If those behind the idea of turning the arena in MacTier into a legal marijuana grow-op thought they had a fight on their hands before, No.  4 has just jumped over the boards.

Bobby Orr was famous for scoring big goals and, if necessary, dropping the gloves, too.

This time he’s prepared to do both.

In his more than half century of celebrity, Orr rarely speaks out or steps into controversy.

However, when it comes to closing down an arena and community centre on his home turf to rent out to a company so they can grow medicinal marijuana, it brings out the anger in the Hockey Hall of Famer.

When he first heard of it, the two-time Stanley Cup winner who also led Canada to the 1976 Canada Cup, thought somebody must be smoking something.

But it turns out, there really is a move to shut the MacTier Community Centre and lease the space out it to grow pot.

“Its outrageous,” Orr said in an exclusive interview.

Somebody must be smoking the strong stuff up there on Hwy.  69 if they thought they were going to sneak this one by without reaction.

But it seems, that is exactly what has happened.

And Monday at 9 a.m.  the council is expected to discuss a letter of understanding they have struck with the medical marijuana company Mettrum Ltd.

It will be a heated debate for the people who live there, some of whom have formed Save the Community Centre Committee led in part by Steven Schell.

Orr said to add his name to the cause.

“Shame, shame, shame.  Shame on those decision makers,” said the Boston Bruin’s legend and Canadian icon.  “What are they thinking?”

The whole thing is upsetting for the pride of Parry Sound, Ont.  since, although he grew up 20 minutes north, Orr considers himself hailing from MacTier too.

“I love MacTier.  I spent a lot of my youth there,” said Orr.  “My sister Penny married Ron Blanchard from MacTier.  These are very good people.”

The community centre was built in the 1970s and although Orr never played in it, he played baseball at the diamond nearby.  In fact he was on the 1964 MacTier Legionnaires championship team which is displayed in a picture in the arena.

Cheryl Ward, general manager of the Stockey Centre and Bobby Orr Hall of Fame, said Orr also played minor hockey on outdoor rinks in MacTier.

“Where would I be if not for the hockey rink,” asked Orr.  “Where would any Canadian kid be?”

The local connection aside, Orr said, he would have taken the rare approach of speaking out if this was being done in any Canadian arena.

“Does it seem right to you?” asked Orr.  “Who would close down a community centre to grow marijuana? Who would close a community centre down for any reason?”

Township of Georgian Bay Mayor Larry Braid told QMI Agency’s Roberta Bell “the annual cost of operating the community centre is about $250,000″ and it only “generates about $30,000 in revenue for the township.”

Orr said he had never heard of such an argument before in his decades around hockey.

“It doesn’t make enough money? Give me a break,” said Orr.  “Are these community arenas supposed to make money? When did they ever make money? That’s not what they are for.”

And the one in MacTier is so vital to the community, the irony is it was there 300 of the 800 residents gathered last week for a meeting with the company about this proposal.

Many stormed out in disgust.

Orr said he understands how they felt and agrees with them wholeheartedly.

“They are going to haul the marijuana out of the old arena right past the kids in the school across the street and right through the downtown?” asked Orr.

“It’s disgraceful.  I can’t believe this.  It’s a community centre.  A community place.  They have weddings there.  Seniors gather there and play cards.  There are birthday parties, funerals.  I just don’t understand this.”

Braid told QMI Agency this new operation could create 35 jobs and provide a better return on investment in the ledger book.

“But where are the kids going to play hockey and figure skate?” asked Orr.  “They just put money into this arena last year to fix it up and now the kids will have to drive to Midland 40 minutes away and the seniors will have nowhere to go.”

Others Orr has talked to about this have nothing against the company or growing pot for medical use but wonder “is this the only place in the Georgian Bay region where they could put it?”

The hockey legend said his involvement in this fight will continue when he comes up for his annual visit this summer.  “This is just not right,” said Orr.

Time will tell how it turns out but history shows when Bobby Orr is in the game, his team usually wins.

Source: Intelligencer, The (CN ON)
Copyright: 2013, The Belleville Intelligencer
Contact: http://www.intelligencer.ca/letters
Website: http://www.intelligencer.ca/
Author: Joe Warmington

The medical-marijuana bubble has officially burst in California.

Until recently, anyone with a $20 doctor’s note and a hankering for Hindu Kush
could walk into his or her corner marijuana dispensary

My 9-year-old daughter has Aicardi syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that causes extremely hard-to-control seizures, debilitation, disability and early mortality. She began having seizures at three months of age, and since that time has had multiple seizures every day, with rare exception — probably to the tune of nearly 200,000 seizures in her lifetime.

For most families, even one such day would be an emergency. For ours, it is the norm.

My daughter is a beautiful, loving girl who goes to school, enjoys music and parks, loves to be read to and adores looking at big, modern art in museums. She cannot walk independently, cannot talk and wears diapers. Every day she is at risk of Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy, or SUDEP, which accounts for 34 percent of all sudden deaths in children.

She is one of the 3 million Americans who have epilepsy, and one of the 40 percent whose seizures cannot be controlled by anti-seizure drugs. She has tried 10 anti-seizure medications as well as a high-protein/low-carbohydrate diet called the ketogenic diet; she takes three anti-seizure medications at once and has a vagus nerve stimulator implant that sends mild electrical pulses to the brain. These drugs help her, but she nonetheless experiences an average of three seizures every day. Moreover, the medications cause persistent side effects that negatively impact her quality of life, particularly her gastrointestinal, bone, dental, cognitive and mental health.

The Illinois Senate Executive Committee recently voted, 10-5, to move the House-passed medical marijuana legislation to the Senate for a vote. The bill is expected to pass, and though Gov. Pat Quinn has not committed to signing it, the general expectation is that the bill will become law. This should be received as great news for the many people with “debilitating” conditions that the bill is supposed to help — people for whom medical science has documented real, measurable and safe outcomes of the controlled use of cannabis or its component of chemical compounds.

It’s too bad that the legislature has ignored the medical needs of some of the most debilitated, and most vulnerable, patients in the state: children with epilepsy.

Imagine her father’s and my reaction upon learning that the legislature, in its concern not to send a “message” to kids that it is safe to smoke marijuana, decided that kids like ours, for whom medical cannabis has the potential to be as safe and effective as typical anti-seizure drugs, should be excluded from the benefits of this new law.

They have done so, I hope, only out of ignorance. Take, for instance, the parent survey conducted by Stanford University neurology researcher Dr. Catherine Jacobson. These parents had children with some of the most difficult-to-treat syndromes of epilepsy found in children: Dravet syndrome, Doose syndrome and Lennox-Gastaut syndrome. All of the kids were being treated with a nonpsychoactive compound made from cannabis — cannabidiol. Their parents report remarkable results — 83 percent noted that their children’s seizure frequency had been reduced.

Two-thirds of these children achieved a greater than 80 percent reduction in seizure incidence. Seventy-five percent of the parents reported success in weaning their kids from other ASDs; a similar proportion noted improved sleep, mood and alertness in their children. Most important, the survey’s author notes that common negative side effects reported on other ASDs were notably absent on cannabidiol, including rash, vomiting, nausea, confusion, insomnia, anxiety, irritability, dizziness and aggressive behavior.

There is no likelihood that my daughter will become a drug addict from using a compound within cannabis in a medically controlled setting. There is, however, a good chance that participation in a controlled study of these compounds could open the door to new treatments for her, and the many children like her, who desperately need medical innovation to save or improve their lives.

I urge the bill’s chief sponsors, Rep. Lou Lang, D-Skokie, and Sen. William Haine, D-Alton, to reconsider and amend the bill to allow for the medically controlled and regulated use of cannabis for pediatric and adult patients with uncontrolled epilepsy. And to all Illinoisans who know or love someone with epilepsy, please let your legislators hear your voice on this matter.

Margaret Storey lives in Evanston.

Source: Chicago Tribune (IL)
Author: Margaret Storey
Published: May 15, 2013
Copyright: 2013 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC
Website: http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Politicians are slowly coming around to the idea that states and localities should be able to determine their own marijuana policies, and that the federal government should stay out of the way. Is your mayor one of these?

You can help bring them into the Marijuana Majority by contacting your mayors and asking them to support sensible policy reform!

It looks like Ultimate Fighting Championship and the New Jersey Athletic Control Board have not caught on to the changes in marijuana testing thresholds proposed by the World Anti-Doping Agency. Fighter Pat Healy has been fined, suspended, and his win changed to a “no contest” after testing positive for marijuana after his victory over Jim Miller two weeks ago.

According to UFC president Dana White, his organization will continue to abide by the standards set by various state athletic commissions when it comes to drugs. He does not, however, seem overly concerned with testosterone replacement therapy, which, while legal, can significantly increase the performance of athletes. This means that it is up to state athletic commissions to heed the advice of WADA.

Pat Healy

Healy apologized for the incident, saying he made a “very poor choice” and promised to “make a conscious effort to be a better role model within the [mixed martial arts] community.”

He shouldn’t have to apologize. Not for using a substance that is safer than alcohol and does not overtly enhance performance.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) raised the threshold for a positive test for marijuana from 15 nanograms per milliliter to 150 nanograms per milliliter, significantly reducing the likelihood of detection for athletes who use the drug.

“We wanted to focus on the athletes that abuse the substance in competition,” said Julie Masse, WADA’s director of communications. “This should exclude cases where marijuana is not used in competition.”

Although marijuana is not considered a performance-enhancing drug, WADA included it on its initial list of prohibited substances in 2003 after caving in to pressure from U.S. sports officials.

“From a sports perspective, I was rather ambivalent (toward marijuana),” stated Richard Pound, an attorney who was WADA’s initial chief and still serves on the Foundation Board. “As we morphed into WADA, the USA was very keen to have it included.”

Although marijuana thresholds and testing are vague indicatives rather than precise measurements of use, WADA hopes that the new limit will lessen the chance that responsible recreational users will suffer disciplinary action. In recent years, a number of athletes, some of them legitimate medical marijuana patients, have faced suspensions and huge fines failing post-competition marijuana tests.

“There is no desire to go soft on the list,” WADA’s Athlete Committee announced, “but members want cheaters to be caught for cheating, not for recreational usage.”

According the latest Kentucky Health Issues Poll, 78% of Kentuckians support the legalization of medical marijuana, and 25% say they would be okay with regulating recreational use as well. Only 38% oppose any form of legalization.

Proponents were split when it came to legislative action. Almost half thought the decision should be left up to voters, 23% thought state legislators should change the law, and another 23% believed ending prohibition was the job of the federal government.

Sen. Perry Clark

Citizens of Kentucky will be happy to know that State Senator Perry Clark (D-Louisville) has been tireless in his push to introduce medical marijuana legislation; unfortunately, his bill has yet to receive a hearing.

Let’s hope more Kentucky lawmakers start listening to the people they claim to represent.

Despite a previous lack of clinical data to support their claims, thousands of people suffering from PTSD have reported finding great relief from their symptoms by using marijuana. Now there is some research to add to the anecdotal evidence.

Patients’ gravitation towards marijuana inspired researchers at New York University Langone Medical Center to examine the brain’s response to cannabinoid (CB1) receptors, a first-of-its-kind study, funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

They found that when an individual consumes some of the cannabinoids found in marijuana, CB1 receptors are activated in the brain, impairing memory and reducing anxiety, a blessing for those scarred by past events. With this information, scientists hope to manufacture a “CB1 equilibrium”-promoting, trauma-targeting drug.

It should be noted that NIH departments rejected a study proposal in 2011 that sought to test the effects of whole-plant marijuana on a group of veterans suffering from PTSD.

Currently, New Mexico, Delaware, and Connecticut explicitly allow PTSD as a qualifying condition to use medical marijuana, and a bill to do so will likely pass in Oregon this year. Doctors in California and Massachusetts may recommend medical marijuana for PTSD patients if they think it will ease debilitating symptoms.

The more people you know who use marijuana, the harder it becomes to say that they should be arrested for possessing it. After all, the vast majority of marijuana users are productive and otherwise law-abiding members of society. This fact has become increasingly evident as more and more people come out of the “cannabis closet” and become open about their experiences with the substance.

Dominic Lakhan

Last Friday, House Speaker John Boehner’s daughter Lindsay married Dominic Lakhan, a Jamaican-born construction worker. Lakhan was arrested for possession of a small amount of marijuana in 2006.

Rep. John Boehner

Is it possible that Boehner, who has consistently opposed marijuana policy reform, will start to come around now that he has a convicted marijuana user for a son-in-law? Does he think Lakhan is better off with an arrest record or that Lakhan deserves to be arrested again for using marijuana? Would he care about how it affects his daughter? Only time will tell.

Let’s hope his experience is similar to that of Republican Senator Rob Portman, who changed his stance on gay marriage after learning that his son is gay. While this position initially caused a slight loss in approval among Republicans in his state, the growing acceptance of gay marriage (which has been nearly mirrored by the increasing support for marijuana policy reform) could actually help him in the long run.

Politicians’ thinking traditionally lags far behind the general public on social issues, but it gets a little harder to ignore when that thinking hurts your own family.

Marijuana-like medicines that lack the plant