Glaciers carve valleys out of rock in more than 10,000 years. Santa Rosa created the first outlines of CannaCom Valley in the past year, with some two dozen cannabis-commerce startups already shaping the valley floor.

CannaCom Valley, expected to quickly attract thick growth of new business enterprise, will become a verdant source of city revenue if voters say yes to a new tax measure in June. The cannabis industry will rival wine and beer, soaring to hundreds of millions of dollars of business.

Global cannabis software and point of sales solutions company Guardian Data Software (GDS) has announced a partnership with Australian medical cannabis accelerator BuddingTech that will see the organisation act as an analytical engine and business consultancy for GDS clients, while working towards new research initiatives.

BuddingTech, a Sydney-based organisation which emerged in 2015, identifies startups working with cannabis technology and research, and looks to support them towards commercialising their ideas for the Asia Pacific medical cannabis market.

Besides the accelerator, BuddingTech also offers consultation services, and holds a medical cannabis resource database filled with surveys and analytical white paper reports.

The San Jacinto City Council meeting April 4 in a public hearing on a proposed marijuana cultivation ordinance brought strong emotional debate between marijuana cultivators, those opposed and a member of the city council.

The continued public hearing on Ordinance 17-02 that is meant to regulate the establishment of commercial marijuana cultivation in the light industrial zone of the city has been an emotional issue before the council since the passage of Proposition 64. Proposition 64 allows the limited cultivation and use of recreational marijuana.

This vast and fertile valley is often called the salad bowl of the nation for the countless heads of lettuce growing across its floor. Now California’s marijuana industry is laying claim to a new slogan for the valley: America’s cannabis bucket.

After years of marijuana being cultivated in small plots out of sight from the authorities, California cannabis is going industrial.

Over the past year, dilapidated greenhouses in the Salinas Valley, which were built for cut flower businesses, have been bought up by dozens of marijuana entrepreneurs, who are growing pot among the fields of spinach, strawberries and wine grapes.

The cost of doing business as a medical-marijuana provider in Ohio isn’t going to be cheap. And that’s probably a good thing.

State regulators organizing the infrastructure for what will be the state’s medical-marijuana regulating body have said that licenses for businesses involved in growing and selling marijuana under a law approved by state voters in 2016 will be more expensive than in many other states that allow medical marijuana.

The Ohio Medical Marijuana Control Program plans to charge a $20,000 application fee and $180,000 license fee for larger growers, and a $2,000 application fee and $18,000 license fee for smaller growers.

The Marijuana industry is growing rapidly, and at the moment it seems as if nearly everyone wants in.

According to cannabis research firm ArcView, legal cannabis sales in North America surged by 34% last year to $6.9 billion, and by 2021, sales of legal weed are expected to top $22 billion. Investment firm Cowen & Co. is arguably even more bullish, calling for $50 billion in legal pot sales by 2026, which works out to a compounded annual growth rate of more than 23%.

Ty Nero thinks new pot legislation tabled by the federal government will make people feel more comfortable when they're shopping at his business.

Nero owns Treehouse Lifestyle Supplies in Regina, a head shop that provides customers with access to tobacco products such as pipes and bongs — though they are commonly used for marijuana instead.

Nero thinks the legislation might mean more people start taking an interest in marijuana in general. Already, he said he's noticed more and more people walking into the shop who are new to pot.

"The stigma is going away slowly," Nero said of marijuana use. "It's just propaganda in the first place, it's not bad — anything can be abused. As long as you don't abuse it, it's fine."

Officials in one Alaska city have taken steps to keep commercial marijuana out of Soldotna.

Soldotna City Council voted 4-2 Wednesday to direct city administrators to draft legislation that would ban marijuana establishments from operating within city limits, the Peninsula Clarion reported (http://bit.ly/2oH3qvt).

The council had previously placed a two-year suspension on pot businesses, which temporarily prohibited them until Jan. 1, 2018. With this vote, city administrators will start to draft legislation to ban them, present it to the Planning and Zoning Commission and have it go through the public process, Mayor Pete Sprague said.

Council members Lisa Parker and Tyson Cox voted against the measure.