Pubdate: Fri, 24 Apr 2015
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2015 Postmedia Network Inc.
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Author: Ian Mulgrew
Page: A2

NOTHING CONFUSING ABOUT POT LAWS

Zero shades of grey: Ottawa is unequivocal in its stance on
marijuana

A generation after Canada's first medical cannabis dispensary opened
in Vancouver in 1997, city council and police are scrambling to
regulate the business as if taken by surprise.

City manager Penny Ballem says Ottawa has created "greyness and
confusion," sounding incredulous that there is a pot precinct downtown
and more cannabis cafes on corners than Tim Hortons. Where has she
been? The federal government has never been clearer about the
demonized weed and has used the plant to draw a hard line for the fall
election between it and Liberal leader Justin Trudeau.

Federal Health Minister Rona Ambrose is unequivocal in the current
Reefer Madness-like TV campaign that warns marijuana fries teenage
brains, provides no provable medical benefit and is most definitely
illegal.

The law only looks grey if you're standing sideways in West Coast rain
or a cloud of 21st-century, high-potency purple kush, certainly not
your grandfather's grass.

Ottawa overhauled the medical cannabis program a year ago and the
public prosecution office stridently asserts the right to cut down
every last plant under personal cultivation.

The new rules created a free market regime with approved high-security
corporate producers, catalogue shopping, secure home delivery and
public companies shilling shares and stock. The massive reform was a
response to municipalities across the nation loudly whining about
neighbourhood grow operations and the supposed hazards caused by home
cultivation.

Free-standing clinics, compassion clubs, pot dispensaries, smoke
shops, hash houses,marijuana cafes: call them what you will, they were
not part of the old scheme and are not part of the new. They were not
and are not legal in Canada - and that's the black-and-white truth.
Get over it.

Ballem should drop the hypocrisy and the disingenuous naivete - there
are reasons dispensaries popping up like mushrooms isn't an issue
elsewhere. And it isn't our rain.

For nearly 20 years, this city has thumbed its nose at the law in the
rest of Canada while profiting from a reputation as Vansterdam on the
Pacific.

In 2004, then-mayor-now-Sen. Larry Campbell (who wanted to tax and
regulate marijuana) and the cops shut down the mega-successful Da Kine
cafe to emphasize discretion was an essential element of the
laissez-faire city policy toward pot.

The international news coverage about the shop and lineups down the
street embarrassed the good burghers, who wanted liberal tourism but
no overt boasting or profit-making that called attention to the
thriving underground economy.

Not surprisingly, when Da Kine owner Don Briere got out of jail, he
returned to the lucrative illegal business and now is a major player
in the current green rush.

And in June 2012, The Vancouver Sun pointed it out with a big story
and picture pointing out this booming illegal business. We haven't
seen the same exponential growth in marijuana dispensaries in other
cities because they have not tolerated them in this way.

Similarly, because B.C. was the prime Canadian producer of pot for the
U.S., the province's guerrilla gardeners have had to find another
market given the surplus created by the advent of legalization in two
states and medical production in two dozen others.

The appearance of more than 80 dispensaries in Vancouver in the last
two years is a direct result of the collapse of the U.S. black market.
Yet police Chief Jim Chu's minions issued an edict last year that
essentially said unless you were dealing to kids or wearing Hells
Angels colours, you were free to sell pot.

I'd like to see him defend that if, as widely surmised, he runs for
the Conservatives in the next election. More than that, I'd like to
hear him explain how you can buy marijuana wholesale without dealing
with criminals or gangsters.

The Dutch decriminalization model has always suffered from this flaw -
permitted pot cafes make consumers happy, but the owners deal with
crooks so society continues to deal with pernicious results.

There is no legal supply chain for any of these outlets in Vancouver.
None.

In spite of Ballem's professed confusion and the benign police policy,
the civic authorities know this.

They now are proposing a regulation without so much as a phone call to
those in the business.

The outrageous fees, the wrong-headed ban on edibles and derivatives,
the sudden haste: all are big red flags the proposal was thrown
together without serious thought.

This city has the most experience and the longest history of dealing
with widespread open marijuana use and its retail sale. It should take
advantage of that.

Vancouver's politicians, civic staff and police should be using the
insight gained over the last 20 years to lead an honest,
evidence-based discussion.

Instead, the vapid comments and the badly framed approach leaves me
wondering what they are smoking.
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MAP posted-by: Matt