The Estevan Police Service will be “well-prepared” once cannabis is legalized, according to police Chief Paul Ladouceur.
The Senate passed the federal government’s cannabis legalization bill last month. Canada will become the second country in the world with legalized recreational possession of cannabis on Oct. 17.
“It’s something that we obviously saw coming to the community, and have been working diligently to prepare for,” said Ladouceur.
The EPS sent two officers to Florida for the drug recognition expert training program. They’re fully trained and have come back to Estevan.
Officers have also been sent for training in standardized field sobriety testing. Additional officers will continue to be sent on the course so they can recognize the signs and symptoms of impaired driving by cannabis.
“There will be an internal educational component for our members, just to have them well-educated on the law, so that we ensure their powers of arrest and detention when it comes to illegal use,” said Ladouceur.
While people think the only way to test for cannabis is through the saliva test, Ladouceur said the drug recognition expert program is well-established in Canada and has been supported by the Supreme Court. But the local officers are sent to the U.S. for training because of the use of live subjects.
“They actually use individuals who are under the influence of drugs to do their assessments, so they will go out into the communities and deal with people who have consumed. So it’s not a case where they’re getting simulation-based training. They’re getting live training as they do this.”
The EPS is eager to see what kind of approved roadside screening device will be released to assist police at the side of the road to deal with impairment by cannabis. Ladouceur isn’t confident this issue will be resolved before the legislation comes in, but police can still move forward with drug recognition experts.
The EPS has also committed to focus its school presentations on impaired driving by drugs and alcohol in the next school year.
He also met with the owner of Prairie Sky Cannabis, who will have the licence to sell cannabis in the community. Ladouceur characterized it as a good conversation about the sale of cannabis in the city, and the police chief feels comfortable with the company and its willingness to work with city and police officials to keep cannabis out of the hands of youths.
“We always know that there are youths in the community using cannabis, and the majority of that is through the black market,” said Ladouceur.
The EPS has fielded a number of calls from concerned landlords about what to do if a tenant uses cannabis in a rental property. If landlords don’t want their tenants smoking marijuana in the property, then Ladouceur said it can be treated in a similar fashion to cigarettes.
“That would be something that the landlord would put in place in the lease agreement,” said Ladouceur.
The police chief noted that when a government makes a big legislation change like this, people often say the date for the change is too soon. Sometimes the gaps can’t be corrected until the legislation comes into place.
“Whether it’s October, November or December, we’re still going to see gaps once the law comes into place where we need to tweak this or we need to change that,” said Ladouceur.
While possession of less than 30 grams of cannabis will be legalized on Oct. 17, illegal trafficking through organized crime and black market remains an offence, he said.
And in much the same way that people can’t walk down the street with an open beer in their hand, people also can’t walk down a street while smoking marijuana.
