The state water board has launched an unprecedented program that seeks to work cooperatively with cannabis growers, but other government agencies just want to raid farms and seize cash.

Trusting government doesn't come easy to Northern California weed farmers - not after a drug war that has lasted for four decades.

Yet there they were: sixty or so professional outlaws, sitting in folding chairs at the Grange Hall in Laytonville, Mendocino County, with their bushy beards, skeptically eyeing the reps from the water board.

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