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Date: 2/21/2023
GRANBY — The Planning Board started preliminary discussions regarding a revisit of the town’s Grow Facility Zoning Bylaw during their Feb. 13 meeting and came away looking to learn more about options for potential growers in different zones.
The current bylaw on the books allows cannabis retail/commercial only in the General Business zone. It also states that all cannabis retail/commercial operations are subject to special permit and site plan approval by the Planning Board. According to the bylaw, commercial growth operations shall be indoor facilities only and allowed in Industrial and Business Park Overlay Districts with special permit and site plan approval by the Planning Board.
Planning Board Chair James Trompke said his impression was the Selectboard wanted the Planning Board to look at the bylaw overall and look at potential benefits of allowing the zoning to stretch in residential and or other business zoned areas. As currently stated in the bylaw, grow facilities are only allowed in industrial zoning.
Trompke was consistent through the discussion that these were preliminary discussions to help the board identify potential benefits of expanding on the bylaw, looking at similar communities’ experiences trying out these options, and eventually what may work in Granby.
Board member Melissa St. Germain Martel said from her experience that there are cities and towns that have private grow facilities, but they still abide by a controlled environment, proper security measures, other regulations while being on a private property.
According to Pioneer Valley Planning Commission Deputy Director of Land Use and Environment Ken Comia, Town Administrator Chris Martin explained through a letter that during the Selectboard review of an applicant looking to grow on their property, the question came up on the use for a microbusiness under their current bylaw. That is not addressed in the current writing, so the Selectboard could not do anything for the applicant in that scenario. Comia works alongside the Granby Planning Board through his role with PVPC.
Comia said the question for the board is whether they want to consider amending the zoning bylaw to address the various types of uses allowed under state regulation, such as a microbusiness or retail. The writing as it stands states there are only four different criteria for approval before going to their table of uses which only spells out the requirements for a commercial growth operation.
“The question for the board is whether or not the board would want to introduce these various new uses that an applicant may bring forward to the town because they would coincide and align with the licenses that are available at the CCC,” Comia explained.
He continued and said right now, all they had was cultivator and retailer covered in the bylaw. If the board did want to look at other types of uses, they could address craft cooperatives, independent testing laboratories, curriers, delivery operators, research facilities – even microbusinesses.
Comia added that the CCC describes a microbusiness as a co-located marijuana establishment that can either be a tier 1 marijuana cultivator or product manufacturer, or both. He also noted earlier in the meeting that a craft marijuana cooperative is the type of marijuana cultivator that allows growers to join together and grow up to 100,000 square feet of marijuana plants among them. Currently none of this is allowed due to the bylaw’s language.
St. Germain Martel noted she felt a great way to get started on learning more is finding out what direct positive impacts can come to the community if they were to pursue amendments in the bylaw. Comia said when it comes to cultivation, it’s the transactional amounts that would be beneficial to the town. He added that with this industry being heavily regulated by the Department of Revenue, the state would issue the town funds up to 3 percent based on what the town adopted through their Host-Community agreement.
Comia continued saying there is a lot of resources and examples showing the benefits that can come from this option.
“This is about year four of legal selling and there’s a lot of good examples right here in the Pioneer Valley, in Northampton, in Easthampton, with regards to what those revenues for the town look like,” Comia said. “Obviously there are lots of legal things happening in the background in regard to that host-community agreement so we’re really going to know after five years if a town or city has adopted a host-community agreement with a marijuana establishment, what their relationship will be in the future.”
St. Germain Martel said she saw the potential revenue as a benefit for the town. Trompke agreed but still wanted to learn much more about the options.
“Granby is an agricultural town. We’ve had a hard time brining business into this town ... We need a larger tax base,” Trompke said. “I don’t know what kind of revenue these things are kicking off ... I’d like to learn more about it to see what the risk and reward is.”
Planning Board member Nina Abbott said she has some security concerns about potential zoning changes related to growers and specifically for lower scale private growers themselves if something like an outdoor facility were to be a part of the cannabis landscape in town.
“We’re a small town. We don’t have a huge police force and it can draw negative people to the area,” Abbott said.
St. Germain Martel responded by saying she believes for cultivation it is already a heavily secured part of the industry through regulation. She also noted these sites commonly have security cameras, fences and security for an industrial growing location, but agreed that could be a concern for individual growers leaving them more vulnerable.
Abbott also noted concerns of odors saying it can be “abrasive” to which Trompke replied some could say the same about fertilizer odor in their community.
Abbott also suggested when learning more that members of the board look at communities similar in size and more aligned in views as opposed to closer communities such as Easthampton and Northampton that were cited earlier in discussion. Abbott also mentioned looking at crime statistics in these same areas in correlation with their expansion of growing and cultivating facilities in their towns.
“I’d like to see where its been adopted and put into use where they’ve issued permits for this, and how it’s working out,” Trompke said. “If this board puts some sort of bylaw change in place, we aren’t the final say, we are just proposing something, the town still has final say. The Selectboard has asked us to look into it then we are looking into it.”
Trompke added they would be begin looking for feedback from other communities to help eventually decide what would work best for Granby.
St. Germain Martel added that since a petition with signatures reached the Selectboard about a microbusiness use — leading to the Selectboard sending over this discussion for the Planning Board — she felt there seemed to be enough interest from residents to look into the bylaw further.
“If residents of Granby are saying they have interest in maybe changing the bylaw and we can get more info on the revenue source, I think why not, it could be a good thing for the town,” St Germain Martel said.
Trompke agreed and added again the town was in need of a larger nonresidential tax base. He also said another angle on this could benefit farmers as it could allow for them to add another product to help “sustain the business and livelihood” of farmers if they wanted to pursue it.
Hatfield and Cummington were two communities mentioned by board members of where to start looking in comparison with a similar community to Granby. Trompke also noted they would be looking to find out how allowing outdoor cultivation in residential or agricultural zones would work in town.
“We need to look at benefits and if it’s worth it and then if it is we take it a step and then another step and leave it to town voters,” Trompke said. “But if it’s more of a burden than a benefit, then we write that up and give it to the Selectboard and if someone disagrees, they need a new petition. We will keep an open mind about it but [right now] what’s the benefit?”
Board member Robert Sheehan Jr. said the process was still in its “birthing state” as legally working with cannabis is still so new to Massachusetts. The board will continue to gather information and learn more before eventually returning to the discussion.