings all over the county, uh, and speaking frankly with us, it's a cue that there is still a lot to be done. Uh, and a lot to be done in some complex areas of local law.

TRASK:

Yeah. And I think you know, the we we spent a lot of time being somewhat pessimistic during the course of the show. But if you're looking for one reason to be optimistic at least there has been some acknowledgement that, that this is an issue. I mean, we saw it with the tax deferment that happened a little bit earlier. That was a really quick kind of response from county government to say, hey, okay, we get it. There is a problem here. We're going to take this specific action and we're going to take a long, a longer look at it beyond just this one specific step.

ROGERS:

And that was a bold move I think by the county supervisors, they deserve some credit for that because they knew by casting that vote that it was gonna mean less revenue coming in to the county for some indefinite period of time. But they went ahead and did it anyway because it was the right thing to do at that time.

TRASK:

Yeah, of course. And you know, I mean, it just buys some time. But for some people that time is crucial.

ROGERS:

Absolutely. I'm Chuck Rogers with producer Larry Trask and Comet the Radio Dog. This edition of The Humboldt Chronicles will be posted soon at 941 lounge dot com, lost coast outpost dot com and at itunes for listening and downloading and we send much appreciation to our sponsors -- Goat Global Humboldt, Humboldt Herb & Market and MOCA Humboldt. Thank you very much. We'll be back with The Humboldt Chronicles at six p.m. on the third Wednesday of October. So we'll see you next time, October the 19th at six p.m.