Fisheries panel to hold Sacramento hearing on water use by pot farms

The devastating impact of drought and illegal marijuana cultivation on North Coast fisheries will be the focus of a state legislative committee hearing Wednesday in Sacramento, on the heels of reports that pot plants are consuming billions of gallons of water and salmon-rearing creeks are running dry.

John Laird, head of California’s Natural Resources Agency, and Chuck Bonham, director of the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, will lead off the daylong hearing by the Joint Committee on Fisheries and Aquaculture.

Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman and Hezekiah Allen, executive director of the Emerald Growers Association, an advocacy group for medical marijuana farmers and patients, also will address the eight-member committee.

State Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, the committee chairman, said the environmental impact of rogue marijuana gardens on the North Coast is “getting statewide attention” nearly 20 years after California voters were the first in the nation to approve of medical marijuana.

“We’re playing catch-up for the last two decades of inaction,” McGuire said. The medical marijuana industry has “exploded” in the absence of state regulation, he said.

“California’s fisheries are in crisis,” he said, with tens of thousands of acres under illegal pot cultivation amid a fourth year of drought. The Russian, Eel, Gualala, Mattole and Mad rivers are among the waterways impacted by pot’s voracious thirst, he said.

Assemblyman Jim Wood, D-Healdsburg, is vice chairman of the joint committee, which has met since 1973.

More than 86,500 marijuana plants were seized last week during a four-day operation in the remote Island Mountain region where Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity counties meet. Officials said they found “egregious environment issues,” including unlawful grading and creeks that had been dammed and diverted to provide water for the pot plants.

Allman estimated the plants seized were consuming about 500,000 gallons of water a day.

The illegal marijuana plants confiscated in California by law enforcement in recent years - between 2 million and 4 million annually - use upward of ?1.8 billion gallons, or about 600,000 water tanker trucks over their five-month growing season, according to a Department of Fish and Wildlife study.

That’s enough water loss to stanch the seasonal flow of many small creeks in the region, potentially stranding the young salmon and steelhead trout that decades of taxpayer-funded efforts have sought to restore.

“Essentially, marijuana can consume all the water. Every bit of it,” Scott Bauer, a Fish and Wildlife environmental scientist, said in April.

Last year, 24 North Coast salmon-bearing tributaries were reported to have gone dry, he said, though not all were verified by the agency. Commercial fishing generates $7 billion a year in revenue, while recreational fishing along the coast contributes an additional $2 billion, McGuire said.

At the hearing, representatives of two fishermen’s associations will discuss the drought’s impact on fisheries, while Allman, Allen, a rancher from the California Cattlemen’s Association and others will assess the impact of illegal pot cultivation.

Commenting on the Island Mountain pot raids, Allen last week acknowledged the environmental and public safety issues associated with unregulated ?cannabis cultivation. “Solving these problems will require a broad coalition of stakeholders, including some of the very farmers being targeted right now,” he said.

McGuire has introduced the Medical Marijuana Public Safety and Environmental Protection Act, which would establish what he called “an all-encompassing regulatory framework” for the medical cannabis industry. The bill would require all licensed cannabis growers to comply with state water quality regulations, including permits for all irrigation and water discharge from marijuana grows.

The “lion’s share” of growers are “eager to become legal” and comply with state regulations, he said.

McGuire’s bill, SB 643, was approved by the Senate, 26-13, on June 4 and is headed for Assembly committee hearings.

Wood is the author of another bill, the Marijuana Watershed Protection Act, that would require the state’s nine regional water quality control boards to develop regulations on wastewater discharge from medical cannabis farms.

His bill, AB 243, was approved by the Assembly, 60-15, on June 3.

Wednesday’s joint committee hearing, which begins at ?10 a.m., will be carried live on ?the Senate’s website, www.senate.ca.gov, under “Today’s Events.”

Staff Writer Glenda Anderson contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer Guy Kovner at 521-5457 or guy.kovner@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @guykovner.