POT REMAINS BURNING ISSUE

Medical marijuana supporters who gathered at Victoria City Hall this week
left disappointed, after hoping their attendance at a joint Victoria city
council and police board meeting would prompt local police and politicians
to relax enforcement of marijuana laws.

Instead, decisions on how to police the distribution of "medical marijuana"
was put off until later.

"We're trying to avert disaster here," said Ted Smith, founder of the
Cannabis Buyer's Club.

Smith referred to the possibility that a seriously ill club member might
come to harm having to buy pot on the street if people such as himself, a
proponent of the distribution of pot as medicine, continues to be arrested
and charged in relation to marijuana trafficking.

"We just want the Victoria police to consider making the enforcement of
cannabis laws a lower priority," he said.

Smith said he had feared his club would be shut down by Victoria police,
but was encouraged after he and a number of medical marijuana supporters
addressed Victoria city council on the issue back on March 28.

Victoria police Chief Paul Battershill refused, at the joint council-police
board meeting Tuesday, to discuss specifics in the case of Ted's Books, the
storefront location where members of Smith's club have been purchasing
marijuana for alleged medicinal purposes, because trafficking charges
against Smith are currently before the courts.

That left police board members and city councillors talking about the
general concept of medical marijuana and related policing options.

Smith - along with the 20 club members and supporters who attended
Tuesday's meeting - was hoping a decision would be made that would allow
the club to continue operating without fear of police intervention, and to
continue policing itself against alleged re-selling of pot on the street by
unscrupulous club members, as police allege in a recent legal case against
Smith.

But for club members with high hopes of an easing of enforcement of
existing federal drug laws in Victoria, all that came out of the discussion
was a promise to gather information on the topic for a future police board
meeting.

Victoria Coun. Art Vanden Berg said his understanding of what Smith and his
supporters were asking for at the previous March 28 council meeting was an
idea of what priorities the police would set for enforcement.

Battershill said while the department has a wide range of priorities, he
doesn't think his officers are spending "an inordinate amount of time"
enforcing marijuana laws.

Coun. Pam Madoff asked if there weren't other jurisdictions where police
had put marijuana investigations on a low-priority basis. Victoria deputy
chief Geoff Varley said he wasn't aware of any departments where that was
the case.

However, the Vancouver police department's stance on the issue has been
rather well-publicized of late.

"I think you start down a very slippery slope when you tell police officers
'we don't want you to follow the law,'" said Battershill.

He said police officers are not authorized to make judgment calls on what
is more or less important under the law.

Police say while Victoria medical pot distributors, such as the Cannabis
Buyers Club and the Vancouver Island Compassion Society, are illegally
supplying marijuana, given they are not licensed by the federal government
at this time, the biggest problem is the re-selling of pot on the street by
people who have purchased from such clubs.

Smith said he has a solution for such problems. "They tell us (who it is)
and we cut them off. It would end right there."

Coun. Pam Madoff said she would be interested in hearing more about the
complexities of the medical marijuana debate. Battershill wasn't getting
drawn into that discussion. He said he has turned down "about a dozen"
invitations to forums on the decriminalization of marijuana, because he
doesn't think the police belong in that debate.