Pubdate: Sat, 24 Apr 2010
Source: Record Searchlight (Redding, CA)
Copyright: 2010 Record Searchlight
Contact:  http://www.redding.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/360
Author: Janet O'Neill

HEMP FEST SPURS LAW UPDATE IN TEHAMA COUNTY

RED BLUFF -- It's not exactly Yasgur's Farm, but a proposed hemp fest 
in a hayfield south of town has county officials scurrying to update 
a Woodstock-era law.

Responding in part to the planned three-day World Hemp Expo 
Extravaganja -- or WHEE 2010 -- Tehama County supervisors Tuesday 
will consider adopting an urgency ordinance regulating special 
events. Assistant County Counsel Arthur Wylene said this week that 
the update of the 1970 festival law already was long overdue when 
medical marijuana patient and grower Donna Will submitted her plans 
for the Memorial Day weekend, alcohol-free expo on Riverside Avenue.

"The festival certainly affected the timing of the ordinance, but the 
underlying reason is really not related to this particular festival," 
Wylene said. "It caused us to realize that modernizing our ordinance 
was a priority."

The original WHEE festival was put on by Steve Hager, creative 
director for High Times magazine. Will has known him through her work 
at the magazine's Cannabis Cup, held annually the past 22 years in Amsterdam.

She's hosting her event "just to bring awareness and to have a social 
meeting -- a social situation where it's not all about alcohol," Will 
said this week. With her permit application estimating about 1,800 
attendees, she also believes the event will provide a much-needed 
economic boost to the county she calls home.

Scheduled for May 28 to 30, the expo will include a marijuana film 
festival, live music, vendors and a world peace prayer circle. Will 
said she has a graded parking lot at her 46-acre site, and hopes to 
run shuttle buses between the event and area hotels.

She visited a recent marijuana expo at the Cow Palace in Daly City, 
where she distributed fliers to the 150 vendors there.

As for the urgency ordinance, it switches the permitting authority 
from the Board of Supervisors to the Planning Department. In 
addition, Wylene said, it's aimed at making the procedure more user 
friendly by specifically laying out all the rules, including criteria 
for granting, denying and conditioning permits.

The ordinance excludes events at the Tehama District Fair grounds, as 
well as those sponsored by the county or government agencies. If 
passed, it goes into effect Tuesday.

In an e-mail Thursday, Hager said the first festival was held in a 
Eugene, Ore., lumberyard and drew 300 vendors and 12,000 people. But 
after three more years and different locales, he gave it up, weary of 
antagonistic government reaction to the gatherings.

"Donna wants to do a peace ceremony," Hager said. "She has a 
spiritual commitment to this plant, as I do, and we feel these 
ceremonies help heal the suffering that has been created by the war on drugs."

He'll volunteer at WHEE 2010 and provide some of the films. What can 
first-time festivalgoers expect?

"A non-alcoholic event dedicated to nonviolence and peace culture," he said.
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart