Pubdate: Wed, 20 May 2015
Source: Press Democrat, The (Santa Rosa, CA)
Copyright: 2015 The Press Democrat
Contact:  http://www.pressdemocrat.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/348
Author: Julie Johnson

SONOMA COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS TAKES NEW TACK ON MARIJUANA FESTIVALS

Sonoma County Fairgrounds officials have scaled back the marijuana 
trade show events to be held at the Santa Rosa event center in 2015, 
bringing back an event with North Coast origins but passing over the 
Cannabis Cup run by international event powerhouse High Times magazine.

The homegrown Emerald Cup will return to the fairgrounds event center 
in December for its third run in Santa Rosa as a fair celebrating 
organic marijuana grown outdoors. Organizers are expecting bigger 
crowds but are also restricting it to adults for the first time.

Fairgrounds officials, however, said they will not be welcoming back 
the High Times' Cannabis Cup, after last year's event was a headache 
for staff from unloading to cleanup. The High Times trade show drew 
thousands to its first Santa Rosa event on a weekend last June.

"They left our facility really messy - debris, stickering, couches - 
more so than any other event we've had," Katie Fonsen Young, interim 
fair manager, said. "It took us about a week to clean up after the 
event. The normal event that's just in one building will just take a 
few hours."

Young said that the decision had nothing to do with the fact that the 
event involved marijuana but rather the High Times' show was a 
significant drain on staff, who were already taxed with preparing for 
the Sonoma County Fair. The 17-day fair that typically begins in late 
July is the fairgrounds' biggest project of the year.

Dan Skye, High Times editorial director, said earlier this month that 
his organization had wanted to return to Santa Rosa and had thought 
last year's event was a success. On Tuesday, he said festival 
organizers were aware the event would not come back to Santa Rosa. He 
said they had moved on and were hoping to announce a new Northern 
California location as soon as this week. He dismissed the idea that 
cleanup was a problem.

"We pay for the cleaning service once we leave," Skye said. "It's a 
big event. You have how many thousands show up. They leave a mess, 
there's no doubt."

Emerald Cup founder Tim Blake, who runs event center Area 101 on his 
rural property in far northern Mendocino County, said he had to make 
certain changes to the Emerald Cup's event plan before reaching an 
agreement for this year's event. The changes include altering the 
event from all ages to 18-and-over, bringing more security to prevent 
smoking outside the designated "medicating" areas and planning to 
strictly prevent vendors from handing out samples of marijuana-infused edibles.

"The reason we're bringing back the Emerald Cup is because we have a 
track record of working with them and they've been very open to 
meeting anything we require," Young said. "That kind of organization 
and pre-planning didn't occur with High Times."

High Times rolled out its first issue more than four decades ago, and 
was a pioneer in championing pot culture with full-color centerfolds 
of pot leaves at a time when even images of marijuana were 
provocative. The magazine's pages unearthed an underground economy 
from pipes to detox teas and has beaten the drums against the 
so-called War on Drugs.

The magazine held its first Cannabis Cup awards program in Amsterdam 
in 1988. In the 27 years since, the contest has evolved into 
speaker-thumping events with bikini-clad women held in cities across 
the country.

In April, an estimated 10,000 people attended the group's U.S. 
Cannabis Cup in Denver. The group is planning upcoming international 
trade shows in Amsterdam and Negril, Jamaica, as well as in American 
cities including Portland, Ore.; Clio, Mich.; Washington, D.C.; and Fresno.

In contrast, the Emerald Cup started in 2004 as a secretive 
word-of-mouth gathering of pot farmers at Blake's Area 101 near the 
Mendocino-Humboldt county line.

The close-knit event grew into an all-night party over the years and 
in 2012 moved from an arrangement of hay bales and tents at Blake's 
property to the Mateel Community Center in Redway. It was nearly 
canceled in 2011 when major law enforcement actions - including the 
raid of Mendocino's poster-child collective Northstone Organics - 
made people afraid of the attention it would bring to the pot-growing 
community.

But Blake said that they held the event anyway and started including 
a speaker program to address topics from medical marijuana laws and 
the implications of legalization to growing practices.

Organizers brought the Emerald Cup to Sonoma County in 2013.

This year, they will have the entire fairgrounds to spread out, and 
he expects about 18,000 attendees, up from an estimated 13,000 in 
2014. They are doubling the number of food trucks to 20 and shelling 
out an additional $100,000 to attract top notch musical acts.

Blake said they are anticipating a lot of discussion about the 
potential that a referendum to legalize marijuana may go before 
voters in 2016, and they are inviting lawmakers, including Lieutenant 
Gov. Gavin Newsom, Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, and Assemblyman 
Jim Wood, D-Healdsburg, to attend the event.

"With 2016 around the corner, we ought to bring everyone to the 
table," Blake said.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom