In 2015, it was the buzz of the burgeoning cannabis industry. Martra Holdings and its subsidiary Martra Development bought 332 acres of City Ranch property from Walsenburg for over $1.3 million, with plans to develop a sprawling cannabis-growing campus on the eastern border of town. On build-out, its planned 92 state-of-the-art greenhouses would provide some 1.8 million square feet of cultivation area, to be rented to cannabis entrepreneurs.
That didn't come to pass, for a variety of reasons. In the end, the Martra property was auctioned off in a sheriff's sale in December, 2023. Many involved in the project, including the city, were left holding the bag. Martra's downfall left the city, which carried the original debt on the 2015 land sale, a primary creditor — to the tune of more than $500,000.
KGA Holdings, who were investors in the Martra project, acquired the property in the sheriff's sale in December of 2023, in an attempt to recoup their investment. They have been making monthly interest payments to the city ever since, while working toward getting a much-less ambitious grow operation off the ground.
On Tuesday, the Walsenburg City Council unanimously approved KGA's application for a cannabis cultivation license for one greenhouse to be built on a roughly seven-acre triangle of the original Martra site, just east of Interstate 25 and north of State Hwy. 10, at 500 Parsons Road.
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