[420 Girl]

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. - Jon Castaline, a middle-aged disabled handyman, was looking for a place to store his tools and his medicinal marijuana plants.

The rental units Jill Escher oversees on Beach Hill was perfect. While the one-car garage below a motel-turned-apartment complex didn't have electricity or water, Castaline was allowed to install one power outlet so he could put up a light and do his handyman work in the storage area.

For $145 a month, it was hard to beat.

But two weeks into the month-to-month rental agreement, Escher learned from other tenants that Castaline was setting up a medical marijuana grow in the tiny garage and his operation quickly ended.

The fire danger, not the marijuana, irked Escher, she said. She immediately moved to evict Castaline from the unit and, after some resistance, Castaline agreed to vacate Thursday.

The renter-landlord disagreement is not unique to Castaline and Escher.

While medical marijuana cards are available in Santa Cruz County, finding a legal place to grow pot for medicinal use is not always easy.

As a result, tenants often set up indoor gardens without notifying their landlords. The grows - if sanctioned under Proposition 215, the state medical marijuana initiative approved by voters in 1996 - are legal and typically do not violate the terms of a rental agreement, supporters say. County guidelines do not limit plant quantity, but state medical growers cannot cultivate a canopy larger than 100 square feet.

That leaves landlords who don't want marijuana grown on their property in a tight spot.

"Even though they get a renter who can pay the rent because they're making money growing marijuana, the risk to the home is great," said Sgt. Mark Yanez, head of the Sheriff's Office drug team. "If they don't want that activity, they probably should include it in their rental contract, same thing (as) if they don't want pets in the house."

If a rental contract doesn't expressly forbid growing and a landlord wants the marijuana cultivation gone, Yanez said the best bet is to pursue an eviction through civil court, a costly and time-consuming process.

Yanez said about 80 percent of the indoor marijuana grows his unit busts are in rentals and that, often, property owners have no clue about their tenants' activities.

A pot grow - medicinal or not - poses several risks to the integrity of the home and the safety of those who live there, according to Yanez.

An indoor garden introduces moisture to the structure, which can cause mold, paint damage or loosen mortar around masonry. Sometimes growers cut holes in floors, walls and ceilings to add ventilation, the lights produce substantial heat and a grow requires ample electricity, so a grower might fiddle with the home's electrical system, according to Yanez.

"Houses generally aren't constructed with the idea that you can grow a lot of plants in there," he said.

A Boulder Creek rental was damaged in August when a fire broke out in an area where about 30 marijuana plants were growing, according to the Boulder Creek Fire Department. The small fire, which started when no one was home, caused about $20,000 in damage.

But Yanez also acknowledged that not every marijuana grow will cause these problems and that some property owners have no qualms with indoor pot gardens.

"If they're OK with it, then more power to them," Yanez said.

For Escher, the issue wasn't marijuana so much as the dangers the grow could pose to the 12 tenants living above the garage Castaline rented.

She said it wouldn't matter if Castaline were cultivating marijuana, growing tomatoes or cooking pizza in a wood-fired oven.

"My beef isn't with his ability to smoke. Fine. I could care less," Escher said. "This is about protecting my tenants."

The company Escher works for, Claradon Properties LLC, provides low-income housing to autistic and special-needs adults. Years ago, there was a fatal fire at that complex.

"I don't really care if he has permission to grow plants. ... He can talk to me about marijuana laws all day long. It's irrelevant," Escher said. "The last thing I want is another fire at this property, which is clearly a vulnerable property."

Castaline said he has no space to tend to the plants in the on-site housing he is provided at the motel he maintains. He was keeping 11 plants and four clones in a 7-by-7-foot mylar-lined room framed inside the storage unit.

The motel handyman, wearing a T-shirt and paint-stained sweatpants, said he suffered a serious neck injury in a car crash and uses marijuana to cope with the residual pain. His prescription medications cost $400 a month, he said.

"It's legal and I've done nothing wrong," Castaline said before Escher inspected the storage unit Wednesday.

He eventually removed the plants, but said he didn't know where he would take his personal-use grow.

"Maybe they should advertise pot-friendly," he suggested to landlords.


NewsHawk: MedicalNeed: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: Kentucky.com, your local online news source | Lexington Herald-Leader - Lexington, KY
Author: JENNIFER SQUIRES
Contact: Kentucky.com Contact Us
Copyright: 2010 Lexington Herald-Leade
Website: Indoor marijuana growing in rentals put landlords, tenants in a tight spot - McClatchy Network - Kentucky.com


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