For anyone that cares...which is obviously not many here.....I have hit a speed bump. We have been trying to get the county moratoriums lifted here on I502 businesses and have been successful for the most part but they still had a moratorium on retail shops and on outdoor growing in industrial areas which of course is the land use for the property I leased. We have been working with the commission and were finally to our last meeting, the commissioners were going to vote to just totally lift the last moratoriums this last Tuesday. Quite frankly I take most of the credit for educating the commissioners on what we were doing as they were absolutely clueless. Thought weed goes into the ground and stays there season after season like a tree. Anyway....just before the meeting on Tuesday one of the commissioners took my daughter and myself aside and asked us if he could speak with us privately.....that he had some information and didn't want to blind side us in the public meeting. He took us into his office and told us the commissioners had received an email from the port authority as our property was originally part of the port land. The email said the land was originally donated by the Corp of Engineers to the port, then sold to a company and finally sold to the current land owner that we are leasing from .The port believes that there were restrictions and covenants in the original donation of the land that are still valid today and one of them was that if the land is used in a manner not allowed the land reverts back to the Corp of Engineers. The port says agriculture (not just pot, any agriculture) is not to be allowed on the industrial zoned land. Basically what the Port was requesting was that the county not allow us to grow there. The county said "not our issue and we don't care." The county already signed off with the LCB that it is fine with them if we grow there. The county continued and lifted the moratorium totally so now there are no restrictions by them on where to grow as long as you are licensed with the state and do things within their rules.
I immediately contacted the land owner and said what the heck....don't you know no one is supposed to use your property for agricultural use? He said he didn't know but I find that hard to believe. He also told us repeatedly before that the Port had no authority on his property but now he says they do.If there was any indication that the Port had authority there I would have gone to them first thing and told them my plans as I did with the county, the police, the local community, etc., because I want to do this right with nothing coming up behind me to bite me in the ass. I think the landlord now expects us to just move out and go away. We have spent over $28,o00 just on improvements to his property so that ain't going to happen! I have spoken with 2 attorneys now just to be sure and they both say we are in good shape and if he breaks the terms of our lease he will have to reimburse us. That won't help me much if I have to find another spot though:-(( We are still hanging in there. I have tried to be as proactive as I possibly could. We are just moving forward and if the Port wants to do anything about it they would have to litigate with the land owner and it would be his problem not ours. Who knows how this will all turn out? I am just hoping to get a crop or two done before any shit hits the fan with him and the port authority because then I would have the cash to move which is allowable with the WA legal license. The worst case scenario is if he breaks our lease because even though he would be legally libel for all money we have put into his building, that still would not give me a crop and would put me behind in this process when we have worked very hard to get here.
I am sure this will be great news for you haters:-) Not so much for me:-/ We will still be moving forward....will still find another place if that is what has to happen.....but dang....I hope it goes down ok for us and we get to stay in this location for the term of our lease. I did not have to post this....I just felt like it is part of my process and I said I would share the tale so that is why I put it here for all you naysayers to gloat on. We are not down...we will still be doing this..... but man oh man I could have done without this particular step.
