Until the federal government passes a law that legalizes the recreational use of marijuana, widely expected to happen sometime this summer, selling cannabis is illegal. Not only was the Robson Street open-air pot market dealing in an illegal product, it was operating in a public space without permission. If that wasn't enough, the vendors were conducting business without licences, paid no business taxes, and failed to collect GST or provincial sales tax, as every business selling a product or service is required to do. [continues 90 words]
After reading the column written by Tyler Dawson on why it's time to legalize all drugs, I couldn't help butt my head as to why he would even suggest such a dangerous and ill thought-out plan. I myself am opposed to these so-called "safe" injection sites. Sure, it will save people from overdosing on heroin, but it also enables those to go out and do it all over again and again. It's unsafe for you to be injecting this poison into your body in the first place. [continues 146 words]
Nelson's top cop is preparing for the legalization of recreational marijuana The woman waiting in the reception area of the Nelson Police Department spots Chief Constable Paul Burkart and calls his name. "Hi Paul," she says. The chief smiles and leans out through the open door, asking, "What can I get for you?" The woman tells him she needs some volunteer security clearance forms. Burkart speaks to an officer in the front dispatch area and asks him to assist the visitor. [continues 657 words]
I've read that there will be new drugged-driving rules for when pot is legalized this year. But I don't really understand them. So do we have rules now or is it legal to be driving after consuming marijuana? - Katie, Calgary The proposed rules will make it easier for police to weed out drivers who've been toking. But until they pass, if police believe you're impaired by any drug, you could still face criminal charges. "So, right now, police can have you take the standard field sobriety test and if you fail, they can demand a drug-recognition evaluation," said Andrew Murie, chief executive of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) Canada. "If you fail that, they charge you with impaired driving and they make a sample demand. It's not tested for level, but cannabis must be in that urine sample for the charge to go forward." [continues 924 words]
Marijuana is moving in. Big time. So here's something to ponder: Will a flood of prolific, easy-to-grow pot mean fewer exciting plants for we gardeners to grow? Could be. Right now, we're accustomed to taking our pick from a wonderful selection of inexpensive offerings, mostly because they're raised in Ontario greenhouses and no longer imported from other countries. Think of fabulous Phalaenopsis orchids (once rare and pricey, yet now so common and inexpensive, we're actually getting tired of them); perfect Christmas poinsettias; a cavalcade of mums in fall; potted spring bulbs all winter; pansies, petunias, plus many other colourful annuals; In spring, heavenly hellebores; exotic offerings such as anthuriums and alstroemerias. [continues 600 words]
This month, Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, introduced legislation to change the spelling of "marihuana" in the 1970 Controlled Substances Act to "marijuana" - and then to drop the word altogether from the federal list of "controlled substances" - that is, illegal drugs. Removing the marijuana prohibition from federal law is just the warm-up act to the bill's primary goal: to end a counterproductive war on drugs. It's past time to reform drug laws that have ruined lives and devastated communities. [continues 608 words]
Despite criticism from a consumer advocacy group, the province is wise to proceed cautiously with regulations governing the pending legalization of marijuana. Islanders should be able to legally light up July 1 but there are hints from Ottawa of a delay by several weeks. More information on P.E.I.'s regulations was released last week, adding details to plans announced in early December. Most of the provincial rules seem reasonable, and based on recent polls and analysis, caution is advisable. [continues 440 words]
City hall bureaucrats don't think poor people should have access to legal marijuana. Of course, in making that request to the LCBO subsidiary that will run legal pot shops, Ottawa's bureaucrats couched it in more palatable language. City staff asked the Ontario Cannabis Retail Corporation, which is currently looking for areas to open pot stores, to please avoid areas "experiencing socio-economic stress." What, precisely, that means is not defined. And no neighbourhood names are attached to that request. But we can all guess what areas they're talking about - say, Vanier. [continues 289 words]
Drunk driving laws have not stopped impaired drivers and pot will be no different Last Sunday, I was driving on John Laurie Blvd. when I caught up to a motorist in the passing lane who was doing 40 km/h in a 70 km/h zone. As I pulled out to pass him on the right, I could smell the stench of marijuana coming from his car. Wait until marijuana is legal in Canada and then more of these bozos will be on the road. In Colorado, where marijuana has been legal for almost four years, a recent poll by the Colorado Department of Transportation showed that 55 per cent of people there think it's perfectly all right to drive while stoned. As Time magazine reported, the poll also found that of the people surveyed who had used pot in the past 30 days, half thought it was fine to drive while high. Why should Alberta's potheads think any differently when legalization arrives here? Some of them, like the guy on John Laurie, aren't even waiting till then. [continues 499 words]
It's tough to imagine a situation where it would be fair for a landlord to change a tenant's lease mid-term. But the impending legalization of pot consumption this summer is one. Ontario landlords are understandably concerned that recreational users may smoke weed in their units once it's legal, leading to a deluge of complaints from other tenants when the fumes inevitably end up in their suites. Not only would the second-hand marijuana smoke be an annoyance, parents would be rightly concerned that it will get into the lungs of their children. [continues 302 words]
It's just another example of how complicated things are going to be as provinces roll out their marijuana rules. Several provinces - Newfoundland and Labrador among them - have decided that marijuana smoking has to be done on private property. Ontario's rules are so tight that weed smoking has to take place in private residences. But what happens if your private residence is an apartment? Here's part of a Canadian Press story out of Toronto: "(The province is) not going to allow marijuana to be smoked in public areas, so where the heck are people going to smoke marijuana? Well they're going to do it in their apartments," said John Dickie of the Canadian Federation of Apartment Associations. "The problem is, just like when they smoke tobacco, the smell goes to neighbouring apartments. Buildings are not hermetically sealed." [continues 347 words]
Two vices are poised to potentially descend on Delta in the coming months, but it's curious that the reception they're getting from city leaders is markedly different. The federal government is expected to legalize marijuana sometime later this year, which has prompted those over at city hall to compile a laundry list of concerns. Delta doesn't want to see pot grown on local farmland due to its impact on food security and public safety, worried that large-scale pot farms could be a draw for organized crime. The city is also raising questions over public consumption, where marijuana will be sold, how tax revenues will be split and more. [continues 285 words]
Punitive approach behind OD crisis, Susan Boyd says. Canada has been inching toward legal regulation of cannabis for many years. But the fears that paralyzed our country for more than a century are still very much in evidence, despite decades of proof that none of the punitive policies we cling to help reduce drug-related harm. Increasingly, drug prohibition is understood as an issue of social justice and human rights by those who have fought for a better way. The history of Canadian drug prohibition is marked by many pivotal moments and challenges to the status quo, brought forward with passion and insight by community activists, people who use drugs, organizations, constitutional lawyers, researchers, and health and service providers. [continues 633 words]
Safe injection sites where addicts can shoot up in a supervised setting could be a hard concept for many to grasp as anything but an invitation for users to inject poison into themselves with the city's blessing. To believe that, though, would be a mistake. Philadelphia announced Tuesday it would support the idea of sites that would not only provide medical supervision to addicts but give them access to treatment and other services. Such a move won't solve the deadly opioid crisis, but is intended to be damage control ... literally. Such sites may control the fatal damage that drugs are inflicting, in a crisis that has laid waste to thousands of lives and families. [continues 443 words]
When I think about the people I've met in Kensington over the last eight months, the people who've opened up to me about their addiction, about their lives, talking to me from the cardboard mattresses and train bridges and alleyways and library lawns where they live, I think about the ones I haven't seen in a while. No, Philly did not just approve of 'Hamsterdam' Could City Council block Kenney's proposed safe injection sites? I think about how many of them by now are dead. [continues 752 words]
National Non-Smoking Week 2018 National Non-Smoking Week (NNSW) has been observed during the third week in January for more than 35 years. From Jan. 21 to 27, one of the most important events in Canada's ongoing health education efforts in the prevention and reduction of tobacco use will be promoted, with Weedless Wednesday on Jan. 23. Weedless Wednesday focuses on the benefits of cessation and promotes a "one day at a time" approach to quitting smoking - a concept appealing to many smokers who may be discouraged when contemplating a week or perhaps a lifetime without cigarettes. Coping with one smoke-free day is manageable, and can contribute to small successes that lead to the decision of quitting long-term. [continues 412 words]
Eating weed gummies at work? Marijuana rules may take a decade to sort out A customer walks into a downtown marijuana dispensary to browse the hash menu for the perfect after-lunch pickup. Another flicks through images in an online store, planning to purchase a selection as a hostess gift. Like it or not, this will be the reality across Canada after the proposed Cannabis Act (Bill C-45) comes into force this summer. Depending on which province or territory you live in, if you are of legal age to purchase marijuana, you will soon be able to drop into a licensed store or order it online from the comfort of your own home. [continues 791 words]
The Trudeau government's decision to legalize marijuana was a welcome and overdue acknowledgement of what has in recent decades become a truism of both the health and justice fields: treating pot-smokers as criminals is a costly, dangerous mistake. The government is right that the prohibition on pot has driven up the cost of policing, contributed to a national crisis of court delays, compounded racial and class inequities and unnecessarily criminalized people for doing something that by and large poses little threat to them or others - all without delivering the promised benefits for public health or public safety. [continues 559 words]
With the impending legalization of marijuana for personal use this July, Corporate Research Associates' (CRA) research suggests the majority of Atlantic Canadians are not likely to take advantage of this new opportunity, at least not initially. It has been interesting to track the change in opinion over time regarding the legalization of marijuana for personal use. While there has been widespread support among Atlantic-Canadians for the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes for more than five years, it has only been recently that a majority of those living in Atlantic Canada support the legalization of marijuana for personal use. [continues 465 words]
A few days before Christmas my son and I were in the site office with a friend of ours solving the problems of the world as we sometimes do. The topic of government taxation came up and how every aspect of life is taxed. As the conversation continued, our friend Mike expressed a point of view we had never considered so I asked and received his permission to use it here, with some background and explanation. When I was a teenager I worked part-time at my dad's General Motors dealership and every now and then this old fellow walked through the shop saying hello to all the mechanics and would wind up going out the back door where he would just stand around. Over the next few minutes the mechanics would lay down their tools one at a time and go out to talk to him, as well as the car salesmen and fellows from the parts department. After a few minutes of this, the old fellow left just the same way he came in, which was all a mystery to a teenager in the early 1960s. [continues 402 words]
