Residents of a rural Sonoma County community have joined forces to try to prevent a large cannabis cultivation and processing facility from being built just across the street from their homes.
It’s a growing issue in the county, where the marijuana industry has expanded seven-fold in just five years' time.
We’re on Pepper Lane just outside Petaluma. Two dozen or more homes dot the country road, surrounded by hundreds of acres of bright green springtime pastureland. "We have a great community. We all get together on holidays. We get together for parties," said Veronica Rafalo.
She and her husband are in despair because a massive cannabis grow operation may pop up 300 feet from her home. She told KCBS Radio she has nothing against cannabis, it’s legal and that’s ok.
"I think it brings crime," she added.
Plans for the facility call for special fencing and armed security patrols.
Back at home and joined by several neighbors at the kitchen table, the group said they have gathered 1,200 petition signatures to convince the county to disapprove the 18,000-square-foot grow and processing facility with chemical and pesticide storage and parking.
"They’ll question ‘Mommy, what is that smell?’ They’ll question the huge trucks driving down our roads," one neighbor said.
Sonoma County Supervisor David Rabbitt’s district includes Pepper Lane.
"(It’s) something that we’ve been battling is how you actually take into account neighborhood compatibility in these cases," he said. "Right now, I think we haven’t done enough."
It will be up to the Board of Supervisors to decide the fate of the property.
Its developer, Marin County plastic surgeon Dr. Robert Aycock, told KCBS Radio he has no comment, adding that he’ll do whatever the county wants.
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