Pubdate: Tue, 21 Sept 1999
Source: Edmonton Sun (Canada)
Copyright: 1999, Canoe Limited Partnership.
Contact:  http://www.canoe.ca/EdmontonSun/
Forum: http://www.canoe.ca/Chat/home.html
Author: Bernard Pilon

DOPE SHOW UP IN SMOKE

A pro-pot celebration is having a hard time getting lit
up.

Only days after the Freedom Foundation - a cannabis advocacy group
behind Edmonton Hempfest '99 - got the boot from one hall after a Sun
article on the day-long bash, a second, bigger space been snapped up.
But the price has been the dope-growing show.

"We just had some altercation with the (first) hall. It was due to
your newspaper," foundation member Haley Nelson said yesterday.

Hempfest '99 was supposed to be a noon-to-midnight affair at the
non-smoking Ritchie Community Centre this coming Sunday - the first
time the annual pro-pot bash has headed indoors since the province
kicked them off the Legislature grounds after last fall's rampant drug
use appalled cops and MLAs.

But when Ritchie community league president Don Sequin met with Nelson
and company to discuss exactly what the foundation was planning to do,
the booking was scrubbed.

"We thought we'd given them a fair shake. We're always concerned about
narcotics (in the 7727 98 St. hall), but it doesn't mean we approve or
disapprove of them," Seguin said.

Now the bash is rescheduled for Oct. 10 at Bonnie Doon Community Hall
- - a bigger, newer venue. But Hempfest's second shot at success has
dropped plans to show people the tricks of domestic marijuana growing
- - something Nelson said was necessary "because of tensions that arose"
within hall brass.

"I told them what this festival is all about and what this festival
isn't all about. They had no problem," Nelson said.
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MAP posted-by: Derek Rea