Grow house zoning

LAKE COUNTY — Dennis Lewis wants to be very clear: he’s not necessarily against legalizing medicinal marijuana. What he is against is the growing, cultivation and sale of the drug in his neighborhood, where he is the president of the homeowners association for the 32 families.

“First and foremost, I’m concerned with the safety of the children and families in this neighborhood,” Lewis, who retired after 44 years in law enforcement, said. “The sheriff’s office has been very helpful and the county commissioners are busting their tails on it, so we’re taking every avenue to get them out of here for the safety of the community and our children.”

The neighborhood in question lies above Flathead Lake in the South Hills area, outside of Polson city limits. Though the city of Polson has a moratorium on medical marijuana businesses, the neighborhood lies out of that jurisdiction, leaving it open to county zoning policies and oversight. And Lewis believes a group operating a medicinal marijuana “grow house” has set up shop right in his neighborhood, creating safety concerns and other hazards he wishes he did not have to worry about.

“The state law says county’s cannot have a medical marijuana moratorium,” Lewis said of the 2004 bill passed into Montana state law. “If we can’t handle this through our state and our state legislature, I’ve been talking to the federal Department of Justice.”

The passing of Initiative 148 in Nov. 2004 made Montana the tenth state to legalize medicinal marijuana, but may have been a bit hasty, Lewis said. Rather than fully regulating and enforcing the limits of the law, he said, it has become abused and may open the door for criminals hoping to grow the drug under the guise of medicinal use. Instead, Lewis hopes the upcoming state legislative session will attempt to control and regulate marijuana much in the way pharmaceutical drugs are dispensed and regulated.

“I love Montana and it’s people, but it’s getting destroyed by negligence,” Lewis said. “Yeah, they voted for legalizing it with the understanding that there’s going to be strict controls over it. Guess what, as soon as it passed, they opened it up and there are no controls at all. So whose fault does that fall under?”

Some of the lack of controls lie with zoning commissions like the Lake County Planning Department. The problem, according to planning director Joel Nelson, is that the department does not know what kind of activity — commercial, manufacturing or otherwise — is happening on the property. That information would help the department figure out if a public review was necessary, or something along those lines. If not, business can go on as usual if all laws, county zoning and statewide, are followed.

“We’re aware of the concerns and we’re following up on it,” Nelson said. “Until we know what’s going on, we can’t decide what’s needed.”

Lewis has found county law enforcement to be an equal dead-end. Members of the Lake County Sheriff’s Department have said their hands are tied, Lewis said, and that the law has made it tough to enforce noncompliance.

A legitimate complaint is needed for either the county attorney or the sheriff’s office to get involved. But Lewis fears once a complaint is filed, it may already be too late.

“If organized crime knows about it, don’t you think they’ll be up here, trying to get their piece?” he said. “Crime around here, I can guarantee it, will go up, big time.”

Attempts to contact the owner of the property in question and the tenants of the building were unsuccessful.

Lewis said that as soon as he found out the intended purpose for the building, he made it clear he would try to stop such activity in his neighborhood. And by all accounts, he may be very close. Lewis held a public meeting at his home on Sept. 27 and had representatives from 12 of the 32 families in the neighborhood represented. Progress has been made on the county level as well. Commissioner Bill Barron said county civil attorney Kurt Moser has been in contact with the alleged group, and a resolution could be on the horizon.

“It does not appear at this time that it can be properly zoned out there without some type of special variance,” Barron said. “That’s a city and county highway commercial zoning area that does not allow industrial or agricultural activity, and that seems like what [marijuana-growing] would fall under. It doesn’t qualify for anything in that area, and that’s what we’ve relayed to their attorney.”

Barron said the group is “very interested in being on the up and up and do not want [citizens] being against where they’re at.”

“There is so much confusion with this law and hopefully the legislature will figure it out,” he said. “The only reason we’re doing anything is because it’s a zoning issue. If they were two miles further down and two miles off the highway, it wouldn’t be an issue.”