A company that owns a cannabis farm in Midway will put up money for roadwork in the village. The farm will now only hire locals and will slash its workforce heading into the 2022 harvest, easing concerns about a lack of housing for staff.
The farm is owned and operated by BZAM Cannabis, whose Michael Hofmann met with village council via Zoom Monday evening, Feb. 7. Company trucks have considerably added to traffic and wear and tear along Fritz Road, a previously little-used stretch of old railgrade leading to the farm and some private homes.
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“We’d be willing to give a monthly or a quarterly contribution towards” upkeep along Fritz Road, Hofmann told council.
Hofmann then thanked council for the village’s recent snow-plowing along the road. BZAM is eager to co-operate with the village moving forward, he continued.
Addressing concerns that temporary farm hands had been living in tents last season, Hofmann said, “My number-one rule for 2022 is that I will only hire locals,” later clarifying that he meant people from the Midway and Greenwood areas.
BZAM will further bring down housing pressure by cutting staff levels from between 80 and 90 people at the peak of the 2021 harvest to around 20 people at the peak of the 2023 harvest. New automated equipment would make a great many of these jobs obsolete, Hofmann said.
Mayor Martin Fromme said Tuesday, Feb. 8, that the village had recently seen “an amazing level of cooperation from the company.”
He and Hofmann had had productive conversations about what BZAM could do to help maintain Fritz Road. BZAM and village Chief Administrative Officer Penny Feist will arrive at a dollar-figure in terms of the company’s regular contributions at some point in the future, Fromme said.
*Editor’s note: BZAM’s Michael Hofmann’s last name was misspelled in an earlier version of this story.
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