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News (Media Awareness Project) - CN BC: Poco Wants Another Look At Grow Op Regulations
Title:CN BC: Poco Wants Another Look At Grow Op Regulations
Published On:2004-11-20
Source:Tri-City News (CN BC)
Fetched On:2008-08-21 13:42:26
POCO WANTS ANOTHER LOOK AT GROW OP REGULATIONS

Chilliwack's new bylaw dealing with marijuana grow operations is setting
the standard for municipalities across B.C., says a leading provincial
expert on drugs.

Insp. Paul Nadeau, a former Coquitlam RCMP member, said Chilliwack drafted
its bylaw in conjunction with the RCMP and the provincial government as a
way of combating grow ops.

Since its adoption in August, a number of communities, including Port
Coquitlam, have looked at the Chilliwack bylaw and are now reviewing their
own regulations. This month, Abbotsford updated its bylaw to be more in
line with its Fraser Valley neighbour.

PoCo Coun. Greg Moore, chair of the city's protective services committee,
said PoCo's anti-grow op bylaw (adopted in July 2003) lacks the ability for
the city and the RCMP to recover from the property owner costs it racks up
dismantling pot farms. It is also limited in who can inspect a suspect
property.

"This is as much about the money and the cost recovery as it is in trying
to prevent these," Moore said after Monday's meeting.

Moore said PoCo staff plan to work with the city of Coquitlam, which
adopted its grow op bylaw in April, to streamline the two bylaws for the
RCMP services it shares. (In September, Coquitlam RCMP detachment started a
new Marijuana Enforcement Team to crack down on pot farms). "We want to be
on the same page as Coquitlam on RCMP matters," he said.

But Therese Mickelson, Coquitlam's communications officer, said the city
has no plans to change its bylaw. "We've had ours in place since May and
it's been working really well," she said Thursday.

Nadeau told the PoCo committee that 70 per cent of grow ops in B.C. are
found in residences and police are now seeing a trend called "M&Ms" - grow
ops on one floor of a house and methamphetamine labs on another.

Police claim most of the grow ops are run by the Hell's Angels or
Vietnamese drug rings that trade the profit from the operations for harder
drugs or guns. One reason there are so many grows in B.C. is because of lax
laws, he said. "They have really become, frankly, part of the problem," he
said. "No risk, high reward."

While some B.C. marijuana heads south, about 95 per cent of marijuana in
the United States comes from Mexico, he said, noting much of the province's
pot is sold in eastern Canada.
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