It’s a growing process to find greener side of life for Cathedral City residents in coping with pot smell

Sherry Mindel lives at Outdoor Resorts Resident in Cathedral City year round, and says she believes the property values and number of people willing to stay at Outdoor Resorts is falling because of the pot smell.

David Bernard is the COO of Cat City Cannabis CO in Cathedral City.

"I'd say the biggest impact we have is, employment," Bernard explained. "So, you know, good paying jobs, consistent employment for our local community. So that's I'd say that's probably the biggest impact on the financial side."

Bernard says currently they are close to 150 in-house employees.

Andrew Firestein from the Community and Economic Development Department, Planning, Building, Code Compliance in Cathedral City says the city also generates a cultivation tax that provides revenue for the local economy.

Despite the economic benefits, the facility has brought, the odor is something nearby residents continue to complain about.

Bernard says they've had open discussions with Open Resorts for close to a year, which has been an improvement.

"There's been areas that maybe could have been expedited, when we initially started," Bernard explained. "But for us, this was somewhat of an unknown."

Bernard said up to a recent point in time they had the most robust system for dealing with odor that people had confidence in - carbon filtration.

"There was a little bit of variability to carbon filtration and it's effectiveness," Bernard said. "And I think we've kind of went through that learning curve over the last six months so."

Despite its effectiveness in the summer months, Bernard said they we're monitoring the possibility that in the Winter months, the odor may become stronger.

"We had a concern that a carbon filtration would not be effective through the winter months," he said. "And it's when we started our due diligence to find a supplementing odor mitigation system."

Andrew Firestein from Cathedral City Economic Development says they've been in communication with Cat City Cannabis and over Thanksgiving were told they added additional measures to their carbon filtration system.

"We've added, those systems being a fogging application that uses, food grade components to, in essence, bond and neutralize cannabis odor," Bernard said.

" I think what was designed at that point in time was the most robust system that, that that people had confidence in,It was tried and tested, and I think we've kind of went through that learning curve over the last six months or so.

But for now, Sherry or Cat City Cannabis aren't going anywhere. And finding the greener side of life, is a quest they're both on together.