A raft of amendments to two city bylaws designed to crack down on stores that sell paraphernalia associated with illegal drug consumption were held up by one city councillor who wants to see more consultation.
Coun. Cathy Heron voted twice against giving unanimous consent for consideration of third readings to a group of amendments to the business licences bylaw and the tobacco retail licensing bylaw. As a result, council could not pass all three readings Monday night. Third reading will return to the council agenda at its April 2 meeting.
At issue are council’s efforts to make life more difficult for businesses in town that sell products frequently associated with the consumption of illegal drugs. Mayor Nolan Crouse and other councillors have been vocal in their disagreement with the presence of such stores in the community and had asked administration to find a way to discourage such businesses from setting up shop.
The amendments to the business licence bylaw include prohibiting any one business from selling products from three or more categories of restricted items, restricting the sale of such products to minors and requiring restricted products to be obscured from outside view. Licensed pharmacies are exempt under the bylaw.
The restricted categories include any product that displays a marijuana plant; a device intended to facilitate smoking activity; grinders; digital weigh scales and detoxifying products marketed for masking drug effects or enabling users to defeat drug tests.
Other business licence amendments include giving the licence inspector the ability to add new conditions to new or existing business licences and the power to revoke or deny a licence when it is in “the public interest to do so.” Violators would face a $1,500 penalty.
The amendment to the tobacco retail licensing bylaw adds certain smoking devices to the definition of “tobacco products.”
Council has taken a hard stance against so-called “bong shops” in the community over the last six months. The former owner of Blitz 420, a bong shop that wanted to open in Akinsdale, openly accused the mayor of interfering with his business. Late last year, the owner of the retail chain The Chad 420 Smoke Shop appeared before council to explain his business practices, but was instead presented with an outstanding warrant for his arrest on drug trafficking charges.
But Heron announced she wasn’t comfortable with the process, saying she would have preferred to see a “red-lined” version of the amended bylaws and stating she wanted to know if the bylaw would accomplish what council intended.
“I want to hear from the business permit office if it’s going to accomplish what we’re looking for, which is to reduce the sale of drug paraphernalia,” Heron said.” I know it’s an opinion, but we’ve been pushing this hard and I’m not sure I’m comfortable with where it’s ended.”
Besides saying she found flipping between the amendments and an old version of the bylaw “hard,” Heron worried they hadn’t heard from other groups.
“Unanimous consent won’t be given by me tonight. We haven’t heard from the chamber or others, so let’s see where it goes.”
Her statements appeared to rile other members of council.
“[Up until now] there’s no one here who has shown concern for this bylaw,” Coun. Roger Lemieux said.
