HOLY SMOKE!

A marijuana "compassion club" is opening this weekend just a stone's throw
away from the new courthouse in downtown Chilliwack.

A grand opening of the Holy Smoke Healing Center at 45965 Princess Ave. is
planned for Aug. 6 when marijuana activists Brian Carlisle and Steve Kubby
will ask the B.C. Supreme Court to order medical exemptions for them.

Mr. Carlisle says five "patients" have already joined the Chilliwack club
to obtain medical marijuana to treat ailments ranging from cancer to AIDS
to glaucoma.

Norm Siefkin, a B.C. Marijuana Party candidate in the last election, says
he is joining the Chilliwack club, but will also keep his membership in the
Vancouver compassion club where he has been obtaining medical marijuana.

He says police in Vancouver, and several other communities around the
province, have been turning a blind eye to the clubs.

"There's a lot of compassion clubs popping up in B.C. ... and the police
have turned a blind to them," he says.

But Chilliwack RCMP Const. Dave Aucoin says "in no way, shape or form" will
the Chilliwack detachment allow the club here to break any drug laws.

"We will enforce all statutes relating to drugs," he says. "If we have the
evidence that there is illegal activities (at the centre) then we will take
the appropriate action."

Mr. Carlisle, who suffers from glaucoma, says he is asking the court to
grant him a medical exemption from marijuana laws after failing to obtain
one from Health Canada.

"I'm done with Health Canada," he says. "They've taken a year off my life,
making me go over hurdle after hurdle."

Mr. Kubby, a U.S. pot activist now living in Sechelt, is seeking political
refugee status in Canada in addition to the medical marijuana exemption.