THE DOPESTERS OF LA-LA LAND

British Columbia's Organized Crime Agency has cleared up a lingering
Vancouver mystery.

How is it, we wondered, all those high rollers went back to Hong Kong
and took their money with them, yet Vancouver still looks sleek and
prosperous?

Logging, mining and fishing were in the tank. Investors were repelled
by the NDP government as effectively as vampires faced with necklaces
of garlic. Yet Robson Street was still clogged with shoppers, the
roads still humming with designer traffic.

What, we asked, is the mystery fuel of this economic activity?

In a word, Watson, pot. While the Rest of Canada teeters on the brink
of another recession, the OCA reveals that marijuana puts $6-billion
into B.C.'s underground economy. We're high and dry.

The OCA says Vancouver is particularly addicted to pot, estimating
that 80 per cent of the illegal pot-growing in the province is
concentrated right in our midst. Grow Busters, the squad assigned to
fight these high crimes, has shut down 607 operations in the past 14
months. Impressive stats, but it would be easier to stamp out
breathing -- there are still 15,000 to 20,000 grow operations in the
Lower Mainland. Never mind a chicken in every pot; there's pot in one
out of every 35 local residences.

Not a dime is taxed. Most is exported to the U.S., according to the
OCA, making marijuana a candidate for B.C.'s largest export, higher
even than our previously most important vegetable product, lumber.

A sophisticated criminal infrastructure, run by bikers and Asian
gangs, has been established. And it's tough to bring pot perps to
justice as the gangs like to recruit growers without criminal
records, people who are treated lightly on a first offence and are
back at it before the growing season is over.

With hydroponics, of course, our ideal West Coast climate is
augmented by technology, and the growing season is a 12-month affair.

It's hard to avoid the sweet smell of success as you stroll the
seawall along English Bay, or any bus stop, for that matter. Despite
the four-month transit strike, it appears there are plenty of people
content just to hang out at the bus stop. There are growers, and
there are consumers.

We don't know whether to laugh or cry. Hollywood North could more
accurately be described as Miami North, or worse, Bogota North.
Thousands of people -- as many as 150,000, according to the OCA --
depend on marijuana for their livelihood. It's impossible to
calculate the economic spinoffs, but they must be, um, high.

To someone who's not smoking the local product, it's obvious that
Grow Busters are fighting a losing battle. It doesn't help that
marijuana is getting great press as a pharmacological Mother Teresa,
effective in relieving suffering from arthritis to AIDS. According to
a researcher at the recent Banff conference of the Canadian College
of Neuropsychopharmacology, THC, the active ingredient in marijuana,
"is probably one of the safest compounds on Earth." Notice they
always have these conferences at high altitudes.

So relax, folks, roll up a spliff and take a deep drag. Inhale if you
like, and enjoy the medicinal benefits of one of the safest compounds
on Earth. Of course, the very success of the pot lobby will mean the
end of the underground gravy train. How long before the cultivation
of medical-quality marijuana is taken over by the big drug firms, and
all these local entrepreneurs are reduced to selling Chia Pets and
velvet paintings at the side of the road?

Then we'll have something to worry about. Compared to the cultivation
of the politically correct miracle drug of the 21st century, the
unlicensed flogging of irredeemable kitsch is a real crime.