Marijuana Monday

The Daily Bulletin has been running a series of articles on marijuana appropriately titled "Grass Valley."

There a group videos on their website that feature an interview with Rancho Cucamonga resident Ed Hill with his views on marijuana dispensaries, film of a police bust of a pot farm, an interview with Mira Loma medical marijuana patient George Agatep, a video of police serving search warrants on a Pomona medical marijuana dispensary, and an interview with Rancho Cucamonga Mayor Don Kurth. (NOTE: The videos may slow down your computer's performance.)

The Don Kurth interview, which comes at the end of the string of videos, is especially interesting. The video states that when he was 20, Mayor Kurth was an alcoholic and marijuana and heroin user before going into rehab. Kurth sees merits in favor of medical-use marijuana, but also worries about abuse of the dispensaries by people who perhaps don't really need the marijuana for medical reasons.

The videos and articles paint a pretty complete picture of the debate over the medical marijuana dispensaries, as well as the ongoing problems with illegal marijuana farms in the Inland Empire and the San Gabriel Valley.

For some time now we've heard of pot farms being discovered in upscale bedroom communities in our area. These farms are large-scale operations with thousands of plants and pirated electricity to power grow lamps.

Will Bigham has an article in today's Bulletin on the subject. Bigham's article indicates Asian organized crime gangs are behind many of these operations, which require significant capital outlays and expertise in setting up the farms. According to the article, the pot farms are used by the crime syndicates to generate cash, which is then pumped into other parts of their operations.