Lake County Board Chair Leslie Campione (L) at meeting with Vicki & Ted Miller
The saga of the noisy MedMen pot growers continues in Lake County, FL over the grower facility north of Eustis, FL.
Angry neighbors met with Leslie Campione, Chair of the Lake County Board on April 15, and we were there and made a video.
The short link to the video of the meeting is: https://youtu.be/4CPoTj3ZoGE
Below is a short history of the issue, with links to news articles and our recommendations if MedMen does not act promptly to resolve the noise issue. The reputation of all pot growers is harmed by them since STATE regulations supersede local laws like noise ordinances, thus local governments and angry residents may lobby state legislators to expand regulations over ALL marijuana and other agricultural operations.
California owned MedMen ( https://medmen.com/), a medical marijuana grower in Eustis, FL who has disrupted quiet farmland neighbors with excessively noisy industrial processing equipment which reduces their property values, then they offer lowball prices to buy out the neighbors. This unethical firm has led to a growing resentment of marijuana farmers who are regulated by the state, not local government, and may harm this nascent industry and result in public demand for more regulations over marijuana growers.
Here is our history of the MedMen marijuana farm noise issue which is in Lake County, FL (near Orlando) - this has been going on for months
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The owner of the long time Treadwell nursery at 25548 County Road, Eustis, FL (now MedMen) applied for and received a Florida State permit to grow medical marijuana on their land. The State required they also process and package it there, and they did so quietly for months. The criteria for applicants included the farms must be a LONG time, Floridian owned farms.
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The legislature, after some marijuana farms were approved, changed the regulations to permit outside, non-Florida firms to buy out the approved farms.
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Then a California public firm, MedMen, purchased Treadwell Farms. They renamed the facility, bought more land on one side, expanded operations and brought in very noisy equipment to process and dry the marijuana faster for shipping.
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Neighbors within 1/2 mile complained about the noise, huge parking lot lights that shined into the State Road 44a frontage road, semi-trucks parking on the Highway, backing into traffic and growing traffic problems with 60 new employees entering and exiting right off SR 44a. Parent concerns rose about the existing student school bus stop right at the entrance of the farm.
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Various meetings were held, and the MedMen staff promised improvements, but our observation of resident statements is that the MedMen staff did not implement what they promised, and gave conflicting statements to different neighbors.
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Neighbors complained about the drop of property values due to the noise, traffic, and lights, then the MedMen owners made low-ball offers to several neighbors to buy adjacent properties for expansion. This inflamed the neighbors further.
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Neighbors starting posting complaints about MedMen on Facebook community groups.
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March 17, 2019 - The Daily Commercial saw the posts on Facebook and wrote an article and published a video that expanded public awareness of the issue. https://www.dailycommercial.com/news/20190317/medical-marijuana-farm-in-eustis-is-pain-in-grass
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The affected neighbors created a closed Facebook group to share info on this issue.
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Residents complained to County staff about the noise and found out 1) Marijuana farms fall under state rules and local County government has no power to enforce local regulations such as for noise, etc. 2) The County had no specific noise standards, just saying code enforcement used their judgment, but nothing about sustained noise exceeding certain decibel levels.
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Lake County Board Chair Leslie Campione, an experienced land use attorney, was contacted and performed some research in her role as Chair.
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April 9th, 2019 - The Millers and neighbors showed up at the Lake County Board meeting and gave public input, complaining about the noise, etc.
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The issue was not on the agenda, but the discussion with the board generated by the public input was illuminating.
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The video will continue playing after the MedMen discussion, so you can just close it then.
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Start the video at 38:50 to see the public input and MedMen discussion by the Board (not on the agenda, so no decision was made).
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Apr. 14, 2019 - The Daily Commercial published a follow-up story.
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Apr. 15 - Spectrum News 13 (Orlando) published a TV video report with the Millers. This video actually shows an 18-wheeler BACKING into the MedMen entrance ACROSS busy Highway 44A in rural Eustis.
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The Millers held another community meeting with Lake County Board Chair Leslie Campione in attendance, and we made a video:
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post URL here
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- We published our video of this Apr. 15 meeting HERE on April 18.
- The Daily Commercial reporter, Roxanne Brown, published her story about the Apr. 15 meeting HERE on Apr. 18.
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Bookmark this April 18, 2019 page - we will update it or post future articles.
Our recommendations on April 18, 2019:
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MedMen should act as a nice neighbor and completely and IMMEDIATELY (not in one year) kill the noise, fix the bright lights, enable proper traffic, pay for a westbound and eastbound turn lane for entrants to the controlled facility. They need to provide proper turnaround roads for 18-wheelers. They need to address the school bus stop issue. They need to control the smells. If they need to buy land, they need to pay above the market at prices before they disrupted the neighborhood.
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If MedMen does not implement the above, the neighbors need to inundate local and other Florida legislators about the problem with state regulations preventing the ability of local governments to govern the activities of these growers, including noise limits, the responsibility to pay for traffic mitigation, etc.
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The neighbors need to start picketing any store carrying their brand.
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They need to start filing complaints on websites analyzing MedMen stock values.
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They need to file complaints with any pro-Marijuana group for not ensuring Marijuana growers play "nice" with neighbors.
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They need to demand that ALL elected County and City Commissioners visit the site, learn the issues, and lobby Florida legislators for regulatory changes over noise, lighting, traffic and other disruptions caused by Marijuana growers OR, provide local governments to enforce and fine business for violation of local codes applied to other agricultural operations.
The big view of where the MedMen facility is located. It is the upper right red marker, north of Eustis, FL.
Tight view of MedMen. They are in the red circle at right, and the Miller neighbors are at left in the blue circle.
The neighbors closed Facebook group is: 44A East Eustis Spotlight
Mar. 17, 2019 Daily Commercial article/video by Roxanne Brown:
Medical marijuana farm in Eustis is a pain in the grass
Apr. 9th Lake County, FL Board meeting video - scroll to 38 min. 50 sec. to see public input by the Millers and others on MedMen noise
The issue was not on the agenda, but the discussion with the board generated by the public input was illuminating.
The video will continue playing after the MedMen discussion, so you can just close it then.
Apr. 14, 2018 Daily Commercial article/video by Roxanne Brown:
Tension grows between marijuana farm and neighbors
Vance Jochim
Fiscal Watchdog Blogger for Lake County, FL
FiscalRangers.com
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Vance Jochim
[email protected]
YouTube Channel "FiscalRangersFlorida"
