Port Hueneme Establishes ‘Green Mile’ For Pot – 19 Miles Up From Malibu

Marijuana is causing a red hot real estate market to explode just up the coast.

Port Hueneme has designated a rundown industrial neighborhood on the east side of town as as the Green Mile.

Always the poor cousin on the local coast … Port Hueneme has rolled out the welcome mat to an unlimited number of marijuana industries.

The Ventura County Star reports Port Hueneme is the only city in Southern California = to allow multiple types of marijuana businesses, including cultivation, manufacturing and retail sales.

All this … 19 miles from the Malibu city limits.

A cluster of cannabis dispensaries have opened up in Port Hueneme.

Multiple retailers, cultivators and delivery services.

Port Hueneme Police Chief Andrew Salinas told the Ventura County Star that the city’s green mile is not – repeat not –  a hotbed of criminal activity, the source of vehicle crashes from stoned drivers … or an attraction for youth using cannabis,

He says the cannabis businesses are helping the hardscrabble city get back on its feet financially … , adding jobs and playing a meaningful role civically in the city … the police chief said.

And it is causing a red hot real estate market in the rundown industrial section on the Malibu side of Port Hueneme.

One industrial buildings that had sold for $300,000 several years ago just sold for – get this – $5.1 million.

City officials said the cost of buying a commercial or industrial property has shot up 25 percent on average over the past 12 to 18 months. That compares to a healthy market, where sales might climb by 3 to 4 percent annually. 

The Ventura County Star reports investors and entrepreneurs are racing for a share of the fledgling industry that’s already attracted 12 businesses. They’re scooping up shopping centers and industrial complexes, in some cases moving into buildings with existing cannabis operators.