UP IN SMOKE: ‘Crisis mode:’ Failing pot farms are killing this California town’s economy.

In the 1980s, the federal government waged a brutal war against illicit cannabis farming in the Emerald Triangle, yet the industry continued to grow larger. And then California legalized medical marijuana in 1996, creating a green rush of new cannabis farms. Soon, Humboldt’s farms were sending cannabis to dispensaries across the state and even feeding the entire country’s illicit market. By some estimates, the Emerald Triangle grew 60% of the pot in the entire United States.

But the same things that made Southern Humboldt County one of the country’s best places to grow pot before legalization are now working against it. After voters legalized recreational cannabis in 2016, the region’s dense forests and long winding dirt roads, which were good for evading law enforcement, became costly expenses when it came to running a legal business.

Wendy Kornberg, the owner of Sunnabis, a small cannabis farm 20 minutes down a dirt road from Garberville, said all of the surrounding pot farmers either have given up or are on the verge of bankruptcy. “Everyone is struggling. We all had to raid our kids’ college funds,” she told SFGATE. She said these farm failures have drained the town’s economy.

“I grew up in Garberville, from 1977 till I graduated high school in 1995, and I have never seen so many empty storefronts. The whole side of one of the streets is just empty storefronts. It’s a little bit terrifying when you look at it from that viewpoint,” she said.

Didn’t California’s pot growers stop to think that legalization had its own risks?