POT COURSE WEEDS OUT THE ILLEGALITY

People will be lined up for a Pot 101 course at Concordia University
College next weekend, but don't expect your typical stoners.

The two-day seminar is aimed at people who either use or grow medical
marijuana and those who want to.

Most medical pot patients in Alberta buy their weed off the street
because it's such a headache wading through government red tape to get
it, says Don Schultz, who's organizing the event.

It's also almost impossible to find a doctor willing to provide a
prescription for medical pot -- a Health Canada requirement.

"I'm really trying to get the pot stigma away from medical marijuana
because it's a medicine," says Kelowna-based Don Schultz, who's
organizing the seminar.

Canadians have been allowed to use pot for medical purposes for a
decade but there's still so much confusion surrounding the issue that
many people are too intimidated to apply to the program, either as
users or growers, he says.

So Schultz decided there was enough of a need for clear information
about the legal and technical aspects of growing medical pot that he
could make a business out of it.

Last year, he took a state-approved business administration course in
Colorado about medical pot, learning everything from how to set up
grow-ops and dispensaries to how to manufacture pot-based tinctures,
oils and salves.

SWITCH

It was quite a switch for the former airline transport pilot and
property developer but, after more than two decades in the U.S., he
was ready to return home and try something different.

"Everything kind of fell into place," says Schultz who founded the
Greenline Academy to educate people about Canada's medical pot
regulations. "It's like a new industry," he explains. "A lot of
patients don't know how to do this and I've made it very, very easy
for them. I've got a manual about an inch thick that's got all the
laws in it."

On Saturday, a doctor and a lawyer will address the seminar. The
following day, a Colorado-based cultivator will go into detail about
the best way to grow medical weed.

More than 100 people have signed up for the $330 course so far. As of
yesterday, there were about 50 spots left.

PARANOID

"I get people who are totally paranoid even to buy a ticket (to the
seminar). I just tell them 'you're doing it the legal way' ... and not
to worry about it," says Schultz.

Curiously, more people signed up for the Edmonton seminar than the one
Schultz held in Vancouver in July.

Perhaps that has to do with the fact that pot is openly sold in
dispensaries in Vancouver and the police there turn a blind eye, says
Schultz.

Although Canada's medical marijuana access regulations have been
around for a decade, they need refining, says Penticton lawyer Don
Skogstad, who'll be at the Concordia University College event.

"They're not perfect and they're hard to understand and it's good to
have legal advice," he says.

Health Canada officials recently suggested there are changes in the
works, he adds.

Skogstad figures we're headed to larger, more secure, better-zoned
grow-ops. That's exactly what we need for economies of scale, he says.
Currently, a grower can only have two designated grow sites with only
four customers, he notes.

Then again, the Ontario Court of Appeal could toss out our medical pot
laws altogether, effectively making marijuana legal, when it hears a
key case next year.

Once again, the courts may have to knock some sense into our
politicians.

For tickets to the seminar, check out www.greenlineacademy.com