Pity the children! A pot shop is opening up nearby

Theglobeandmail.com
June 28, 2018
Marcus Gee

As the legalization of marijuana approaches, Canadians are suffering some anxiety about how it will all work. You might even call it a case of the fears. Just look at the fuss over the location of the first government pot shop in Toronto.

Provincial government cannabis sellers (it is going to take awhile to get used to seeing those words in print) propose to put it in a plaza at Victoria Park Avenue and Gerrard Street East in the eastern suburb of Scarborough.

Locals were quick to point out that there is a school close by. In fact, said some appalled parents, schoolchildren go to martial arts and tutoring in that plaza.

The head of the school board said she was blindsided. She wanted to know why no one had asked the board what it thought of the idea. The Premier, Kathleen Wynne, said she was ordering her people to find out exactly how such a thing could have happened. Her big concern, she said, was for the safety and security of young people.

The reason for all the consternation is a bit of a mystery. Marijuana, after all, will shortly be a legal product across Canada. The fact that it is being sold in stores doesn’t pose any direct danger to schoolchildren. It is not as if plutonium nuggets or rocket launchers are passed over the counter.

In any case, the little dears won’t be able to skip into the cannabis store and pick up an order of Gorilla Glue #4. Anyone buying the stuff will need to show ID, just as they do when they buy cigarettes at the corner store or booze at the beer and liquor stores. There are plenty of those near schools. A Globe analysis found that 291 liquor stores in Ontario or 44.3 per cent of the total are within 500 metres of at least one school. No great harm has come of it.

Do the hand wringers think that the mere sight of a pot shop will lead children into temptation, setting off a bout of reefer madness? Or are they worried instead that older, of-age youths will buy marijuana at the pot shop and sell it in the schoolyard down the street?

If so, they are out of step. It may come as a shock to them, but dope has been readily available in Canadian schoolyards for decades. That is one reason that Ottawa is making it legal. The law was so widely ignored and so sporadically enforced that it had become moot.

If the authorities insist that pot shops can’t be anywhere near a school, they are going to have a problem. Ms. Wynne herself notes that Toronto has 800 schools. They are scattered all over the city. A map drawn up by a local man and passed around on social media shows that when you draw a 450-metre no-pot-shop zone around every school, there isn’t much much space in between. Most of the city is off limits.

The question of pot shops and where to put them points to the confusion that currently reigns over what we think of marijuana. The message coming from authorities is mixed. They are making it legal, which suggests they think it is not all that bad. Yet they keep telling people how dangerous it can be so dangerous it must be kept out of the sight of schoolkids. As a comment on one online thread summarized it: “Come buy pot from us! But don’t use it! It’s bad! But give us your $$$!” No wonder people are anxious about the dawn of legal dope.

Things would be simpler if governments stayed out of selling cannabis, avoiding the absurdity of the government weed store and leaving sales to the dispensaries and private pot shops that have already popped up like magic mushrooms in cities from coast to coast. That would help them stay clear of minor tempests like this one.

The Premier of the province doesn’t speak out about the location of the latest Beer Store or Liquor Control Board of Ontario outlet. She should not voice an opinion on the site of marijuana outlets either.

That Scarborough plaza looks like a pretty good place for a pot shop anyway. It has a pizza joint.