Police late to the party

We have to wonder about the Mounties’ sudden interest in marijuana dispensaries with what’s likely just a few months to go before recreational use of the drug is legalized.

Earlier this week, officers paid a visit to the Green Essence shop on Martin Street in downtown Penticton and “warned the owner that should they continue to sell illegal marijuana, there may be enforcement action taken,” according to Penticton RCMP spokesman Const. James Grandy.

No word on whether the city’s other weed shop, Okanagan Cannaboid Therapy, got the same warning.

The two dispensaries and one other – we’ll get to it in a moment – received scary letters containing similar language from the police in March 2017. But that was the end of it.

Business carried on as usual until just a couple of weeks ago, when police raided the Herbal Green dispensary that had relocated from Penticton to Okanagan Falls. Mounties said they had evidence owner Jukka Laurio was selling weed to people without medical notes.

Sorry to burst their bubble, but Laurio admitted as much in an interview with The Herald way back in 2015 when his dispensary first came to the public’s attention.

What’s more likely going on now is the police are trying to clear the deck ahead of legalization so that those who played by the rules – such as not selling weed before it was legal – can get the proper licensing and those who didn’t play by the rules can be punished by withholding the proper licensing.

We’re still wondering, though, about why the Mounties are all of a sudden talking tough again on weed. Why not back in 2016 when at least four pot shops were operating openly in Penticton and city council was struggling to get a handle on them?

That fight gobbled up hours of staff time and resulted in a short-lived system of temporary use permits that was later abandoned in favour of a different – and failed – control method that involved lots of lawyers and court time.

Had the police stepped in then, it would have actually been of some use. Stepping in now is like trying to unlight a bong.