Pubdate: Tue, 27 May 2014
Source: Alberni Valley Times (CN BC)
Copyright: 2014 Glacier Community Media
Contact:  http://www.avtimes.net/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4043
Author: Eric Plummer

APPLICATIONS ROLL IN FOR MEDICAL POT

Zoning amendments receive opposition

The Alberni-Clayoquot Regional District is pushing ahead with allowing
large-scale medicinal marijuana growing operations in the municipality
by proposing a zoning amendment to accommodate public concerns.

Four applications for grow-op licences in the Alberni Valley currently
await Health Canada's approval under the new federal guidelines that
came into effect April 1. The new Marijuana for Medical Purposes
Regulations (MMPR) require companies to grow medicinal marijuana in
fully-enclosed buildings approved by Canada's health authority.

The regional district initially proposed allowing these indoor
operations on lots measuring at least 1.62 hectares (four acres) in
size, with the growing building located at least 30.48 metres (100
feet) away from property lines.

But during a public hearing on March 27, several residents spoke
against permitting the medicinal grow-ops, citing odour, fire hazards
and potential criminal activity as areas of concern.

This led to changing the proposed minimum size of grow-op lots to 2.42
hectares, or six acres. The suggested zoning bylaw amendment comes
from a recent meeting of the Electoral Area and District of Tofino
Committee, and will be put to a vote of the ACRD directors on
Wednesday at a public meeting.

Following the vote, the bylaw amendment would come to another public
hearing in the near future, said Mike Irg, the ACRD's director of planning.

"We haven't scheduled the date yet but it would be fairly soon," he
said.

Since Health Canada announced personal growing licences would no
longer be issued this spring, the federal authority has been flooded
with hundreds of applications for larger-scale pot growing operations.
Locally, these include the four in the Valley, plus a growing site in
the City of Port Alberni on Bute Street near Fourth Avenue.

Increasing the minimum size of grow-op lots would prevent the
operations from interfering with communities, according to the ACRD's
recommendations.

"Staff is of the opinion that these zones, with the proposed
conditions of use, will provide a variety of rural options for MMPR
proponents while minimizing the impact on smaller lot residential
areas," read a document recently drafted by the regional district's
administration.

Thirteen medicinal grow-ops have been approved by Health Canada, 
including five in British Columbia. Two of these licences belong to 
operations recently set up on Vancouver Island: the 60,000-square foot 
Tilray facility in Nanaimo and Thunderbird Biomedical, a company that is 
yet to disclose its location.

Bill Thomson, chairman of the regional district's Agricultural
Advisory Committee, spoke against allowing licensed growops during the
last public hearing on the issue. His concerns remain the same even if
the lot sizes are larger.

"It's not the proper use of the farmland," said Thomson.

"I have no objection to growing marijuana, if that's what the
government wants, go ahead - but not agricultural land that's supposed
to be used for food. Marijuana is an industrial business, it's not
food."

Thomson said he hasn't heard from a farmer in favour of a zoning bylaw
amendment to allow grow-ops in the regional district.

"They need space, not soil to grow marijuana," he said. "You've got to
change the zoning because Ottawa says so? That's not the way it's
supposed to work."

The MMPR was announced last year after Health Canada saw the number of
licences to grow medicinal marijuana rise exponentially over the last
decade to more than 30,000 personal producers. Health Canada cited an
increase in the number of people growing marijuana in their homes,
bringing consequences for public health and safety that include fire
hazards and criminal activity in neighbourhoods were grow-ops are located.
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