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Get-tough best tool for grow ops
03.13.07|The Progress

Marijuana grow ops are no joke in the Lower Mainland, where hardly a week goes by without a bust or a raid. And area residents are increasingly at risk of being in the line of fire when criminals try to steal from criminals.

Sadder still is the plight of children living in homes that house grow ops who must be shunted off to foster care when their parents are charged while their homes, hard-wired to suck up electricity, make for dangerous living conditions for both the inhabitants and their neighbours.

It’s no surprise, then, that police and city officials are using what tools they have to enter and shut down these indoor pot farms. Coquitlam will likely adopt next Monday the Public Safety Inspection Program, which gives police and inspectors the clout to enter homes with high energy consumption within 48 hours of notice and to charge the homeowners $5,000 in fees associated with the safety inspection.

There is some concern these powers are too broad for the circumstances and could entrap an innocent hobbyist with an electricity-draining collection of aquariums or over-developed model train set. But those circumstances would be rare, if not improbable.

Even so, most Coquitlam residents would probably put public safety over individual rights if it would make their neighbourhoods safer. As it is, there are few other ways, except power consumption, to identify a grow op, especially today, when people are rarely home during the day and don’t always know their neighbours.

Some might argue this so-called war on drugs, which requires pot-growers to go underground – or, in many cases, the basement – to avoid detection is getting increasingly dangerous and costly while accomplishing very little. Evidence for this line of thought is in the sheer number and audacity of neighbourhood pot growers and the fact that no sooner is one busted than another pops up somewhere else. (Since January, Coquitlam RCMP has logged more than 45 grow op complaints.)

But until someone comes up with a better idea, this get-tough search-and-seizure program is the best tool cities have to push pot farmers out.

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Disclaimer: I love to grow

 

Buzzby

This is why most commercial grow ops use techniques to steal electricity rather than pay for it. A personal grow op with 400 - 1,000 watts of lighting would probably fall below the radar.

Or get them to install generators powered by gasoline or fuel oil...

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reggie_the_dog

they say in the article
"Sadder still is the plight of children living in homes that house grow ops who must be shunted off to foster care when their parents are charged while their homes, hard-wired to suck up electricity, make for dangerous living conditions for both the inhabitants and their neighbours."

I have a great idea. Legalize the cultivation of cannabis, make the laws concerning growing it like the laws for tomatoes. Then we can all grow a bunch in our yards, on our balconies or roofs or whatever, or in community gardens etc. The value of cannabis would likely drop to 10 CENTS a gram instead of its current 10 dollars. (There are parts of France that grow a lot of weed, still illegally mind you, but you can score outdoor grown tropical weed that is great tasting and strong for 50 cents a gram, if we can have 50 cents (euro cents, about 65 US cents) a gram illegally I see no reason we cannot have 5 or 10 cents legally.) Anyway you would basically do away with most commercial grow ops as major stoners like myself would grow a bunch and give it away to our friends that either can't grow it or do not want to be bothered.