Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Good morning. China Agriculture back into action. Had some busy morning hearing some concerns about the current use. We're going off agenda a little bit just because we have a gentleman here and we just had a few minutes, so I think we're at bonus time. We're gonna hear some concerns about some hemp. So welcome, the floor is yours. Thank you, Sharon. My name's Dan Query. I own Fern Hollow Apple Orchard in Middletown Springs, Vermont. I am the managing partner of Vermont Turfs. Go back to the video. Okay. One more this way. Thank you. And, I would

[Dan Query (Managing Partner, Vermont Terps/Turfs; Owner, Fern Hollow Apple Orchard)]: believe I could say it with all honesty, Vermont Turks is the largest hemp producer in the state of Vermont. We started seven, eight years ago, right in the beginning when the state and the federal government the state signed up with the federal government to start the pilot program. We had over a 100 acres of hemp and cultivation. We grew it for three years. We all kind of know what happened. There was no markets for it but it was grown nobody knew how to dry it nobody knew how to sell it. Well we unfortunately being the stubborn Vermonters that we are we figured out how to dry it how to store it and so we kept growing. We promised markets, promised the sale. Finally after three years growing over 3,000,000 pounds hemp Those markets for it started drying up so we started figuring out how we could sell it. Then the Vermont legalized recreational cannabis, cannabis control board came to be. Department of Agriculture got out of it. Cannabis control board took us over. Cannabis control board doesn't know what it is. They don't recognize what our products are. They don't know how we make our products. They don't know what to do with us. So I'm being honest with all of us in the hemp world. We can have to go cannabis control board and pass a rule with no public input, no discussion, no nothing at their March meeting giving all of the hemp producers in this state six months to sell all their product or the, and then at the end of six months, the control board's gonna seize it and we have to dispose of it. What you have in front of you is the cannabis control board's press release straight from their site. The very last sentence tells you that we have to dispose, discard that product. Disco it. Disco it, anything that were registered or marketed in the recreational use market. So what happens is to have a full spectrum product, people combine the cannabinoids and hemp with the recreational use to make a broader product for people who are suffering from stress problems. CBD brings down the anxiety from the recreational cannabis. So now it's a you know there's no paranoia in trying to get relief. So it's it's the marriage of the two products that's been going on. Well, now they've ended that. They've ended our ability to market hemp in the adult use market. Whether it's registered, well it has to be registered, it's in the adult market. So every product that we sell, I'll back up a little bit, several years ago we had to become a licensed hemp or recreational marijuana producer, even though we were hemp. Because the state didn't know what to do with this so they made us register as a recreational producer because we had all this in it. So now we're licensed. So now we have to register all of our products with the cannabis control board.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: We have

[Dan Query (Managing Partner, Vermont Terps/Turfs; Owner, Fern Hollow Apple Orchard)]: to send in certificates of analysis. We have to prove exactly what it is. Mean no problems, following all the rules. Some produce, some product manufacturers in the recreational world are buying these hemp products from out of state because there's no rule against that. They're legal at the federal level and then they're adding them to products that are being sold in the recreational market. So the Cannabis Control Board can't really figure out how to make all this work. So basically with the stroke of a rule they've put all the farmers, everybody in the state of Vermont who grow and process hemp out of business in six months.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: That's not going to happen. I can tell you that. We have some pretty good hemp rules that are going to come into play. This is going to still be going on ongoing conversation. It's not going to end once we pass with what we've got. We do realize that hemp and marijuana are two different entities. We are trying to get it so that hemp is a non intoxicate and marijuana is. We do have a problem with the distillate because it's carrying too much THC to be considered hemp, but then by the time that it gets dumped down into the product you are down below the legal limits of where you want to be. I can tell you that we're not going put the hemp market out of business. We are going to have a clear distinction of what's hemp and what's marijuana, and that's going to be only because of where the levels are allowed, what side you're on. Are you a marijuana producer? Are you a hemp producer? Meaning full well that we use some of the wrong phrases because you're in the business and we're not, but what we're really trying to get to is to protect both marijuana, both hemp, and come up with clear divisions. We're having a real hard time with the federal government as far as what's allowed, what's allowed to cross state lines and what's not allowed to cross state lines. But our goal in this committee, we're going to do it, There's no ifs, ands, and buts about it. Our goal in this committee is to protect you, protect your business, and to make sure that if anything, if anything, we allow you to grow more and to have a market to sell to. We would love to and we're going to do that. What I would say as far as this letter right here, and I get it, and I'll tell you, one of the biggest things is for you to come in here and to be not taken serious about what your concern is. We are taking you very, very serious.

[Dan Query (Managing Partner, Vermont Terps/Turfs; Owner, Fern Hollow Apple Orchard)]: My orchard, Middletown Springs, all out orchard, almost thirty years ago, we lost the legislative path at the federal level. Pasteurized juice being shipped from one state to another. My orchard went out of business. I understand firsthand what legislation does to farms. Right. I no longer grow apples because I was put out of business by legislation.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: That's why I'm here. That's not gonna happen here. Bear with us. There's gonna be some rule making that still goes on. There's still negotiations. There's still arm twisting. You probably heard at the beginning of it, I'm gonna tell you again. This committee wants to get to a point to where we protect farmers on the grow side and then there are some regulations that go on the other side. We really want to let them do what they do, but if we see that our farmers get harmed in any way, we'll wait in with a club and we'll write laws, we'll write rules, we'll do whatever and we are going to support the farmer. I appreciate that. You got a word on that, we told everyone that and it's not going to change.

[Dan Query (Managing Partner, Vermont Terps/Turfs; Owner, Fern Hollow Apple Orchard)]: I am also the technical director for Vermonter. Yeah. Probably equal to or more than anybody in the state. I understand how products are moved, how they're made from the field to being a winterized crew, to being a distillate, to be in an isolate, to being transformed. I will be more than happy to answer any of those questions when those come up. And I think there, Dan, I think we're

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: gonna ask some of those questions and it's a little far, again, a little far ahead of where we're gonna get to for this legislation. What we're really getting to, and maybe you have the same, I imagine, the largest producer, but what we are really getting asked to do is to regulate this so that this hemp can stay out of the federal eye as far as to be able to travel nationwide. Another thing we're trying to do is we are, one of the reasons why we're coming up with the licenses and the fees, is we want to keep other national people from invading your market and we want to give you the protections and we think that we can do that by just charging some fees. Yes, they might seem a little bit hard for you to pay, but we do know already that there's national people that will not pay them. So therefore they will not come into your market. And so, yeah, there's a dance going on. Rest assured this committee is committed to the hemp marijuana growers in the state and yeah, our door is always open. We are gonna get to this part right here, but it's gonna be after we just kind of solidify some rule making. Just

[Dan Query (Managing Partner, Vermont Terps/Turfs; Owner, Fern Hollow Apple Orchard)]: break it down into like its simplest form for me would be just let our products be sold in the adult use market under the same rules as the, you know, it has to be certificate of analysis, it has to be registered, it has to be grown in the state of Vermont. Don't close that market to us right because we're growing a product that's titled something different. Right. Because in reality that's pretty much the only market there is for us. Right. And for my products to go into a drink, it's gotta be registered by the control board. Well now I can't. Right. And that's all. I just need them, the CAF control board, to let us in. Right. Just don't close the door on us.

[Sen. Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: So we're not allowed to happen, and we're working closely with them. Give us some time, but you're not going out of business unless you choose to. I appreciate that. No problem. You, Joe. Danielle. Good to see you, bro. Linda, we'll go off.