In a win for supporters of commercial medical marijuana in Calaveras County, a judge has ordered county officials to yank a May ballot measure that, if passed, would have banned the industry altogether.

Judge Richard D. Meyer, a visiting judge from Alpine County, found that the language of the initiative was illegal.

Rather than stating clearly that it was a citizen’s initiative, Measure B invoked the county’s Board of Supervisors, implying that voters were being asked to approve an action that already had been taken by local elected officials.

This “undermines the integrity of the initiative process,” the judge found.

Jeremy Carlson, who owns Arnold-based Calaveras Naturals and operates a marijuana dispensary, filed the lawsuit to block Measure B in early March. The faulty language likely made voters more likely to sign the petition, making it more likely to qualify for the ballot in the first place, he said.

“The entire initiative refers to the Board of Supervisors probably a dozen times,” Carlson said. “Basically, that’s the document they used to go out and get all those signatures. Anybody not paying close enough attention, if they read that document it looks like something the board has already approved, that the government approves it.”

Carlson said he was “definitely happy” that the measure has been pulled off the ballot.

David Tunno, one of the leading supporters of a ban, said the language used in the initiative was a “mistake” but also said the judge had other options besides pulling the initiative from the ballot completely. The judge could have allowed the election to proceed and then weighed the merits of the lawsuit.

“This was the most draconian of his choices,” Tunno said.

He said that anyone signing the petition for the initiative knew that it was not coming from the government.

“The citizens knew it was a citizens’ initiative,” Tunno said. “We advertised it as a citizens’ initiative. We collected the signatures for a citizens’ initiative. No one even read the ordinance. What the people who signed up read is the summary of the ordinance.”

Marijuana farms have been hidden in the hills of Calaveras for years, but the Butte Fire created a kind of land rush from pot farmers from outside the area. Hoping to stop that land rush, supervisors decided to temporarily regulate marijuana, requiring farmers to obtain permits and pay fees. But that decision drew backlash from residents who don’t want the farms in their county.

The judge’s decision last week doesn’t end the debate. Voters last November selected new county supervisors, at least some of whom have indicated they are skeptical of the previous board’s action to regulate marijuana. The new board could adopt permanent rules to regulate marijuana or could ban it outright, just as the now defunct voter initiative aimed to do.

Said Tunno: “This is not the end.”