This bust took place 2 doors away from my place, in a house that was built by my parents and sold last spring. They spent a pile of money in finishing the basement and updating the house prior to the sale, all for nothing obviously. Blows me away that somebody would spend $300,000+ on a nice house just to make it a grow op.

I hear you pgBilly. Look down South or OK., $500,000 and upwards for a house and a grow op. Those plants are worth $$ and therefore taking the risk of making back your money and more.
The only thing is hopefully it wasn't rented out. The land lord will be stuck with a big bill of renovating the whole house as it will be probably unlivable.

I hope it gets seized under proceeds of crime legislation.

At least not all drug houses are in the VLA

Nail the smokers, not just the growers.

If people didnt buy this S..t., there would be no market for it.

I think we all know that a lot of upstanding citizens in this town and other towns smoke pot. If you can get away with smoking it,, then you should be able to grow it.

I suggest they turn it over to the Cigarette companies, and let them grow, produce and distribute it he same way they do cigerettes. The Government gets their pound of flesh, and the smokers can stand around outside of buildings smoking.

This would take the criminal element out of the equation. Suprised it hasnt happened.

pgBilly said; This bust took place 2 doors away from my place, in a house that was built by my parents and sold last spring.

So what's the address of that house??

Sounds like a bunch of pigs to me. I say shut up. Prohibition of weed sucks. Not to mention the fact we could create jobs by Growing hemp which can be made into clothes, furniture. There is 1100 chemicals or more in cigarettes. Hence the Fertilizer and tar in weed. Cigarettes are way more harmful and the y sell them. Yeah we can debate this over and over. But that is the problem.

You can bet when they legalize pot,the price will be higher than on the street. The govt will get more than a pound of flesh.

If pot were legalized I'm sure that the HST would be applied also. Any old tax grab will do.

It is sad to see someones hard work wasted (the home renovations). Maybe that is the problem: Hard work and honest enterprise just dont measure up to the easy profits of illegal activities. It didnt matter what the place looked like inside, it was worth more as a grow op.
All pot legalization arguments aside, this is a problem. Growing dope is so profitable and the risks so low that people will spend a fortune just to house a short term grow operation. That tells me that our legal system is insufficient to deal with this area of crime. If it cant deal with pot, then is it any wonder why it cant deal with meth?

But they did not waste their work. They did the work to increase the likelihood of selling the house at the price they wanted. They succeeded, obviously, so the work was successful. Once sold they have no responsibility for the house, and what the new owners do to it is not their business (the renovations, not the pot growing).

Legalizing it may work if the only market for the stuff was in Canada. Unfortunately, it isn't. The biggest market for the stuff is actually south of the border where it's also used as a currency in exchange for the harder drugs and guns that flow north from the US.

Now if we could get the US to legalize it, then we may have something. Good luck with that though, it will NEVER happen. Because of that we'll be stuck with the grow operations and all of the other crime that comes along with them until the rewards don't justify the risks.

Its legal in California and they pay taxes on it. We should do the same here in Canada.

While I agree with the sentiment of the legalization of pot, it will never happen. The Excited States of America would have absolute fits over that and past history shows they will come down on those who oppose their views.

Why haven't they declared war on California then?

If I'm not mistaken California has only legalized it for medicinal use, not recreational.

Take a look at how hard the Yanks went after the Canadian "Prince Of Pot" for selling seeds via the internet. They'd loose their freaking marbles if Canada legalized the herb.

By "they" I mean the ultra-conservatives who hold too much political power. I think most rational thinking Americans feel differently.

I dont know about that , amonra. WHen i renovate something i come to care about whether the renovations will last. I get attached, due to a feeling of pride i suppose to the whole thing and i feel bad if the place i fixed up get trashed. Illogical but still true. I guess if the folks didnt do the work themselves it might not matter.