By Jon Hiltz

 

On the wild landscape that is the Toronto dispensary industry, it can be difficult to stay positive when the police have a spinning wheel of uncertainty that randomly hands out criminal charges, fines, or warnings.

But the owners of Queens of Cannabis, Brandy Zurburg and Tania Lungo, are taking all this police nonsense in stride as they continue to proudly and happily serve their community with some of the finest cannabis in the city.

In another recent twist, the girls have been served a summons to court in July to discuss fines for “zoning violations” due to the fact that they are selling sweet bud in a mixed residential and commercial neighborhood. It’s a sad thing to say, but this is a step forward for police who for whatever reason, decided to go raid-free this time and also not criminally charge these two great women who help a lot of people.

“[We were visited] by two by-law officials,” Tania said in an interview with Marijuana.com. “They seemed to not really want to do what they had to do.” Tania went on to say that they were instructed to do their jobs, but their demeanor suggested that they didn’t see why this was necessary.

“[The document] says that we’re being summoned to court July 21st because over an infraction of a zoning by-law.” The document doesn’t actually say how much they are being fined, and the by-law officials were not clear about the potential amount that might. The Queens, for now, will just have to take a wait-and-see approach, but they are thankfully staying open with all of their product intact.

As their first court appearance looms closer at the end of July, even if Queens of Cannabis receives any fines, their intention is not to miss a day of work or be closed for one minute less than their sign says.

If they do end up paying fines, they are preparing for that as well. “We’ve been holding fundraisers, so we will keep going with that.” They also have quite a bit of help from people and organizations including the Cannabis Friendly Business Association (CFBA) who are lobbying against the city and others who hold protests to raise awareness.

“We don’t feel like we’re doing anything wrong. The fact that there’s an LCBO and a Shoppers Drug Mart across the street from us, we feel like we’re in an appropriate neighborhood.”

Tania’s co-owner in crime Brandy believes that the police are potentially trying to get the public to sympathize with their cause of shutting dispensaries down. One of the ways they hope to accomplish that is by placing “moles” who pretend to be patients to report on the slightest infractions. She doesn’t believe the Queens had any moles or at least ones who were successful in seeing anything shady going on.

“Bill Blair called us goons last January,” Brandy says with a laugh. “When he said that legalization should happen but with the people who are responsible enough to control this and take it out of the hands of organized crime and the goons,” referring to dispensaries because calling the staff at a medical clinic criminals is an overstatement even for Bill. “If they do end up issuing us a fine, we’ll take it through all the appeal stages.”

Whatever happens, tomorrow at 12pm on the dot Queens of Cannabis will open and stay open until their 9pm closing time.  And they will then open the day after that.  That’s what Trudeau needs to realize, no matter what he does activists like the Queens are not going anywhere, even when the liquor store across the street sells bud as well.