cannabisnews.com: Green Tide Summit on MJ Grow-Ops a Good First Step





Green Tide Summit on MJ Grow-Ops a Good First Step
Posted by CN Staff on March 05, 2004 at 16:10:44 PT
By James McCarten, Canadian Press 
Source: Canadian Press 
Toronto -- Police, government officials and private-sector emissaries pledged to put their heads together and press ahead Friday in a bid to turn the tide of what has been a decidedly one-sided battle against Ontario's burgeoning marijuana cultivation industry. The so-called "Green Tide" summit brought senior law enforcement and government officials together with members of the real estate, electricity, insurance and other industries with a vested interest in cracking down on the province's so-called "grow-ops."
The two-day summit, the first of its kind in Canada, brought more than 160 delegates from 60 stakeholder groups together to begin the process of developing a concerted and co-ordinated strategy, said Ean Algar, president of the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police. "We've got a commitment, a recognition that we're not alone," Algar told a news conference Friday wrapping up the meeting. "There's just been a tremendous number of recommendations brought forward, and they have to be synthesized and put forward, then brought forward in an action plan. You can't do that in a day and a half." Monte Kwinter, Ontario's minister of community safety, described the summit as a "good first step" and promised help would be forthcoming from the province once specific needs are identified. "That will come once we collate all the recommendations, once we come up with a strategy," Kwinter said. "This is something we can in fact build on." The number of grow operations in Canada's most populous province grew by 250 per cent between 2000 and 2002, says a report by the Criminal Intelligence Service Ontario that was the genesis of the summit. The report, titled Green Tide: Indoor Marijuana Cultivation and its Impact on Ontario, estimated that the province's growers have produced anywhere from $2 billion to $12.5 billion worth of plants since 2000. To make them hard to spot, grow houses are increasingly found in quiet, well-heeled suburban areas, where at first glance they're impossible to distinguish from their law-abiding neighbours. Inside, they're hotbeds of peril: exposed wiring to bypass hydro equipment, booby traps to ward off intruders and noxious chemical compounds used in the cultivation process are ever-present dangers. They're often structurally unsound and resold with only cosmetic improvements, a fact that's of great concern to the real estate, insurance and banking industries, Kwinter said. "They want to see a change in both the insurance forms and the real estate offers that have an exclusion in them, where the vendor warrants and guarantees the house has never been used as a grow house," he said. "What that means is that if you, as a an unsuspecting purchaser, buy a house and then subsequently find out it was a grow house, you have some recourse to the vendor." Realtor Ian Smith said the real estate industry is working on educating its agents to better recognize properties that may have been used as grow houses and buyers who might be planning to one. Warning signs include vendors who offer cash deposits or are reluctant to offer personal identification, as well as buyers who don't present as typical homeowners, he said. "Normally when I show a house, when I take a spouse through it, the first thing she wants to see is the kitchen," Smith said. "If they're heading for the basement, maybe there's a sign there." Algar said grow houses in Canada are fuelling a "sinister cross-border exchange" between organized crime in Canada and in the United States. "That's fuelling the importing of cocaine, heroin, ecstasy and other dangerous drugs into Ontario." The pot trade in Canada is also to blame in part for the growing problem of guns in Toronto and other parts of the province, he added. "They also bring in guns that are at the root of escalating violence that we are seeing on the streets of Toronto and other cities throughout this province." Complete Title: Ontario Calls Green Tide Summit on Marijuana Grow-Ops a 'Good First Step' Source: Canadian PressAuthor: James McCarten, Canadian Press Published:  Friday, March 05, 2004Copyright: 2004 The Canadian PressRelated Articles & Web Sites:Green Tide Shadow Summit http://www.greentide.ca/Cannabis News Canadian Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/can.htmMurphy Campaigned Against 'Marijuana Menace' http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread18448.shtmlMarijuana Grow Ops Raise Cash for Crime http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread18447.shtmlPolice Want Private Sector To Fight Grow-Opshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread18442.shtml
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Comment #4 posted by afterburner on March 06, 2004 at 07:52:15 PT:
Privacy legislation impedes pot battle
Privacy legislation impedes pot battle, crime summit told
JONATHAN FOWLIE
Today's Paper: Saturday, March 6, 2004 12:00 AM Page A13 
Overrestrictive privacy laws are preventing corporate Ontario from helping police and governments in their fight against marijuana grow operations, a two-day summit organized by the province has heard.''Changes in legislation are required for us to be able to pass information through to police, and for proper search warrants to be taken out,'' John Sanderson, president of Aurora Hydro Connections Ltd., said at the conclusion of the Green Tide Summit yesterday. 
FULL STORY http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040306/TGROWOPS06/TPNational/TorontoPrivacy stands in the way of prohibition: talk about a made-in-USA solution.
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Comment #3 posted by FoM on March 05, 2004 at 20:34:44 PT
BGreen
You're right! 
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Comment #2 posted by BGreen on March 05, 2004 at 20:29:59 PT
Manure isn't just for the plants
...noxious chemical compounds used in the cultivation process are ever-present dangers.There is nothing involved in the growing of cannabis that wouldn't be used in the production of ANY food product using hydroponics! In fact, most cannabis growers are so hung up on nature and organics that they produce high quality plants grown with love using natural alternatives to chemicals used by farmers throughout the good ol' police states of amerika.If they keep this BULLS**T up then people aren't going to believe the REAL threat to the people of Canada ... the growing number of meth labs springing up using ammonium nitrate, sodium hydroxide, camping fuel and other TOXIC chemicals.The Reverend Bud Green
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Comment #1 posted by John Tyler on March 05, 2004 at 19:50:48 PT
Green Tide indeed
Looks to me like the Green Tide Summit left out one important "stake holder", the cannabis consumer. This summit is a waste of everybody's time. The times have changed. An economical "critical mass" or "tipping point" has already been reached. It is now time to make Cannabis a legal crop. Take the crime out of it. Too bad for everyone that the gov. has not recgonize this yet. 
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