Pubdate: Thu, 23 Apr 2015
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2015 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/wEtbT4yU
Website: http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Jeff Lee
Page: A3
Cited: http://www.scribd.com/doc/262756357/Pot-Proposal#scribd

VANCOUVER FIRST TO REGULATE DISPENSARIES FOR MEDICAL POT

Licences said to cost up to $5K per year, depending on space

Vancouver is about to become the first city in Canada to regulate the
business of selling marijuana.

Even though the drug is technically available only to people with
federally issued medical marijuana cards, the city will permit the
operation of dispensaries under a proposed framework that rigidly sets
out who can operate businesses and under what conditions.

The plan, which will go to city council Tuesday, ignores the legality
of marijuana and instead tries to deal with the astronomical growth of
unlicensed dispensaries over the last few years. As of mid-April, city
officials count more than 80 such shops, a four-fold increase since
2012, when the federal government changed the rules for how medical
marijuana users obtain the drug.

Councillor Kerry Jang said the city was forced into the move because
of what he called Ottawa's "prohibitionist approach."

"It is because the federal medical marijuana laws are absolutely
unworkable. Here is a case in which you had people who used to grow
their own and do their own thing, and we had no complaints and only a
few shops in Vancouver," Jang said.

"All of the sudden, we're told to destroy their plants, they've got to
buy it by mail, they have to smoke it and not eat it. So quite
frankly, the federal government's own laws, this prohibitionist
approach, has created the vacuum these medical pot shops are filling."

Under staff 's proposal, the city will levy a $30,000 annual
administration fee. Business licences will also cost up to $5,000 per
year, depending on square footage. And they will all have to re-apply
annually.

The city is also going to stringently limit where the shops can go;
they can't be within 300 metres of schools, community centres and each
other. And in an effort to rid certain neighbourhoods of established
shops, the city is banning them from side streets.