INDEPENDENT SINCE 1880
The Corne¬ Daily Sun Vol. 135, No. 84
TUESDAY, APRIL 30, 2019
n
12 Pages – Free
ITHACA, NEW YORK
News
Arts
Sports
Weather
Pole Posse
Woodstock Cancelled?
Women’s Softball
Rain Showers
The dance group will perform its first show on Friday, and will donate ticket proceeds to Planned Parenthood. | Page 3
Investors and organizers are caught in a fight over the fate of the 50th anniversary of the festival. | Page 8
Cornell heads across town for a doubleheader with Ithaca College. | Page 12
HIGH: 51º LOW: 40º
N.Y. State Hemp Industry Is Growing Like a Weed Farmers, entrepreneurs, investors seeing green
By AMANDA H. CRONIN Sun News Editor
On December 20, farmers and entrepreneurs struck gold when Congress passed the The Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, or the “Farm Bill.” The law uprooted hemp from the controlled substances list, approving it for industrial growth in all 50 states. Four months later, hundreds of licenses to grow and process
the newly-legalized plant — ic research institutions, of which otherwise known as Cannabis Cornell was among the first sativa L to receive — have a license in “CBD has people saying been dis2017. adjectives like ‘miraculous’ N o w , tributed economto eager and family farms flying the ic analysts growers throughare calling coop from other crops.” hemp the out New most lucraY o r k State. Prior to the greenlight tive cash crop farmers have seen for industrial growth, growing in decades, with the industry hemp was restricted to academ- projected to grow 18.3 percent each year over the next decade. Business is already booming. And Cornell will lend a hand in helping the crop succeed. CBD, or cannabidiol, is a natural compound found in cannabis plants. It can be extracted as an oil and infused into food, used topically to treat pain and injected as medication. It is different than THC, which is a psychoactive compound, found in trace amounts in hemp and high volumes in marijuana. CBD has people saying adjectives like “miraculous” and decades-old family farms flying the coop from other crops into hemp. COURTESY OF CORNELL AGRITECH
Hemp hype | A researcher inspects hemp plants at the AgriTech center Amanda H. Cronin can be reached in Geneva. Cornell is a leading research institutions on hemp in the U.S. at acronin@cornellsun.com.
Panel Weighs Pros, Cons on Weed By VALE LEWIS Sun Staff Writer
Though Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D-N.Y.) proposal to legalize recreational marijuana in New York was dropped from the state budget last month, discussions about the drug continue in Tompkins County. On Monday, the League of Women Voters of Tompkins County hosted a panel of local leaders to present the implications of legalizing marijuana and answer audience questions. Jim Sharp, director emeritus of the Van Dyke Addiction Treatment Center, began with a speech
illustrating that “in regards to marijuana, there’s a lot we don’t know” — including how many people are addicted to the drug and how many people
die each year by overdose on marijuana. He said that one of the most important factors in the legalization of recreational marijuana will be
the accompanying regulations. Sharp pointed to similar regulations regarding increased taxation on See WEED page 4
VALE LEWIS / SUN STAFF WRITER
Pot topic | The League of Women Voters hosted a panel on marijuana legalization, including the voices of Tompkins County Sheriff, District Attorney, an ILR program director and a county medical director.
COURTESY OF NATALIA LOPEZ-BARBOSA
Beep beep! | This remote-controlled food delivery robot may be rolling up the slope next fall. The bot will deliver food from Cornell and Collegetown.
Robot Revolution: Food Delivery ‘KiwiBot’ May Come to Cornell By ROCHELLE LI Sun Staff Writer
Barbosa grad, who is managing the Cornell operations, told The Sun in a phone interview. “We want people to have a warm feeling about what’s happening.” But while the robot hasn’t faced issues moving around on campus yet, Rodriguez realized that the weather in Ithaca isn’t
As spring approached, a small, rectangular robot began making its way up and down Cornell’s hills. This robot is a Kiwibot, which delivers food to college students on campus. First implemented at the University of California, “We want to transition to be something that Berkeley, Kiwibot all people approve of. We think it’s a really is hoping to expand its services clever way of delivering food on campus.” across the country to Cornell. Natalia Lopez-Barbosa grad The robot that students saw roaming campus these past few always April’s blue skies and mild weeks hasn’t actually been deliv- temperatures. Having only been ering food, according to David implemented in California, the Rodriguez, Head of Business robots have not been tested in Development at Kiwi. Instead, it extreme cold or snow. Rodriguez has roved the campus grounds anticipates upgrading and develto see student reactions and to oping the robots to be able to survive in different conditions. The explore the campus. This test was designed to see company will have to wait until if the student body would react next fall to see how the robot positively and for the robot to withstands the weather, according try and move in different spaces, to Lopez-Barbosa. Lopez-Barbosa reached out making sure that it could feasibly to Rodriguez after he posted in travel from one end of campus to another. Based on the tests Columbia Facebook group, which so far, Rodriguez believes that they both attended for their underCornellians have responded enthu- graduate degrees. Rodriguez was looking to test out expansion of siastically. “One of the things that is the Kiwibot to Ivy League schools important for us is that we want and was looking for help; Lopezto transition to be something that Barbosa thought Cornell could be all people approves of. We think a valuable market, especially conit’s a really clever way of delivering See ROBOTS page 4 food on campus,” Natalia Lopez-