Ethel Farm Bets Business on Pot

ETHEL — At around 7 a.m. Monday, mud clings to Cania Lee’s work boots, and his pants are soaked at the shins from walking the crops on his family farm. 

Lee, his parents Ong and Jonenao and their three relatives have been up since 4 a.m. working on the family farm, OJ’s Produce near Ethel. 

They’re bent over or kneeling in a field of Chinese broccoli, breaking one stem at a time until their arms are full. 

Nearby, a few wax boxes lie empty, tumbled into a loose pyramid. Others are stuffed with produce, neatly stacked and waiting to be trucked to Seattle’s International District.

The night before, the six Hmong farmers worked from 4 a.m. to 11 p.m., using headlamps to see the plants. It’s the end of the season, orders are coming in daily and there’s much to be done before the October rains. 

Cania Lee is a second generation American. His parents were refugees from the Vietnam War and lived in Laos until migrating to the United States in 1980. For the last 13 years, the Lees have lived in Lewis County and provided specialty Asian produce to grocers and restaurants from Seattle to Portland.

“If you’re eating in an Asian restaurant in the region, you’re probably eating baby bok choy from our farm,” Cania Lee said.

The family lives together in a small and worn camp trailer which is rivaled in size by the chickencoop where the family keeps their prize Thai chickens and pet fawn. Almost everything is done by hand. Though they’re not short on customers, Lee said at $11 for a 30-pound box of produce, the farm is barely surviving. 

“My parents want to sell the land. We’re not profiting, we’re killing ourselves,” he said. “The demand is high but we haven’t been able to meet it for about 10 years now.”

On top of that, the cold winters and clayey soil make for growing season too short for much of a harvest, he said. 

The college-educated 30-year-old returned to the farm last year after a long hiatus. He said his five siblings mostly see the farm as a “money pit,” but he believes in it. 

He hoped the business techniques he learned in the private sector would turn things around, but, Lee said, the farm lacks the capitol to make any meaningful investments in its future. 

But, there is one opportunity that he thinks will turn the family’s fortunes. 

The Lees hold a tier 3 marijuana producer/processor license, the largest offered from the Washington State Liquor Control Board. According to Lee, OJ’s rural location and it’s infrastructure make it an ideal business for cultivating weed. 

“We’re farmers, we know plants. It’s a business opportunity (and) another cash crop to help subsidize the farm,” he said.

Lee said his parents, who are in their 60s, are, “old school” and were reluctant to grow marijuana, but got more comfortable with the idea when he explained to them the potential revenues and what they could mean for their operation. 

The Washington State Liquor Control Board, the license-granting authority for prospective marijuana producers, processors and merchants, requires criminal background checks and a financial investigation. A marijuana retail store is forbidden by law to open within 1,000 feet of a school, park, library, public transit center or other place described by Initiative 502 as a location where children gather.

Of the Tier 1, 2 and 3 licenses, the tier 3 allows for between 10,000 and 30,000 square feet to be dedicated to growing marijuana, but the state decided in February to cap producers at 70 percent of the maximum growing space they applied for. Lee applied for the largest, so his license allows for a little over 20,000 square feet.

Lee said he would initially grow in his two greenhouses that combine for a little more than 5,000 square feet, but would eventually move to an outdoor grow. 

However, the state capped the square footage allowed to growing marijuana at 2 million and that has put a premium on transferable licenses. Lee said people call constantly asking if it’s for sale, some even from Canada. He’s been offered up to $250,000 for the farm’s license, but said he doesn’t want to sell it if the family doesn’t have to.  

Lee said growing and processing marijuana isn’t about making money. For him, it’s an opportunity to modernize the farm’s produce production, retire his parents and continue to feed the Asian community in Western Washington.

“My passion is my vegetables,” he said. “I would love to make more money (from vegetables), but you just can’t and that's not my vision. Our purpose is to feed our community not capitalize off of it.” 

Lee is excited about the what growing marijuana could do for his farm, but the Lewis County government doesn’t share his enthusiasm. 

“Those who say it’s not a gateway drug are wrong,” said Lewis County Commissioner Lee Grose. “One thing that bothers me with all of it, I have a hard enough time dodging drunk drivers on the roads, now all these stoned drivers won’t know if they’re doing 25 mph or 45 mph.” 

Lewis County has had a moratorium on recreational marijuana businesses since December of last year. Nonetheless, the county’s Office of Community Development is tasked with working with the County Planning Commission in creating zoning for marijuana businesses — should the Board of Commissioners decide to lift the moratorium. 

As it currently stands, that’s not likely to happen.

“The law (allowing recreational marijuana) isn’t compulsory,” said commissioner Edna Fund. “We’re looking into zoning, but at this point there’s nothing saying we have to allow it.” 

One of the main reasons cited in the county’s moratorium and by all of the commissioners is marijuana’s status as a federally controlled substances. 

“We’re reluctant to violate federal law,” said commissioner Bill Schulte. “To criminalize marijuana is almost foolish, but we have a hard time putting our employees at risk.”

However, Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson roundly rejected a similar federal argument the city of Fife made when it banned marijuana. 

Ferguson opined in January that municipalities could regulate recreational marijuana businesses. But, as part of a brief filed in the lawsuit between the city of Fife and a group of marijuana businesses, Ferguson argued that nothing about Washington’s I-502 forced the city to break federal law and thus Fife couldn’t prove that it wasn’t possible to comply with both federal and state law. 

Pierce County Superior Court judge Ronald Culpepper later ruled that Fife could regulate marijuana businesses but avoided ruling on the federal issue. 

“Fife doesn’t settle any questions,” Schulte said.

Lee said his family won’t take the issue to court, they’ll just sell their license and look for other ways to support the farm. Still, he thinks the county is missing out on the cutting edge of a new and profitable industry.

“Our nation is moving toward legalizing cannabis. It’s not a matter of what if, it’s a matter of time,” he said. “If the county restricts us, we’re going to be kept behind in the dark. Everyone around you is going to develop and keep striving … I think (Lewis County) needs to reinvent themselves. We need to be really concerned with how Lewis County survives in the world.”

Again, the commissioners are not convinced. Among other claims made by marijuana proponents, they think the number of jobs the industry will create is overstated. 

“I recognize the argument, but we can do economic development with other things than marijuana,” Grose said. “The economic driver crap is a bunch of baloney. I don’t think it’s there. It’s pie in the sky.”