Re: Winnipeg marijuana dispensary closed due to complaint from Vancouver (July 15). Fifteen per cent THC is the average strength of marijuana. Australians are growing the strongest strain at 40 per cent, hardly four times stronger, as Pamela McColl of Smart Approaches to Marijuana would have us believe. She leaves the impression that all marijuana is four times stronger than in her smoking days, when, in fact, it is a small percentage.

If you zero in on the very few negatives of marijuana, the 40 per cent strain in particular, and dismiss the myriad of positives, you are doing a major disservice to the public, unlike the service that Glenn Price provides. The independent researchers, not the brain-washing Big Pharma people, have proven the benefits of marijuana use.

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Pot dispensary owner threatens to defy law

Glenn Price plans to defy the law if he cannot get some answers from politicians about the closing of his medicinal marijuana dispensary.

Police told Price to shut down his Main Street dispensary on Tuesday because it is not Health Canada-approved.

Price has since tried to contact Mayor Brian Bowman to see if the city would support the same type of regulation regarding such dispensaries that Vancouver has introduced. He has also tried to call Premier Greg Selinger.

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Plans to Hold Peaceful Rally at His Shop Next Week

THE owner of the only medical-cannabis dispensary in Manitoba has vowed to stay open, despite being told by police to stop selling his product. Glenn Price opened Your Medical Cannabis Headquarters at 1404 Main St. in March and started selling to Winnipeggers July 1. On Tuesday, Winnipeg police ordered the store to stop, following a service complaint lodged by a group fighting storefront pot sales.

Price doesn't have a licence to sell from Health Canada, meaning his operation is illegal. He hasn't sold any cannabis since last Tuesday, but said he has been giving some away to his customers. He said he's going to resume selling his products on Tuesday, whatever the consequences.

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A day after Winnipeg police told him to shut down, the owner of the city's first medical marijuana dispensary says he wants to meet with the mayor.

But Glenn Price vows he will keep doing what he says is the right thing, dishing out prescription marijuana to Winnipeggers in need, no matter what legal repercussions may be in store for him.

Price said police came to his Your Medical Cannabis Headquarters shop on Main Street on Tuesday and forced him to shut down his operation, which he said provides services to more than 225 patients.

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WINNIPEG police have told the man running a medical marijuana dispensary from a store on Main Street to stop selling cannabis.

Nearly two weeks after Your Medical Cannabis Headquarters began selling medical marijuana at 1404 Main St., a group fighting storefront sales of pot claimed victory Wednesday when police told the store owner to stop.

"We said shut them down - it's illegal," Pamela McColl with Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) Canada said Wednesday night.

"They're trafficking in narcotics," said McColl from her home in Vancouver. She said she contacted the Winnipeg mayor's office and the police service Tuesday to file a service complaint the police weren't upholding the law by allowing the storefront sale of medical marijuana.

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Chew 'em if you've got 'em. That was the message this week from Health Canada, which officially changed its rules around what approved medicinal pot producers can offer.

Licensed growers can now offer concentrated cannabis oil, fresh marijuana buds and leaves needed to make edible products.

The shipping will be controlled, including child-resistant packaging.

It's an approach that makes sense, in the middle of a debate that often doesn't.

Health Minister Rona Ambrose seemed out of step last month when she said she was "outraged" by the Supreme Court's decision to strike down the prohibition on forms of medical marijuana other than dried leaves.

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Locally owned pot shop set to open here July 1

MEDICAL marijuana users will soon have a local joint to buy their weed.

Your Medical Cannabis Headquarters, a marijuana dispensary, is set to open officially at 1404 Main St., on July 1. It's the former home of Vapes on Main, a medical marijuana cafe.

Owner Glenn Price, a medical marijuana user himself, said he has been open with both the city and the province about the nature of the business he is opening.

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I am outraged by the arrogant and uninformed comments by Health Minister Rona Ambrose concerning the medicinal use of cannabis. I suffer from chronic foot pain and have spent thousands of dollars for surgery, a titanium implant, orthotics, orthopaedic shoes, and pain killing drugs. Nothing available in Canada has relieved the pain. I had the opportunity in Colorado to use a legal Extreme Relief THC Salve that comes in a tube that looks like an underarm deodorant and is just as convenient to use. It is the only effective relief that I have found for my condition. The salve is not smoked or taken internally. So why can't we have it available in Canada?

Gary Whitten

(The appetite for alternate delivery methods is likely strong enough to sway government.)

[end]

I used to think legalizing and taxing marijuana would be a good thing. I thought it was a win-win situation. First a new revenue source and second a more efficient use of police resources no longer spent dealing with its use as a crime. I may have been right but now we can see how it works out in the U.S. and get a free look at how it works out. I believe our two cultures have enough in common that if it works there it can work here and if turns out to be a bad idea, we are warned.

Grant Hooke

(It's still early days, but it seems to be working in Colorado.)

[end]

THE Harper government is quickly becoming its own satire of the mouldy propaganda that portrayed marijuana as the road to mental illness, crime and unemployment.

Health Minister Rona Ambrose, for example, said last week she was shocked and "outraged" after the Supreme Court of Canada ruled medical-marijuana users can consume the product in a variety of ways, not just through smoking.

Of course it was ridiculous for the government to take this matter all the way to the top court when common sense made the answer obvious. Why, for God's sake, would the state insist on smoking only, when less harmful methods, such as baked goods and other products, are available?

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"SPECIAL" brownies could soon be the running special at a Winnipeg bakery near you.

After a unanimous Supreme Court decision Thursday ruled in favour of legalizing the production of edible medical marijuana products such as pastries, cooking oils and teas, Winnipeg tokers celebrated with cannabis-infused beverages and pastries at Vapes Off Main on Albert Street.

The 18-plus smoking lounge licensed for medical marijuana users has high hopes for new programming possibilities, thanks to the new rules. It will start selling baked goods and provide cooking classes now that the grey area surrounding edibles is gone.

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In saying she was "outraged," Health Minister Rona Ambrose chose the right word but misapplied it.

It is outrageous that a minister in a democratic government would attack judges of the Supreme Court. It is outrageous that a health minister would prefer sick people took up smoking rather than consuming medical marijuana in a brownie.

Has the minister no scientific experts to guide her through these decisions, or does she treat scientific experts with the same disdain as legal ones?

Dan Prowse

Winnipeg

[end]

Once again, the Harper government proves itself the masters of misdirection (High court rules no crime to eat pot, June 12).

The Supreme Court's unanimous, common-sense ruling that other forms of consumption of medical marijuana must be legal is not a medical judgment, as Health Minister Rona Ambrose has said. The medical efficacy of marijuana has been resolved by doctors long since; she knows that full well.

The legal ruling offends the Harper government's sense of entitlement to govern without comment from anyone -- the Supreme Court's habit of speaking out against bad laws is the real issue.

Richard Lockhart

Winnipeg

[end]

Tory justice critic blames overcrowding

BRANDON - More contraband was seized at the Brandon Correctional Centre in 2014 than at any other Manitoba jail. A total of 98 items - drugs, weapons, tobacco, home brew, ink and tattooing supplies - were seized by corrections officers in the western Manitoba jail, a jump of 10 per cent from 2013.

Tory justice critic Kelvin Goertzen, whose office distributed the information following a freedom-of-information request, said overcrowding is behind the problem.

"It makes it harder to keep (contraband) out," he said.

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If you're going to make marijuana legal for one day, why would you hold it at the Legislative building? I really don't care that people smoke marijuana and I really don't care if it's legalized or decriminalized. Let's face it, people are going to do it one way or another. People do it, but it should be the exact same as alcohol and only be allowed to be consumed in the comforts of your home or at a place that is licensed for it. It makes Winnipeg look trashy, with a bunch of people sitting around red-eyed and lazy. There are children that go to this, most parents don't even know their 12 to 17 year olds are there. If you held this "event" in a more controlled environment, not in front of the Legislative building it would be better because you could ID people and not allow someone's child to smoke weed in public where something bad could happen to them.

Joshua Wells

(Trying to force these folks into a "controlled environment" would be a little like herding cats.)

[end]

Organizer sees turnout as symbol of resilience

The cold weather was the biggest buzz kill for cannabis supporters at Winnipeg's annual 420 rally on the Manitoba Legislature grounds.

Still, the small crowd of people who did brave the wind, snow and negative temperatures Monday is a testament to the resilience of the city's pot-smoking advocates, said 420 organizer Steven Stairs.

"There's a huge little community here," said Stairs.

"We're definitely growing, and people coming out, even though the weather's crappy, is a great sign of things to come."

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Legalize marijuana to benefit society: It's been at least 30 years since the respected British magazine, The Economist, and many others, presented rational arguments for legalizing marijuana. There has finally been some global movement in this direction, and we hope Canada will soon follow.

Prohibition doesn't work - it simply encourages crime. Marijuana is widely available anyway, so let's have all society reap the financial benefits. There would be a huge boost and "fiscal dividend" for our economy: Significant increases in tax revenues, significant reductions in legal costs-including fewer law-enforcement officers, fewer public lawyers, fewer court cases, fewer prisons and related administrations.

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Marijuana Users' 4/20 Parade in Jeopardy Over Bylaw Change & New Insurance Requirements

The man behind Winnipeg's annual 4/20 rally said a city bylaw is infringing on legal marijuana users' democratic rights by making legal assembly more prohibitive.

Steven Stairs, a vocal advocate in Winnipeg for medical marijuana use, said plans to march through downtown on April 20 - the day weed smokers around the world light up in support of decriminalization - are in limbo after the city refused to issue a parade permit.

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A Winnipeg drug dealer who claims his rights were violated when police tactical team members used "Wild West" tactics to storm into his Fort Rouge home with a battering ram, flash bang and high-powered weaponry, lost his bid for freedom Thursday.

Queen's Bench Justice Herbert Rempel ruled police acted properly and within their mandate in the case of Christopher Li.

"They had reasonable grounds to believe there was a real risk of violence," Rempel said.

Li was seeking to walk free on the grounds police violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms during the so-called dynamic entry in which he was caught with close to $6,000 worth of cocaine, more than $2,000 in cash and various drug paraphernalia.

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How would you feel if your daughter was ordered to strip naked by her teachers and wrongfully accused of selling drugs?

When news broke that a 15-year-old schoolgirl in Quebec City was forced to remove her clothing to prove she was not carrying drugs I couldn't help but think of my daughter when she was that age.

The girl was accused of dealing pot after a teacher confiscated her phone and went through her text messages, in one of which she had joked about selling marijuana.

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