SB 365 – Grandfathering Licensed Marijuana Producers: SB 365 is OPOA’s first bill related to marijuana. We worked closely with the Oregon Farm Bureau to pass this bill.
Although marijuana production is a controversial topic in Oregon, Oregon law allows property owners to obtain a license from the state to produce marijuana for sale, and the 2015 Oregon legislature declared marijuana production as a farm use, just like growing potatoes, carrots, hazelnuts or any other type of farm crop. Consequently, OPOA will defend Oregon property owner’s rights to grow and harvest marijuana, in the same way we defend other property uses. We know this is controversial, but our mission is to represent Oregon property owners making legal use of their property, even when they are farming something that is unpopular.
SB 365 does two things. First, it prohibits counties from charging transportation system development charges (SDC’s) as a condition of approval for an application for a recreational marijuana production license. SDC’s are a charge assessed by a city or county for increased use of government services resulting from a development. For example, if a property owner develops a multi-unit apartment complex on his property, the city will typically charge a SDC to be used to make street improvements needed to offset the road impacts caused by the new development. But counties have never charged SDC’s for a farm use, and it is unfair for a county to single out marijuana production from all the other types of crops grown and assess a SDC for marijuana production only. SB 365 stops counties from doing that.
Second, SB 365 will treat existing approved recreational production operations as non-conforming uses, should the voters of the County ever change the law to prohibit marijuana production in the county, as they are allowed to do. Under current law, if the county voters change the county ordinances to prohibit recreational marijuana production, existing license holders will be unable to renew their license with OLCC, and will be forced to shut down. This is inconsistent with the law of non-conforming uses, which allows a property owner to continue to make an existing approved use of the property even if the law changes to prohibit the use. It isn’t fair to change the rules to prohibit a use that the county just approved, and then ask the property owner who just received the approval to stop using the property for the approved use.