Before those who care about cannabis begin rejoicing over last week’s Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors vote to deny more time for eight Carpinteria Valley cannabis farms to install odor abatement equipment, allow me to be that pesky cloud of reality on an otherwise sunny day.

Cannabis is governed under a dual legal scheme, one controlled by the county Planning & Development Department and the other by the County Executive Office. We are now in the throes of a battle to see which will prevail.

Cannabis is regulated through the interplay of Chapter 35 (Land Use) and Chapter 50 (Licensing) of the Santa Barbara County Code.

Land use is the Planning & Development Department’s fiefdom, which allows them to operate under the relative cover of darkness when they review a grower’s proposed odor abatement plan.

An annual cultivation business license, on the other hand, is controlled by the County Executive Office with due process license revocation protections that ensure public transparency.

Last year’s licensing changes requiring the use of better odor technology by March 18 was a quick Board of Supervisors-controlled fix while Chapter 35 modifications — that could have guaranteed no odor at the property line — and tech neutrality would have required a war with the Planning & Development Department and cannabis.

Unfortunately, First District Supervisor Roy Lee, who has left former Supervisor Das Williams’ planning commissioner in place, never wanted to have that war.

As I wrote in a February 2025 commentary, licensing changes are “a solid first step but — TAKE MY WORD — it is not a magic bullet, because just as important as mandating the best technology is changing the legal framework to determine if the technology is actually ‘working.’”

Still, Lee took no action.

The recent March 10 Board of Supervisors hearing, at which eight coastal growers were denied extensions to install “multitechnology carbon scrubbers (MTCF) OR their equivalent,” only proved the point.

The 4-1 vote was NOT a license revocation, it was a “Notice to Revoke” with a hearing in 60 days. Fifth District Supervisor Steve Lavagnino was the only dissenting vote.

Second District Supervisor Laura Capps led the charge by asking about the potential health risks, especially inside the facility, of a newly proposed Genesis odor system that used photo catalytic oxidation (PCO) without carbon.

Understand, without carbon, PCO is NOT sanctioned by the Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District or the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment because it produces ozone/toxic byproducts that, for Capps, was a “red-flag” and “CLEARLY NOT an MTCF (multitechnology carbon scrubbers) equivalent.”

At the hearing, Air Pollution Control District director David Harris agreed with Capps. Oh, and health risks aside (I mean, it is cheaper), the Planning & Development Department admitted Genesis was only 49% odor effective but apparently, for the district, it was “equivalent” to an MTCF system that was 84% effective.

We must have different dictionaries.

Anyway, and this was surreal, after Capps flayed P&D over its advocacy for Genesiswe learned two things:

The Planning & Development Department engaged the Geosyntec consulting firm (who paid?) to opine that Genesis’ toxin output were “all good.”

And, (you can’t make this up) ONE day before the hearing, the department APPROVED an odor abatement plan using Genesis for Autumn Brands LLC and the system had already been and/or was being installed. Talk about speed-to-install.

Game, set and match for cannabis’ cheerleader and very best friend, P&D! 

Also surprised by the Genesis installation were the Hahn family, owners of the renowned Rose Story Farm on Casitas Pass Road in Carpinteria, adjacent to Autumn Brands.

The Hahns spoke emotionally about the “constant” odor and decline of their business. Also, if Genesis had replaced the previous system, well, they certainly couldn’t tell.

Question: If the noncarbon Genesis is not, per the Board of Supervisors, equivalent to or APCD-safe, what about the now approved odor abatement plan and others that are pending?

Only ONE of the eight growers requesting an extension were willing to use the more expensive Envinity Group multitechnology carbon scrubbers that had been tested at 84% effective.

But as we marched into the Tech Twilight Zone that grower, G&K Produce, said that it may not be able to acquire the required units, i.e., why pay more if the Planning & Development Department will allow less?

Déjà vu: We are back to pre-Chapter 50 licensing changes when folks bickered about “best available technology,” i.e., a game of tech Whac-A-Mole with P&D in control of the odor abatement plan approval process.

Pursuant to the County Code, we will revisit things in 60 days at a licensing hearing where an outside hearing officer will be chosen by the county.

During this time the weed will grow and P&D will, their words, “work with” growers “to get them into compliance” regarding their newly submitted OAPs and request to use “equivalent” technologies.

Over this time these eight corporations will pool their considerable resources (Glass House Farms posts $200 million in annual revenue) and pay an army of hotshot cannabis attorneys, experts and manufacturer CEOs to build their choreographed case.

At their side will be Planning & Development Department’s cannabis apparatchiks to solemnly nod yes and help them with their own multimillion-dollar taxpayer-paid consultants.

The reasonable cannabis citizenry will be COMPLETELY out-gunned. Where is the Environmental Defense Center when you need it?

The Planning & Development Department will say “fear not” because we’ll be using the cheapest odor detecting technology — the Nasal Ranger — to do property line testing.

The problem is that we have seen how P&D is completely twisted for cannabis and manipulates these tests, often taking samples UPWIND from the facility.

P&D even admitted in a 2024 letter to the Board of Supervisors: “The Nasal Ranger manufacturer indicates that the ideal use of the Nasal Ranger is in a lab setting … rather than use in the field …”

Other elegant 24/7, dashboard-monitored testing systems could have been utilized but that would have taken intellectual rigor, a curated P&D-busting cannabis team and deep Chapter 35 changes — none of which ever happened.

Maybe this whole thing will simply work out and next year the Carpinteria Valley will again be filled with the smell of roses from Rose Story Farm, but as I tell my kids, “a wish is not a plan.”

Unfortunately, when it comes to the county’s First Supervisorial District, there really never was a plan.