Oregon County declares a state of emergency over illegal cultivation

Local leaders in a district in southern Oregon declared a state of emergency on Wednesday, saying the illegal production of marijuana in the community poses a threat to public safety. In a letter to heads of state, the Jackson County’s Board of Commissioners said the proliferation of illegal cannabis farms in the area had overwhelmed local law enforcement.

“Jackson County urgently needs your help to address this emergency,” said commissioners in the letter to Governor Kate Brown, Senate President Peter Courtney and House Speaker Tina Kotek.

The commissioners are calling for funding, labor and state national guards to solve the problem of illegal marijuana cultivation in the county. Board members said law enforcement, local code compliance officials and state cannabis regulators were overwhelmed by the illegal activities and warned of “an imminent threat to the public health and safety of our citizens from illegal cannabis production in our county “. . “

“Since recreational marijuana was legalized by Oregon voters in the November 2014 general election, the illegal and unlawful production of marijuana in our county has overwhelmed the ability of our county and state regulators to enforce relevant laws in our community,” said Jackson County Commissioner Rick Dyer said this in a video press conference on Wednesday.

Law enforcement calls for service spike with legalization

Proponents of recreational marijuana legalization in Oregon campaigned for claims that cannabis reform would ease the burden on law enforcement. However, in Jackson County, local police have detected an increase in crime allegedly related to the illegal cultivation of cannabis.

“Jackson County’s law enforcement agencies report a 59 percent increase in calls for services related to the marijuana industry, including burglary, theft, assault, robbery and harassment,” Dyer said. “And there is also significant evidence of drug slavery, forced labor, human trafficking, immigration problems, deplorable and unsafe living conditions, as well as worker exploitation and abuse, child protection issues and animal abuse.”

That year, the sheriff’s office received a government grant to add two detectives and a property and evidence clerk to the payroll to help fight illegal cannabis farms. But to properly address the problem, Jackson County Sheriff Nathan Sickler said the community would need an additional 18 detectives, four patrol deputies, three overseers, and nine auxiliaries, and $ 750,000 a year to cover the cost of services and supplies cover up.

Aaron Lewis, a public information officer for the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office, told reporters that “the problem with illegal marijuana is quite large in Jackson County.”

“We have an area that is very conducive to growing outdoor marijuana. So it was very difficult to keep track of the size of some of the operations here in the Valley, ”said Lewis. “There’s a lot of investigative work going on to identify the main players in the game and from there dismantle those processing facilities and get some of the illegal marijuana off the streets.”

Eliminating illegal cannabis cultivation will require dismantling greenhouses, uprooting thousands of marijuana plants, seizing and processing evidence, including firearms, and arresting or detaining workers on the premises. In a raid on an unlicensed grow facility on Wednesday morning, officials from the Jackson County Illegal Marijuana Enforcement Team destroyed 17,522 cannabis plants and approximately 3,900 pounds of harvested marijuana while detaining three people, according to a report in local media.

Public bodies burdened by enforcement work

The extent of illegal cannabis cultivation is also draining the resources of other public agencies. In 2015, Jackson County Code Enforcement staff handled 604 cases, none of which were marijuana-related. As of September this year, the office had 1,006 cases, 663 of which were related to cannabis cultivation. The local Oregon Water Resources Department office also saw an increase in activity, with complaints of water theft rising from 39 in 2015 to 195 this year.

Much of the illegal cannabis cultivation takes place on supposedly hemp farms. The Oregon Health Authority and the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission recently reported that nearly half of the state-controlled registered hemp farms actually grow marijuana. According to government agencies, around 25 percent of the hemp farms refused access to inspectors.

Charles Boyle, a spokesperson for Brown, said the governor takes the situation in Jackson County very seriously, noting that she formed an interagency team to fight the illegal cultivation of marijuana after lawmakers passed legislation to change regulation the state’s hemp and cannabis industry. Brown also directed the Oregon State Police to allocate additional resources to the area and doubled funding for the cannabis law enforcement grants in the area.

“The message is clear – Oregon is not open to the illegal cultivation of cannabis,” Boyle said. “These are criminal companies that deplete water resources while our state is in a drought, keep their workforce in inhumane conditions, and severely damage our legal cannabis market.”