LandlordBC is the latest group to voice their concerns about the likelihood of marijuana becoming legal in the province next July.
The agency is leery about the consumption and growing of recreational marijuana in rental units.
The group would like to see smoking marijuana be banned wherever tobacco is and the landlords should have the right to ban it.
“We really prefer that there be no smoking whether it’s cigarettes or cannabis in rental buildings, particularly in multi-unit residential buildings. We have our obligation to all our tenants to ensure that they have what’s called quiet enjoyment, we’ve had a lot of experience with cannabis being disruptive,” says David Hutniak, CEO.
According to the federal government, Bill C-45 would allow adults to grow up to four cannabis plants per household.
Doctors of BC has asked the province to consider banning people from growing recreational pot at home once it becomes legal.
Hutniak believes growing recreational marijuana in rental units could prove to be a health hazard.
“If you own your principal residence and you wish to take advantage of that, that’s your prerogative but within the confines of an of a rental unit, the potential for a 50 unit apartment having a personal grow op in every unit would be a volatile situation.”
“Growing this product depending on the number of plants consumes more electricity, causes additional humidity and when it’s mature, what we see in apartment buildings is that the tenant usually dries the product in the oven and there is just a whole range of issues around the potential cultivation of cannabis – we just feel that an outright ban is the best course of action.”
Hutniak believes once pot is legalized, a lot of the authority landlords currently have might be a thing of the past.
“We’re concerned that it’s going to be more challenging for us as an industry to prevent those grow-ops once they are legalized irrespective of how strong are tenancy agreement might be we’re not sure what will happen under the law to ban them or restrict them,” added Hutniak.
The BC Association of Municipal Police Chiefs is also asking for more money to fund drug-recognition projects and field sobriety testing for cannabis-enforcement teams.