{"id":2381,"date":"2016-06-22T08:03:23","date_gmt":"2016-06-22T15:03:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/gripes-grow-along-with-marijuana-shielding-fences\/"},"modified":"2016-06-22T08:03:23","modified_gmt":"2016-06-22T15:03:23","slug":"gripes-grow-along-with-marijuana-shielding-fences","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/gripes-grow-along-with-marijuana-shielding-fences\/","title":{"rendered":"Gripes grow along with marijuana-shielding fences"},"content":{"rendered":"

MURPHY, Ore. <\/strong>\u2014 They say good fences make good neighbors. Then there are the fences that enclose the growing number of Josephine County\u2019s marijuana grow sites.<\/p>\n

There are a lot of them. And they are often ugly, especially when topped by a couple feet of plastic.<\/p>\n

Among those who are unhappy with the proliferation of Visqueen view blockers is Chris Locke, a Murphy landscape nursery owner who endures the sight of a neighbor\u2019s fenced marijuana grow.<\/p>\n

Locke, co-owner of Murphy Country Nursery, says the fences are ruining Josephine County\u2019s rural landscape. They\u2019re tall and typically made of wood, or wood topped with plastic. Many are easy to spot.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are so many people who are unbelievably unhappy over the fences,\u201d said Locke, who has erected a sign that says, \u201cThat\u2019s not ours,\u201d with an arrow pointing at the marijuana grow next to her business, located just south of the Applegate River and within plain view of traffic on Williams Highway.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the laws should be changed,\u201d Locke said. \u201cWhoever made the laws that (a grow) had to be covered up, it\u2019s ridiculous.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year, the fence next door to Locke\u2019s business was an ugly black plastic barrier. This year, it\u2019s been upgraded to an ugly black plastic barrier adorned with brightly painted artsy fish, turtles and dragonflies. It looks to be about 12 tall or higher.<\/p>\n

The artwork could be described as having a psychedelic Northwest tribal motif. A local artist did the work, according to a man tending the property. He asked not to be named.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have the nicest fence in the valley,\u201d he said at the site. \u201cWe did this to make everybody happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Locke says the fence, backed by chain link, is better than it was, but believes she lost business last year when would-be customers saw the fence and thought it was her marijuana grow.<\/p>\n

Her sign disclaiming ownership of the grow went up about a month ago. Since then, people stop about once a day to say they\u2019ve stayed away because they thought the grow was hers, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI realized last year, when they became real obvious, boy, it\u2019s really slowed down here,\u201d she said. \u201cI passed it off.\u201d<\/p>\n

The number of fences in the county has increased as the use of medical marijuana and the number of medical marijuana grow sites increased since 1998, the year Oregon voters approved the use of pot as a medicine.<\/p>\n

In January, Josephine County had more than 2,700 medical marijuana grow sites, up nearly 300 from the previous year. The county also had nearly 6,500 medical marijuana patients, up about 1,300 from a year earlier.<\/p>\n

This year, following voter approval of recreational marijuana, the state has approved 11 grow sites in Josephine County to provide marijuana to retail outlets. Rules for the recreational program mandate that grows be shielded from public view, with one option to accomplish that being the construction of an 8-foot fence.<\/p>\n

However, a fence isn\u2019t required, said Mark Pettinger, a spokesman for the Oregon Liquor Control Commission, regulators of the new recreational market.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey just need to make sure it\u2019s obscured from the eyes of the public,\u201d he says. \u201cAs long as they can prevent public access and obscure it from public view, they don\u2019t necessarily need an 8-foot fence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Exactly why marijuana in the field should be shielded from public view isn\u2019t something Pettinger or his counterpart with the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program, Jonathan Modie, is able to answer definitively. Pettinger said it goes back to the intent of lawmakers and program founders.<\/p>\n

Rep. Carl Wilson, R-Grants Pass, could only guess how the idea for shielding pot from public view came to be. He was a member of a joint legislative committee overseeing implementation of recreational marijuana.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody knows what\u2019s behind the screen,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Josephine County Board of Commissioners Chairwoman Cherryl Walker, herself a medical marijuana grower, also didn\u2019t know the origin of the rule to shield pot from view.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t understand why it has to be,\u201d she said. \u201cYou know what\u2019s behind it (a fence). You\u2019re not concealing it. The complaint we\u2019ve had is they\u2019re detrimental to property values.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walker, who said she fields complaints daily about grow sites \u2014 on a range of issues, not just fences \u2014 says the plastic fences get holes in them, rip and blow with the wind.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt does look pretty shabby,\u201d she said. \u201cI find it to be a very unsightly aspect of the industry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some growers, in an apparent effort to avoid county permit fees, build solid wood fences up to 7 feet tall, the limit at which a fence may be built without a permit in the county, and then add an additional foot or two of plastic to shield grows, Walker surmised.<\/p>\n

The county is considering allowing 8-foot-high fences without the need for a permit. At a recent town hall meeting in Williams, pot industry proponents suggested the use of wire fences, and one person said that tall solid fences inhibit the migration of wildlife.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MURPHY, Ore. \u2014 They say good fences make good neighbors<\/a>. Then there are the fences that enclose the growing number of Josephine County\u2019s marijuana grow sites. There are a lot of them. And they are often ugly, especially when topped by a couple feet of plastic. Among those who are unhappy with the proliferation of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[65],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-2381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-nation-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2381\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2381"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=2381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}