Pubdate: Tue, 09 Aug 2005
Source: Kamloops Daily News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 Kamloops Daily News
Contact:  http://www.kamloopsnews.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/679
Author: Michele Young
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)

CITY MAY GO AFTER DRUG HOUSES

A "half-step" bylaw is going to city council that would help shut down 
houses where drug operations cause health or safety concerns.

The B.C. government is in the midst of drafting legislation that would make 
access to hydro records easier, which in turn would help pinpoint houses 
where drug activity might be occurring, the city's police commission heard 
Monday morning.

But before those regulations go to government, there are steps the city can 
take, corporate and community affairs director Len Hrycan told commission 
members.

"The focus of the bylaw is public health and safety," not the criminal 
aspects of the drug trade, he said of the draft bylaw presented to the 
commission Monday.

That draft calls for the RCMP to work with the city in identifying and 
inspecting properties where drug activity -- such as marijuana grow 
operations -- is being conducted.

It gives the city the authority to be involved in having water, power or 
gas to the house cut off if there are health or safety concerns relating to 
the growing or manufacturing of drugs.

For example, Hrycan said, if the RCMP suspected a grow-op in a home, they 
would still have to go through the usual channels to get a warrant for 
inspection. Once that was done, they could look at whether there should be 
disconnection of services because of perceived electrical wiring problems, 
mould relating to marijuana growth or other drug-related issues.

At that point, the city would step in and order the owner to fix the 
problems. There is then a 30-day period during which a professionally 
certified report has to be submitted to the chief building inspector 
outlining any hazardous situations and the course of action to remediate them.

Then the owner has 60 days to complete all the work and submit a letter of 
certification.

Hrycan said if the owner doesn't comply, the city will take on the job and 
add the expenses onto the owner's tax bill.

There is a fee to be levied for all city inspections, he added.

A previous draft called for landlords to inspect their properties on a 
regular basis. That has been removed as it could be difficult for some 
landlords to follow.

RCMP Supt. Jim Begley said the bylaw doesn't give police the authority to 
go into homes without search warrants. They still have to follow the 
current legal process.

"The principle of the bylaw is, what do you do when the police walk out the 
door and people still want to live there?" he said.

Hrycan, who sits on a working group developing a best practices bylaw for 
the province, said the City of Surrey ran a pilot project with the police 
to deal with a mass of grow-ops there. That project is the basis for the 
new efforts to get access to hydro records that show extremely high or low 
household power use that could indicate a grow-op.
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