KELOWNA – About three dozen people gathered outside of Kelowna City Hall Monday afternoon to push for legal medical marijuana dispensaries in the city.
“The fact is dispensaries are here to stay,” said marijuana advocate and Sensible B.C. Director Dana Larsen at the rally.
The protestors are calling on city council to make access to medical marijuana easier by creating bylaws to allow dispensaries to operate like any other business. Larsen points to cities like Vancouver and Victoria which are both in the process of creating those types of regulations.
READ MORE: City of Victoria drafting new marijuana bylaws
“Kelowna does have a choice,” says Larsen. “They can follow the model Vancouver and Victoria have put forward or they can choose to continue with the expensive attempt to shut down these places and limit the sick from getting their medicine. We feel the second option is not the right one.”
The rally pointed to the recent raid of the Okanagan Kaya clinic, which was forced to shut down earlier this year, as an example. It has since re-opened but only as an information centre.
“It’s not fair to Canadians to have one city one way and another city another way,” says clinic operator Kaja Gjesdal. “If you see it as a medicine and need it as medicine, it’s a human rights issue. This has become a human rights issue.”
The clinic is now forced to turn patients away, something operators say is emotionally difficult to do.
“For some people this is life or death and that is why I had to come forward, I had no choice,” says Gjesdal. “How can I tell somebody who is used to our quality of medicine that we provide, tell them we can’t give it to you anymore.”
81-year old Bob, who didn’t want his last name used, is fighting brain cancer. He attended Monday’s rally in support because he recently turned to cannabis oil to help treat the disease.
“I think it should be open, I should have the right, anyone with cancer should have the right to try it,” he says.
But the city isn’t budging, with the mayor saying federal laws must change first.
“Until such time the federal government makes dispensaries legal, we will be abiding by the law and that means we will not be issuing business licenses to dispensaries,” says says Colin Basran.
“We are not going to give business licenses out for something that is currently illegal,”
Advocates are not giving up, encouraging residents to call the mayor’s office every day, hoping a telephone campaign will make the difference.
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