US City Swaps Jails for Cannabis Crops

The small town of Adelanto has begun to abandon its traditional thinking and embrace a new path, one full of light and greenery. After more than 24 years dependent on a prison-based economy, it now wants to leave that behind and promote business based on the cultivation of medical cannabis.Since the state has not yet legalised the plant for recreational purposes, but has for medicinal use, it will become an example for other US (and international) locations that have taken steps favouring the plant.

Adelanto has become the second city in California to allow the cultivation of medical marijuana for its sale, after a year of intense debate on the City Council, which ended up voting in favour of the measure in late November. Council member John "Bug" Woodard, explained that they had nothing to lose because the city could not be any worse off. "We were broke," he says. Now success is guaranteed.

The making of the decision is already being felt in what the locals are calling a “land rush” as more and more people want to grow these crops, since almost 33,000 residents live below the poverty line. They had tried to get ahead by welcoming prisons and banks, lured by promises of jobs and steady income that never came.

Thus far Ky-Mani Marley, one of Bob Marley's children, has already obtained a license to grow, explained the lawyer controlling the new project. Other musicians and celebrities related to the cannabis world have also shown interest, as have professional athletes whose names have not yet been revealed.

There are now 27 companies holding licenses to grow in Adelanto, and two more are still pending. The first harvest is expected in the summer. When it realises its full capacity the city will be producing thousands of kilos of marijuana for the medical industry, and it shouldn’t take long for the substantial revenue from the industry to benefit citizens.

The experts are confident that this case will mean progress for the whole country and spur other locations to also abandon economies based on prisons to focus on something that is beneficial for both human health and the environment.