Pubdate: Wed, 28 May 2014
Source: Burnaby Now, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2014 Lower Mainland Publishing Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.burnabynow.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1592
Author: Jacob Zinn
Page: 3

POT: FED RULES AND CITY BYLAWS COLLIDE

While the federal government's new medical marijuana regulations took 
effect nearly a month ago, a recent injunction to temporarily allow 
previously licensed users to continue growing on their own has called 
into question contradictory municipal legislation.

In November, Burnaby city council approved a bylaw amendment to force 
all medical marijuana production facilities into industrial zones, 
falling in line with the incoming Marihuana for Medical Purposes 
Regulations (MMPR). The switch by the feds to the new program sparked 
a national uproar from users under the old Medical Marihuana Access 
Regulations (MMAR), whose personal licences were to be revoked as of April 1.

However, an injunction has allowed those users to keep growing their 
own stash until a constitutional challenge of the MMPR system is heard.

"The feds granted a licence for personal growers or someone who was 
growing for a number of people under those licences, but that didn't 
mean that if you got a federal licence that you were licensed at a 
provincial or local level," said Lou Pelletier, director of planning 
and building with the City of Burnaby.

Pelletier said that even if a medicinal user wants to grow only for 
themselves, to do so legally, they would have to rezone their 
property to industrial through the city.

"The bylaw in Burnaby has been changed, so looking backwards at what 
the federal licence is isn't really material to what we look at when 
someone comes forward and says, 'I'd like to get local approval for 
this,'" he said, likening it to licensing programs for other fields.

"I can get a licence to drive a taxi from Burnaby, but if I go to 
Ontario, that doesn't mean I have a licence to drive a taxi in 
Ontario. I still need to go through a local approval process."

Similar bylaws have been put in place in other Lower Mainland cities, 
including Surrey and Richmond, restricting commercial grow operations 
to specific zones.

Pelletier noted that the city does not keep track of the number of 
medical marijuana users in Burnaby, though the bylaw amendment will 
allow the city to map out new medical grow-ops when owners apply to 
rezone their properties. In addition, the rezoning process requires a 
public hearing to give residents their say if a medical marijuana 
production facility is proposed for their neighbourhood.

Pelletier added that at this time, no one has applied to rezone their 
property to grow medical marijuana, commercially or otherwise.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom