Toronto cannabis entrepreneurs vow to fight proposed fines

theglobeandmail.com
May 18, 2016
By Craig Offman

On Tuesday night, the Cannabis Friendly Business Association held an emergency session at Toronto’s Hotbox Cafe. Entrepreneurs, consultants and lobbyists gathered to take on Mayor John Tory, who has vowed to fine unlicensed marijuana dispensaries up to $50,000 a day. It was standing-room only, and no one was taking this threat laying down.

All the tropes and trappings of the high life one might expect in this Kensington Market setting were in effect: berets, goatees, dreads, bongs and vapes, the air inexorably filled with suspicious wafts. But the fog wasn’t so thick that one couldn’t see that this energized group of entrepreneurs, consultants and lobbyists meant business.

There was little talk about the constitutional implications of the proposed clampdown. Instead it was more about strategy. Amid the various speeches and calls to arms, there was an entreaty to lawyer up to challenge the legality of the fines, even though some of the vendors present, such as Rick Vrecic, said they already had done so. “Even $25,000 a day would shut us down,” said Mr. Vrecic,who runs True Compassion Toronto, a west-side clinic that caters to those suffering from chronic pain.

Consultant Marko Ivancicevic called for attendees to inundate the city’s board of health with requests to speak at Thursday’s meeting, which will address a report from the city’s top doctor regarding the implications of legalizing cannabis. “We could filibuster it, so to speak,” he said.

In recent months, dozens of new stores have been popping up across Toronto, more than a hundred, and in this twilight zone between legalized medicinal use and total legalization, there is a pervasive sense of lawlessness.

The vendors see a haze of mixed signals coming from all three levels of government, with no coherent strategy to regulate this chaotic transition. The city, on the other hand, is suddenly agitated with dispensaries, questioning everything from zoning infractions to the quality of the marijuana.

One of the concerns was that Toronto was trying to criminalize what are in effect a set of bylaws, potentially shutting down dozens of small businesses with outrageous penalties. “People are going to fight these fines,” said criminal lawyer Paul Lewin. “By and large, many of these people have been left alone for 25 years, and this is a terrible way to start conversation. It’s bone-headed and mean-spirited.”

The fines also raise questions about the new dispensaries ruining business for the old ones, taking the whole industry down with them. “The cannabis industry is massive,” said Abi Roach, who is the Hotbox’s owner and the CFBA organizer who put together the evening’s event. “Each one employs somewhere between six and 10 people, many of them in their 20s and some disabled. These business all pay payroll taxes and HST.”

At this early stage, it’s difficult to verify how many new dispensaries are actually above board. As some attendees explained, there is a fear among the newcomers that if they followed the same regulations as their earlier counterparts and went on the books, the Canada Revenue Agency would alert them to the Toronto Police, making them more vulnerable to penalties.

But, perhaps, that’s the risk they take by jumping into this sweet fog of war. “There are just of a lot of entrepreneurs out there looking for opportunity in the new economy,” said Alexzander Samuelsson, one of the principals of The Big Toke, a Web site that chronicles this booming economy.

Mr. Samuelsson said he was heartened to see everyone from this space finally coming together and finding a common goal.

A vacuum of regulation is one of the industry’s great challenges, he noted, as is ignorance and misconceptions among public officials. “There are a lot of people who are cannabis-naive.”

One of those singled out for naivety was Mayor Tory, but never in a mean-spirited way. Instead he was depicted as a kind, grandfatherly guy who happened to be uninformed about marijuana. “But we’ll change that,” vowed the Big Toke’s Harrison Jordan, who recently predicted to The Globe and Mail that Toronto could have as many cannabis dispensaries as Pizza Pizza franchises.

Towards the end of the proceedings, one old-school questioner asked if the group would consider a sit-in, but it was quickly pointed out the time for that had come and gone, like, decades ago.

“It’s not time to protest,” insisted Ms. Roach (née Hod). “It’s time to lobby.”