Gainey Estate Vineyards is celebrating 40 years in the community, and aptly, 60 years and four generations of family-legacy farming and winemaking across three estate ranches and two appellations in
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John Palminteri
CARPINTERIA, Calif. - A zoning permit for SFS Farms, 87 acres of outdoor cannabis cultivation at the western end of the Sta. Rita Hills, the county’s most successful wine region, was approved by the county Board of Supervisors this week with few concessions to the neighboring vintners.
SFS Farms, owned by investors in Colorado and Manhattan Beach, is the largest “grow” approved by the county to date. If it were up and running today, it would be one of the largest cannabis operations in the U.S.; 87 acres is about 65 football fields’ worth of pot.
“I do favor large-size grows,” Supervisor Steve Lavagnino, who represents the Santa Maria Valley, said at Tuesday’s “virtual” hearing, where, for the first time in more than a year, all five supervisors sat together at the dais, without masks.
By Melinda Burns
| 2:49 p.m.
It is the winter of discontent for many Buellton-area vintners and residents, as two more outdoor cannabis projects, one of them the largest in the county to date, have been approved for the picturesque Sta. Rita Hills wine region.
How and whether the county requires odor controls on these early projects – SFS Farms OpCo 1 at the western end of the Sta. Rita Hills and Central Coast Agriculture at the eastern end near Buellton – will set a precedent for nearly 800 acres of outdoor grows that are proposed for the region and in various stages of county review, critics say.