If you've got the munchies for cannabis edibles, you'll have to go to the liquor store.

The province has tapped the Nova Scotia Liquor Corp. - which already sells dried and fresh cannabis, cannabis oil and cannabis accessories - - to sell edibles, extracts and topicals.

"The NSLC has done a good job in preparing and implementing our new retail model as recreational cannabis was legalized across Canada," said Karen Casey, the minister responsible for the NSLC, in a news release Monday.

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The legalization of pot may be looming but that doesn't mean police are backing off their crackdown on the "grey" marijuana market.

Most recently, RCMP in Colchester County raided the Community Compassion Centre in Bible Hill. They seized cash, marijuana, marijuana derivatives and drug paraphernalia, and charged Ricky Joseph Leclerc, 51, of Upper Kennetcook.

He's scheduled to appear in Nova Scotia provincial court Friday.

"The RCMP will continue to work within the existing legislation under the Controlled Drug and Substances Act," RCMP spokesman Cpl. Dal Hutchinson said Monday in an email. "If we determine that there is a violation of the legislation, we will take appropriate action."

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The owner of a Bible Hill marijuana dispensary has been charged for the second time in six months with possession for the purpose of trafficking.

Ricky Joseph Leclerc, 51, of Upper Kennetcook, was arrested after police executed a search warrant at the Community Compassion Centre, a marijuana storefront on Pictou Road.

Leclerc is to appear in court in Truro on March 21 to enter a plea to the charge.

The RCMP said in a news release that members of the Colchester County Integrated Street Crime Enforcement Unit had seized a quantity of cash, marijuana, marijuana derivatives and drug paraphernalia during their search last Friday.

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To the editor,

Bootleggers in Pictou County sell beer at double the price because of all the risks involved. Marijuana is mostly supplied by organized crime. These people face all the risks of the bootlegger and more. There have been murders, kidnappings, torture, etc., all in the quest for control of the marijuana trade.

Is it any wonder why their prices are so high? The reasons they risk life and limb is that the profits are astronomical.

Marijuana is one of the cheapest, easiest and maintenance-free plants to grow. Can someone please explain how the government-sanctioned marijuana distributors came up with such exorbitant prices when their entire operation is "risk free." Marijuana on the street is the very same marijuana that the government distributors sell but their prices don't reflect this.

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To see how the NSLC's marijuana distribution will be a disaster take a tour of Halifax's "medical" marijuana dispensaries. There are a dozen, or more, at least. They all have lines, seven days a week, from open to close. Their inventory (marijuana) is sourced in the industrial black-market production infrastructure in BC which is vast, efficient and already produces a variety of products (in-demand strains of marijuana) and product formats (oils, vape cartridges, topicals, edibles, etc).

Many people don't fully understand that these dispensaries are actually all illegal and will be shut down upon legalization. Currently, the only legal way to purchase medical marijuanais through the mail from a licensed producer.

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Regulations as to where cannabis can be used are needed, officials say

With the upcoming legalization of cannabis, Yarmouth's recreation director, Frank Grant, has big concerns.

"One of the things that we have concerns of with legalized cannabis is how it's going to be used on the street, in our parks, in our sports fields, in our parking lots or outside gymnasiums or halls," he said.

In the past, when the recreation department has had issues with older youth, at facilities where cannabis has been detected and reported to the RCMP, Grant says it's been downplayed.

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Harm reduction is more than a job for Karen Kittilsen Levine. Reducing the numbers of people dying from opioid addiction and blood-borne disease is something she's determined to do.

"We began doing outreach in Pictou County on November 1 and have more than 40 clients, and we're beginning outreach in Amherst within a few days," said Kittilsen Levine, who is the harm reduction coordinator for the Northern Healthy Connections Society.

The organization collects used needles and distributes clean ones. It also provides condoms and information on blood-borne diseases.

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Two years after the province abandoned using an Ontario laboratory for drug and alcohol testing in custody cases, a decision by a Sydney Supreme Court justice is casting doubt on whether a Halifax lab is any more reliable.

The decision by Justice Theresa Forgeron of the court's Family Division rejected a bid by the Department of Community Services to have the director of the Capital Health Authority's toxicology lab, Dr. Bassam Nassar, give expert opinion evidence concerning urine testing samples from a Cape Breton father.

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Both the Nova Scotia and federal Liberal governments are blowing the chance to rectify years of anti-black prejudice with their marijuana legislation.

For years, the government's "tough on crime" strategy gave police officers carte blanche to harass people of colour. Now that the government has decided to legalize recreational marijuana, they have no plans to issue pardons for marijuana possession convictions.

Thousands of people have been charged with pot possession over the past decade. Things got so bad under the Harper government that the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police advocated for ticketing to replace criminal charges for simple possession.

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Marijuana legalization for someone my age is somewhat difficult to imagine.

As a teenager growing up in the early 1970s in Cape Breton, I strayed off the approved path (like thousands of my peers across our beautiful island and millions more across our country) and smoked marijuana.

At the time it was a serious criminal offence and government officials made it a priority to do everything possible to eliminate its usage as they believed the drug was poisoning the minds of our youth across the entire country.

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With the legalization of recreational cannabis, local merchants look to capitalize on the sale of marijuana merchandise

Everything from bongs to pipes and vaporizers will likely become commonplace in local smoke shops as recreational cannabis sales will become legal this summer.

The Nova Scotia Liquor Corp., which will operate marijuana dispensaries from nine liquor outlets in the province, has said it will leave the sale of cannabis accessories and related products to the private sector.

That news was received well by smoke and e-cigarette shops that are hoping to expand their line of products to include accessories used by marijuana users.

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It's just another example of how complicated things are going to be as provinces roll out their marijuana rules.

Several provinces have decided that marijuana smoking has to be done on private property. Ontario's rules are so tight that weed smoking has to take place in private residences.

But what happens if your private residence is an apartment?

Here's a part of a Canadian Press story out of Toronto.

"(The province is) not going to allow marijuana to be smoked in public areas, so where the heck are people going to smoke marijuana? Well they're going to do it in their apartments," said John Dickie of the Canadian Federation of Apartment Associations. "The problem is, just like when they smoke tobacco, the smell goes to neighbouring apartments. Buildings are not hermetically sealed."

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Here's why there won't be any legal pot access in Queens County

When marijuana becomes legal across Canada July 1, Queens County residents won't be buying any of the recreational drug from the local NSLC.

In fact, they'll have to drive all the way to Yarmouth or Lower Sackville.

If you're in the Annapolis Valley or Eastern Shore, you're also out of luck.

Justice Minister Mark Furey introduced a cautious rollout of the sales of cannabis in Nova Scotia Jan. 30 with only nine locations - four of them in HRM - selling the product. Amherst, Truro, New Glasgow, Sydney River, and Yarmouth are the only locations outside of the metro area.

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Although a majority of Atlantic Canadians support the legalization of marijuana for personal use, not many actually plan on using it recreationally when it is legal.

According to numbers from Corporate Research Associates (CRA), the proportion of Atlantic Canadians who plan on at least occasionally lighting up for fun is about 20 per cent. Ten per cent of respondents indicated they would "definitely" be occasionally purchasing and using marijuana, while 10 per cent said they would "probably" be doing so.

Twenty-two per cent of people in Atlantic Canada said they would "probably not" be purchasing and, at least occasionally, using marijuana. Approximately 59 per cent responded that they wouldn't, or that they didn't know.

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Sometimes so little is going through my head that if Ralph were to say something, I'd actually have room to listen to him.

Those few times that's happened also seems to be my week to write an article which then leaves me scrambling.

Other times, I start the article only to be sideswiped by some event making me set it aside and start over. Such as todays.

I am an old fogey when it comes to the decriminalization of marijuana.

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Users will have to drive to Yarmouth or Lower Sackville to purchase pot

When marijuana becomes legal across Canada July 1, Annapolis Valley residents won't be buying any of the recreational drug from their local NSLC. In fact, they'll have to drive all the way to Yarmouth or Lower Sackville.

If you're on the South Shore or Eastern Shore, you're also out of luck. If you're in Liverpool, you'll have to drive to metro or Yarmouth.

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Far out, man, New Glasgow is chosen as one of the select spots around Nova Scotia that will have marijuana available. If you're one of those interested in partaking of the herb once legalized, consider yourself lucky, because these places are few and far between.

If you live in a remote corner of Pictou County and think driving in to town for groceries is a long haul, well, it's a lot less daunting a prospect compared to what some tokers will face.

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Province approves nine locations and online sales

Truro is to be one of nine locations in Nova Scotia where marijuana will be sold from an NSLC store, the provincial government announced Tuesday.

The NSLC store at 6 Court St., has been selected as a retail location, once cannabis is legalized, Attorney General and Justice Minister Mark Furey said, in a news release.

The other eight locations include Amherst, Dartmouth, Lower Sackville, New Glasgow, Sydney River, Yarmouth and two in Halifax.

"Our main priority in preparing for the legalization of cannabis has been, and will continue to be, the health and safety of Nova Scotians," Furey said. "Selling through NSLC stores allows us to leverage their experience and expertise in selling these products responsibly in a safe environment."

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Cannabis to be available in only nine NSLC stores provincewide

The Nova Scotia Liquor Corp. has chosen its Sydney River outlet as the only location where you can buy legal recreational cannabis in Cape Breton.

Justice Minister Mark Furey and NSLC CEO Bret Mitchell announced during a news conference in Halifax Tuesday that nine liquor stores across the province will be renovated to accommodate pot dispensaries.

Furey defended the government's decision to limit the number of stores, which leaves large swaths of rural Nova Scotia including the Strait area, the Annapolis Valley and the South

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Craft weed market great hypothetically, but likely a long way off

It isn't uncommon to see booths or tables of Nova Scotia's finest craft beer, liquors or small-scale produced wines at local weekend farmers' markets around Colchester.

With marijuana legalization on the horizon though, is there a possibility craft weed or weed products could have the same future in farmers' market environments?

"I don't know there will be the same kind of regulatory allowance for marijuanaproduction as there is for craft breweries and wineries," said Margaret Congdon, manager of the Truro Farmer's Market.

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