EDITORIAL: Big Cannabis makes landing in Ventura County


California’s system of direct democracy remains a double-edged sword. For every successful voter-led initiative, there seem to be nine or 10 that don’t work out how they’re supposed to and lead to unintended consequences. The latest example: Measure O.

We’re confident that few if any of the 57% of Ventura County voters who in 2020 backed Measure O, which legalized commercial marijuana cultivation in unincorporated areas and only in preexisting greenhouses, envisioned a 5-million-square-foot grow operation coming in overnight, but that’s exactly how it worked out.

In a move that will have ripple effects across the entire cannabis industry, Long Beach-based Glass House Brands has acquired the wellknown home of Houweling’s Tomatoes with the intent of transforming it into the largest indoor cannabis-growing facility in the world.

Yes, you heard that right. Ventura County is about to go from having almost no marijuana growing commercially (hemp is different) to putting out enough of the sticky green stuff to get the entire West Coast high.

On a serious note, Glass House’s acquisition of the Oxnard Plain property and accompanying business has left nearly 500 people under threat of losing their jobs. While there’s hope that some of these individuals will be rehired after Glass House moves in, the outcome is a sobering reminder that the county’s transition to cannabis won’t come without some pain.

Regarding Measure O, the writing was on the wall from the start, especially after it became public knowledge that Casey Houweling, the former owner of the tomatogrowing business, was the primary financial backer of the measure. So the erstwhile owner of the county’s largest network of state-ofthe art greenhouses underwrites a measure that allows marijuana to only be grown in established greenhouses? It was almost too perfect.

Only voters didn’t care. As with most ballot measures concerning cannabis these days, it passed with flying colors. People simply are tired of the government getting involved with marijuana.

There were red flags, however, raised by Sheriff Bill Ayub, who wrote in an August 2020 report to the board that he believed legal cannabis farms in the county would lead to “a significant increase in violent and theft-related crimes in the unincorporated areas.” We shall see. It will be incumbent upon the growers to provide security measures to keep out armed robbers, a real threat that’s happened over the years in Santa Barbara and Monterey counties, where marijuana is legally grown.

But as with the 2019 fallout from the county’s sudden explosion in industrial hemp growing—and the resulting smell that wafted through neighborhoods in Moorpark and Camarillo—government does have a role in managing this nascent industry.

We think there’s room in Ventura County’s world-famous $2-billion-a-year agricultural business for marijuana. But we’d be lying if we said we were thrilled about the size and scope of the first operation. So much for “dipping our toes in.”

We’ll refrain from throwing stones at Glass House until we’ve had a chance to speak to them in person. But we hope they ramp up their public relations strategy in the coming weeks and months to assure Ventura County residents and the local agricultural community that they plan to be a good neighbor—and that starts by hiring back the 486 workers that Houweling’s is laying off.