City wants power to regulate smoking of pot in public

Montreal wants pot smoking banned in public spaces where tobacco use is already forbidden — near playgrounds, for example.

And it also wants Quebec to give it the power to ban cannabis consumption temporarily in other places during special events, Mayor Valérie Plante told the Montreal Gazette on Thursday.

Under rules that came into effect in May 2016, smoking is prohibited in outdoor play areas aimed at children and on sports fields.

“We want to follow the same rules and bylaws as the ones connected to tobacco use in public spaces,” said Plante, who next week will present the city’s suggestions to a National Assembly committee studying

We want to follow the same rules and bylaws as the ones connected to tobacco use in public spaces.

Quebec’s proposed pot legalization bill.

She said that would be a coherent way to proceed and would make pot rules easier to apply.

“We’re also asking to have some flexibility for specific events or period of times.”

She cited the Fête des Neiges festival in Parc JeanDrapeau as an example.

“For four days, there are families, there are kids — we want to be able to say, OK, for this period of time in that area, there’s no smoking whatsoever.”

When it put forward its proposed pot bill in November, Quebec said it planned to ban pot smoking in restaurants, bars, workplaces and within a nine-metre radius of building entrances.

Cannabis would be verboten on the premises of hospitals and post-secondary institutions and daycares, as well as in common areas of residential buildings comprising two or more dwellings.

It would also be forbidden in bus shelters, playgrounds and “on terrasses and in other outdoor areas operated as part of a commercial activity and set up for rest, relaxation or the consumption of products.”