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Lumby Still Hazy Over Cannabis

Lumby Still Hazy Over Cannabis

Aug 15, 2018 | 4:30 PM

Lumby Council continues to wrestle with how to regulate production, retail and consumption of cannabis.

Mayor Kevin Acton says councillors debated the matter this week, coming down to modelling proper behaviour around children.

“We’ve sent our planning department away with some specifics to have a look at on how we might implement that and still try and make it user friendly.”

Acton says they want to see if there’s a way to designate spots to allow it.

“Was there a place we could designate for it, rather than saying it’s not allowed here, it’s not allowed there. Let’s say it is allowed in this particular spot just like we do for cigarette smoking. We’ll give special permission for alcohol and cigarette smoking during Lumby Days for example in the beer gardens.”

Acton notes that while the province wants to keep cannabis out of public spaces frequented by children, really everywhere is frequented by children at some point, other than a bar.

He’s hopeful an amended bylaw will be in place by the end of September.

“They’ve got most of it hammered out so it’s just a matter of investigating what some of the other communities are doing. It’s nice not to be last but it’s also nice not to be first so you can see what other communities are doling, what’s being accepted and what’s not.”

The existing bylaw deals with medical marijuana production and would have to be amended to also include the production and retail sale of non-medical cannabis.