Manitoba municipalities want money from marijuana sales: pot poll

The majority of Manitobans believe pot revenue should be shared with towns and cities.

A Probe Research poll done for the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) found 59 per cent of Manitobans were in favor of municipalities getting one-half to all of the revenue from the sale of marijuana.

Less than one quarter of Manitobans (24 per cent) felt municipalities should receive less, 16 per cent were unsure.

In an email statement AMM president Chris Goertzen said towns and cities expect to spend more money on policing as a result of legalized cannabis and some money should flow to them.

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“We know there is much debate over where this new money should be spent,” Goertzen said. “We want to gauge how much Manitobans feel should go toward these increased costs for municipalities.”

READ: Ottawa agrees to give provinces 75% of marijuana revenue

In December the federal government agreed to give provinces and territories 75 per cent share of tax revenues from the sale of legalized marijuana.

Manitoba did not sign onto that agreement. At that time Manitoba’s Finance Minister, Cam Friesen, said it needed more time to consider the plan.

“It is provincial responsibility, provincial risk and provincial cost that is the lens through which we’ve always seen this issue. Our focus is on safety to Manitobans, both those who will use this product and those who choose not to,” Friesen said. “Going into the meeting our approach was maximum tax revenue needs to be situated with the provinces to be able to deal with these risks and responsibilities that they will be charged with.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "It is provincial responsibility, provincial risk and provincial cost that is the lens through which we've always seen this issue. Our focus is on safety to Manitobans, both those who will use this product and those who choose not to," Friesen said. "Going into the meeting our approach was maximum tax revenue needs to be situated with the provinces to be able to deal with these risks and responsibilities that they will be charged with."

READ: Manitoba holds out on federal accord for legalized pot revenue

The poll conducted for the AMM included 1,000 respondents.