| High
profile marijuana force expects funding renewal |
| July 29, 2002 VANCOUVER-- A
police task force in Vancouver that targets marijuana growing operations
is likely to get its funding renewed by the city, but some activists
say that isn't enough.
Formed in 1999 to battle the spread of high intensity pot growing operations, Growbusters has shut down more than 700 growing operations in Vancouver houses. Police in Vancouver say there are as many as 5,000 hydroponics labs in the city. "It's a major crisis," said Chris Taulu, co-ordinator of a community police office in the Vancouver neighbourhood of Collingwood. She says often no one is arrested in a grow-op raid, because no one is in the house at the time. Charges are laid about one-third of the time. Taulu did track 26 people charged, and said most were given probation or a conditional sentence. None went to jail. Many, she says, simply start up a new operation within weeks of getting busted. "In Vancouver, there's open season. The message is out there that come to Vancouver, you could do whatever drug you want. It's no big deal," she said. "So the judges react to what society wants." Vancouver city council is expected to extend funding for Growbusters for another three years. Taulu wants the courts to start discouraging people from starting up.
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