Worried that the measure would fail without the support of rural farmers, legalization advocates included a provision to encourage legacy growers to join the legal market, promising that no cultivation site would be larger than one acre until 2023. Protecting existing growers was a pillar of Proposition 64, which legalized marijuana for adult use. But the law didn’t create a regulatory body to manage the industry, which thrived as medical collectives popped up to serve customers. Farmers were required to apply for a license and pay taxes to the state, and some towns implemented local sales taxes. 215, farmers came out of the illicit market to grow medical marijuana under relatively modest regulations - for example, each county set a limit to the number of plants a farm could grow. Since the small farms don’t have retail licenses, which cost upwards of $100,000 a year, event organizers had told them they were permitted to show flower samples at their tables, and direct buyers to a nearby dispensary booth for purchases. Moments before, they’d entered the room clad in olive green jackets and navy caps, going around to each of the booths - which were given to 27 grows for free as part of the Cup’s new Small Farms Initiative - and insisted that they put away any actual marijuana on display. The mood is decidedly different in a neighboring building where mom-and-pop cultivators were just accosted by uniformed agents from the Department of Cannabis Control. California’s enormous marijuana market, which reached an estimated $4.4 billion in sales in 2020, has seemingly reached peak cannabis capitalism. In the indoor Puffco Pavilion nearby, buyers are examining jars full of frosty nugs and haggling over cannabis seeds and plant cuttings, some of which are selling for up to $1,000. They’re waiting to get into a makeshift dispensary for the popular cannabis brand Cookies, housed in a magnificent geodesic dome packed with display cases full of bud, concentrates, vape cartridges and seeds for sale. The blissful funk of a psychedelic soul band wafts from an outdoor stage as a chilly drizzle falls, and chipper corporate promoters hand out branded rain slickers to shoppers. It’s a raw December day in the heart of California weed country, and thousands of cannabis growers, purveyors and smokers are gathered at the 18th annual Emerald Cup Harvest Ball in Santa Rosa, California.
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