Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2018

The Current Transcript for October 16, 2018

Host: Connie Walker

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: This is effectively a taboo subject. This ugly underbelly of politics some people don't want exposed and revealed.

CONNIE WALKER: But that's exactly what the mayor of Iqaluit is doing, speaking out about what she describes as widespread sexual harassment in the north. She says it's a regular occurrence for female staffers traveling with male political leaders. And she says that she's experienced it herself. After she spoke out for the first time about the issue last month, the backlash was intense, but Madeleine Redfern isn't backing down. She joins me in our first half hour. After that, meet Nick Venner. He's just 15-years-old but, he's part of a contingent of young people in the United States taking their government to court because of climate change.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: We are out of time now. We have in a sense been procrastinating on solving this climate issue and now the paper is due in the next four hours.

CW: Around the world, more and more young people are taking this legal route, accusing their leaders of ruining the earth for future generations by failing to do enough today to stop the clear and present danger any child can see. So can these lawsuits work? We'll hear from youth who have already been successful in the courts. And an expert who says they just might be onto something. Then in an hour, October 17th has been circled on some people's calendars for quite a while. But for the people of Colorado, legal weed is old hat.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: We have enjoyed several years of the sky not falling. Of adults having access to a plant, a product that they consume responsibly just like you would a glass of wine.

CW: Goeff Turner of the CBC podcast, On Drugs, takes us on a tour of the state that first legalized weed in 2014 to see what the symptoms have been. But we begin with the story of a Saudi dissident living in Canada. He's a friend of Jamal Khashoggi, who says he's also been targeted by Saudi authorities. I'm Connie Walker, sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti and this is The Current.

Back To Top »

Activist living in Canada says Saudi officials tried to lure him to visit embassy

Guests: Omar Abdulaziz

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I just spoke with the king of Saudi Arabia who denies any knowledge of what took place with regard to as he said his Saudi Arabian citizen. I've asked and he firmly denied that. I've asked secretary of state, Mike Pompeo to immediately get on a plane, go to Saudi Arabia. The king firmly denied any knowledge of it, but it sounded to me like maybe these could have been rogue killers, who knows. But his was A flat denial.

CW: President Donald Trump speaking in Washington yesterday after a 20 minute phone call with Saudi King Salman about the case of Jamal Khashoggi. Today his Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, held a brief meeting with the king in Riyadh and he also met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. His next stop will be in Turkey. Much is still unclear in the case of the disappearance and possible death of Jamal Khashoggi, but one clear fact is that the Saudi journalist was last seen entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2nd. And nobody seen him since. Now there are multiple reports the Saudis are preparing to admit Jamal Khashoggi was killed in an interrogation that went wrong. Omar Abdulaziz knew Jamal Khashoggi. He is a Saudi dissident living in Canada and we reached him outside Montreal. Hello.

OMAR ABDULAZIZ: Yes, hi.

CW: So Omar how did you know Jamal Khashoggi?

OA: Actually I'd say a year and a half Jamal Khashoggi decided to leave the country. He was scared to be jailed or arrested or interrogated. So he decided to leave the country. So since then he started to write in the Washington Post. He started to criticize the Saudi regime . So since then we started to work together. We started to build a great relationship, let's say that and working on some projects.

CW: What kind of projects were you working on together?

OA: Actually we are working on three main projects. The first one is the Bs army, which is we are talking about the peaceful army. Accounts and users of the social media to counter this with the propaganda. They really care about what's happening in Twitter. They want to control the Twitter platform. So anyways we decided to have this kind of army to counter their propaganda. The other thing that we were working on it was the focusing on the prisoners, the activists, who are arrested in Saudi Arabia. And the third one he wanted to launch his organizational foundation about democracy in the Middle East.

CW: When did you last talk to Jamal?

OA: 28th, 27th of September.

CW: So just a few days before he disappeared.

OA: What was going through your mind when you heard the news yesterday that the Saudis are reportedly preparing a report that will acknowledge Mr. Khashoggi's death. That it was a result of an interrogation that went wrong.

OA: That tells us that or it shows that the crown prince, he was lying since the first day because he knew that something happened, but he said, he told the Bloomberg that no, Khashoggi walked out of the embassy. We don't know what happened to him. We are concerning about his safety. So now they're telling us that there was a mistake. Everybody knows that they were trying to get him. You know they went twice to the embassy. So now they're trying to cover their crime. Trying to cover their what they did to Jamal.

CW: Well we're still waiting for the details about what allegedly happened, but several high profile participants in the so-called Davos in the Desert conference on investment are pulling out in protest. How concerned do you think the Saudi government is about its international image?

OA: Honestly, you know it's been destroyed. It's been damaged. This mistake you know they were trying to, they were trying to promote their vision. They were trying to promote their new face, but you know makeup will not last for more than 24 hours. So that's what happened there. So I'm really thankful to the people and they have to you know you do not have to support this kind of regime.

CW: So you've been a vocal critic of the Saudi authorities and your family is still back in Saudi Arabia. What's happened to them?

OA: The beginning of August, I've been threatened that if I keep talking about what's happening between Saudi Arabia and Canada or I'm doing anything with the social media, they're going to be arrested. I didn't listen. I kept doing what I'm doing and now they arrested two of my brothers, a group of my friends and even before that you know, before that they were trying peacefully with me to shut me down to shut my activities down and I didn't listen. They sent me two representatives from the Saudi government with one of my brother to convince me to go back to Saudi Arabia. I refused.

CW: They sent them to Canada?

OA: Yes. In Canada. Yes. They were here. I met them. I talked to them, but I refused to cooperate. Months later you know they hacked my phone. A month later they arrested my brothers and my friends.

CW: So you say the Saudis hacked your phone and spied on your conversations even including your conversations with Mr. Khashoggi. What proof do you have that they did that?

OA: Actually according to Citizen Map because they could double check my cell phone and they could confirm that my phone was hacked and they sent me a link you know it was a DHL link. Track your package. So I believed that it was one of my amazon or DHL order or stuff like that. So I clicked. It was a mistake you know and since then they could be able to monitor my phone. They could listen to the calls. They could read the chatting messages and everything. So they were basically monitoring my phone including my conversations with the Jamal for sure.

CW: So you're a permanent resident of Canada. How concerned are you for your own safety here?

OA: Here I'm really thankful to the Canadian government, to the RCMP. For the last few days they were trying to you know tell me that you know everything is going to be fine. You don't have to be scared. They're checking on me and you know I'm thankful you know thank God that I'm here in Canada. You know nothing's going to happen to me, but I'm really concerned about the safety of my family. About others who live in Saudi Arabia or about my friends. You know it's a big shock.

CW: So you say the Saudis tried to lure you to the Saudi embassy in Canada. How did they do that?

OA: When they came in May 15th they started this conversation with me and negotiation with me. I was refusing all their offers. So then they said you know what at least just go there for an hour, get a new passport because my one, my passport is expired. Just get a new one just to show the government that you know you have a good faith on them. Just for an hour. I didn't know why they were insisting to go there, but after what happened to Jamal, I was shocked.

CW: What do you want Canada and its allies to do now?

OA: Honestly people should, I mean Canada and its allies, they have to rethink about. Canada did very well, you know. Canada was one of very few countries who said no to this regime and Canadians should be proud of their government. At least I think we don't know what's really going on. We don't know what's going to happen. Are they going to support the prince anymore? Are they going to hide the crime? Are they going to send someone else to say you know to blame someone else, but we don't have to let that go.

CW: Alright well this is something that we'll continue to watch. Thank you very much for joining us.

OA: Thank you.

CW: Omar Abdulaziz is a Saudi dissident living in Canada. We contacted the Saudi embassy in Ottawa about this story, but did not hear back. You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One. I'm Connie Walker, sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti. Up next, the MeToo movement in Canada's North.

Back To Top »

The stakes are higher to report abuse as #MeToo hasn't come to Nunavut, says Iqaluit mayor

Guests: Madeleine Redfern

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I'm going to call the meeting back to order. Welcome back to the 111th meeting of the Standing Committee of the Status of Women and we're continuing our study of barriers facing women in politics.

CW: It started out as just another day of hearings at the federal committee on the Status of Women in Ottawa last month. But then, toward the end of the day, one piece of testimony stood out. The mayor of Iqaluit had been asked to talk about the challenges of traveling for her job, as a politician in the north, where the distances are so vast. Here's how Madeleine Redfern answered.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: The biggest issue that I would have regarding travel is actually our Inuit male leaders when they travel with their female staff actually think it's a benefit and a perk that they can actually sexually harass or sexually assault or have relationships with women on the road. That is, actually I know that's not answering your question, but it's actually the bigger problem is that outside the workplace, many of our leaders or managers believe that those workplace rules are don't exist. That's the biggest problem.

CW: The mayor's words that day travelled far beyond the committee room in Ottawa. She says she's received a lot of support since then, but some of the reaction from both men and women in Nunavut has been critical. In fact, she's even received death threats since speaking out that day. Mayor Madeleine Redfern is with us from Iqaluit. Hello.

MADELEINE REDFERN: Good morning.

CW: So Madeleine when that buzzer went and you had said what you did, did you anticipate the reaction that that answer would generate?

MR: Yes and no. In part because it happens too frequently and it's not spoken about. So I expected that you know revealing anything that is usually unspoken about and difficult can create a bit of a response. I had someone contact me and say you know you tarred all men with the same brush. Of course I said you know I didn't mean to include all men, but definitely there are some that abuse their positions of power and in particular, when travelling with women staff or women and girls in our communities. It's happened unfortunately for decades.

CW: What kind of threats have you been receiving since speaking out?

MR: I've had people sort of tell me to watch my back, that I better not be you know ever alone. I've had people you know put their hands as if it's a gun and pretend to shoot me. This is effectively a taboo subject.

CW: Can you elaborate on what you told the committee? Like what can it be like for women politicians and staffers who travel for work in the north?

MR: Well first of all, you're away from your spouse or your family in a support network and even whereas I was just coming into the studio, I had one of the CBC staff come up to me saying you know he remembered when he first travelled out the community as a politician, he couldn't believe the behaviour of some of the other politicians who partied and imbued and acted in ways that they shouldn't have and inappropriately. And unfortunately you know some of those poor choices then extends to sexually harassing or sexually assaulting the women who travel with them for you know support. It can be interpreters, assistants or even other sort of women who are politicians, but it also unfortunately extends to some of the women or girls that are in the community that have also been subject to these inappropriate behaviours.

CW: Has this happened to you when you were travelling for work?

MR: Absolutely. Everything from sort of lewd comments to propositions to inappropriate touching. I've been lucky in so much as that I've made my effectively escape, you know get myself out of that situation before it goes where I don't want it to go. But I know women who unfortunately were not able to get themselves out and you know there's been attempted rapes or there have been you know actual rapes. I've been part of non-governmental organizations and Inuit organizations and involved in politics in one way or another for 30 years. It happens.

CW: So obviously we've been talking about the MeToo movement everywhere and how it affects women around the world. But how is it, you mentioned this is taboo to talk about in the north. How is it different?

MR: Well it's very small. I mean geographically large, but our communities are quite small and interconnected. I've known you know victims who've tried to report and all of a sudden you know find a firestorm. Their jobs are at risk and if your job comes with housing, your housing is at risk. Even coming back from a trip and telling your husband I mean you may be blamed and it's just it's fraught with significant risk. When your abuser is a person who has power and that's the thing, we have a limited number of jobs here. I've known women to reject promotions so that they don't have to spend you know time next to powerful abusers or try to find some sort of strategy in which you never find yourself alone with known abusers.

CW: I want to play a clip from Elisapee Sheutiapik. She's Nunavut's minister responsible for the Status of Women and she was disappointed that you singled out Inuit men in power in your remarks.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I have never honestly had challenges when it comes to Inuit leaders. I think in all honesty it's not just our race when there's such a big movement with MeToo. It's a global issue, not Inuit men issue.

CW: How do you respond to that?

MR: Of course we know that this is an issue that happens worldwide, but not to acknowledge that we have our own societal issues around this. The vast majority of our population in Nunavut are Inuit. The vast majority of our leaders are Inuit. The people that have come forward to me and as you know people in positions of leadership from the church, in business to Inuit organizations, to elected officials, we in order to tackle this have to be prepared to look at our own. We have to face that this happens and it shouldn't happen.

CW: So this has obviously sparked a lot of conversations in the north. We're going to hear a clip from Nunavut premier Joe Savikataaq, who also had some concerns about what you said at the hearing. Let's listen.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: My first reaction was I don't think all Inuit leaders should be painted with the same brush. And at the same time, if Mayor Madame Redfern has any known cases or concerns that they should be brought forward and dealt with. I feel it's a very negative comment that was made, not only for the men, but for the women too.

CW: So that was his initial reaction. But did you speak to him since you spoke in Ottawa at the committee?

MR: I did call the Premier's office and I spoke to his assistant. And it's important that to acknowledge that the Premier has since come out with a very strong and positive statement that he wants to support our women and girls and children who have been abused and the ability to have that acknowledged is, especially by a premier, is a very very good step. And the commitment to review the government of Nunavut's policies, I highlighted that one woman who had been sexually harassed for seven years, finally got acknowledgement, but that took way too long. She received $3000 compensation, but that's $428 a year. That's $8 a week. That's the cost of a cup of coffee that you get to go to work with your harasser and be sexually harassed and abused and not get quick, an appropriate response. Clearly, we need the policies to be stronger that when you are travelling for work that those work policies apply. That when you are going to after hours meetings or workshops those harassment policies apply and we need to make sure that it doesn't take seven years to get an outcome and that the outcome must be appropriate and suitable.

CW: So you mentioned the Premier has released a statement saying that his government will review its harassment policy to offer better support to women who have faced sexual harassment or abuse in the workplace. Are you hopeful that these conversations will lead to significant change?

MR: It's a beginning and having reviewed the government of Nunavut policies, I was actually surprised that for the most part, they don't apply to the elected officials. We need to see the elected officials also be held to the standard that we expect them, which is a position of trust, that you don't abuse your power for personal gain or pleasure and that our people are entitled to be safe around their leaders.

CW: Thank you very much for joining us Madeleine.

MR: Thank you.

CW: Madeleine Redfern is the mayor of Iqaluit, Nunavut. The CBC News is next. Then fighting climate change in the courts. Why young people around the world are taking their political leaders to court, to speed up the fight against global warming. I'm Connie Walker in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

By suing U.S. government over climate change, young people 'take some of that control into our own hands'

Guests: Victoria Barrett, Gabriela Eslava, David Boyd

CW: Hello. I'm Connie Walker, sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti, and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

CW: Still to come, when marijuana becomes legal in this country tomorrow, it's more than just big news for cannabis enthusiasts. It's bound to have knock on effects right across the economy and society. In half an hour, join Geoff Turner, host of the CBC podcast, On Drugs, as he makes a trip to Colorado, where marijuana was legalized over four years ago to see what the effects on life in that state have been. And don't miss tomorrow's special edition of The Current, Into the Weeds, about the changes on their way here in Canada. But first, forget writing letters to their elected leaders, today's kids are fed up about inaction on climate change and are taking their governments to court.

[Music: Theme]

CW: If you're someone who's frustrated about our political leaders' lack of action on climate change, then you may want to consider joining the burgeoning trend of people doing something about it by taking their leaders to court. Last week, a judge in the Netherlands sided with a group of activists demanding its government act faster to slow climate change. Here's one of the winning plaintiffs, Marjan Minnesma.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: It's an enormous good decision. We won on every single point and it was a very good explanation of the urgency of what's necessary. They clearly said climate change is a very urgent problem with enormous risks, so the states should do at least the minimum. The last time that we won, we had hundreds of reactions of people crying that they had hope because of our case. So I think that this will only well enlarge this hope and will make people try the last democratic thing that they can do. Go to the court because if your politicians don't act then someone else should act and that can be the judge.

CW: Marjan Minnesma is with the Dutch environmental group, Urgenda. Back in 2015, it filed a lawsuit against the government on behalf of about 800 Dutch citizens. It claimed the government was failing to protect its legal obligations to the people. And last week's appeal court decision compels the government to reduce emissions by 25 percent compared to 1990 levels by 2020. Regardless of whether the emissions will really drop, this type of climate activism is a growing field and proving especially popular with young people, including those too young to vote. A lawsuit in Belgium right now involves an astonishing 35,000 co-plaintiffs including 20-year-old Felix de Gheldere.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: If we don't act now there will be total war, not just about land, not about oil, but also about drinkable water and food. It's pretty dark actually if we let it happen like it's happening now.

CW: Children and youth have taken to the courts in countries from Pakistan to India, Norway to the USA .in the United States, a groundbreaking case brought by 21 children and young adults is coming up at the end of this month. In Colombia, young people have already tasted victory. In April the Supreme Court found in their favor after they sued the government to try to halt the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest. We have two young people joining me now who have been part of these lawsuits. Victoria Barrett is 19-years-old and one of the plaintiffs in the legal case against the US government. She's in Madison, Wisconsin. And Gabriela Eslava is one of the Colombian plaintiffs. At 26-years-old, she's the oldest member of the group and she's also one of the lawyers who worked on the case. She is in Bogota, Colombia. Hello to you both.

VICTORIA BARRETT: Hi.

GABRIELA ESLAVA: Hi Connie.

CW: Victoria let's start with you. Why did you and the other plaintiffs decide to sue the US government?

VB: I think that a lot of the reason that we came to that conclusion to sue the government was that a lot of us were taking individual action at home and as people who couldn't vote we felt that we weren't necessarily being heard by our government because we weren't constituents that had a stake in whether or not they were reelected. We were trying to find ways to be able to engage with our government in a way that they had to care about what we are saying even though we didn't necessarily have the political power to put them in office.

CW: What particularly inspired you to get involved? What were you seeing happening around you?

VB: I was living in New York and doing a lot of work with nonprofit organizations, learning about Hurricane Sandy and climate change as a justice issue and as a young black latin next person worrying about the way that climate change disproportionately impacted low income and minority communities made me really intrigued by the issue.

CW: Gabriela Eslava, what was the goal of the Colombian court case?

GE: We wanted the case to order the government to stop deforestation. Colombian government have to comply with its prior commitment to stop deforestation, the Amazon forest by 2020 and it also committed to the climate change summit in Paris. But what we saw is that the country is still far from meeting that goal. Deforestation increased by 44 per cent in 2016. So we told the court that people who are children, teenagers and young adults today are going to suffer the effects and the consequences of not doing something right now. So we wanted to show that there's a strong relation between deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. That's the main cause of climate change. So our main goal was to get the Supreme Court of Justice to tell the government to stop deforestation in the Amazon rainforest.

CW: And what was the legal argument that you made?

GE: We say that currently deforestation is the main cause of the increase of greenhouse gas emissions and that is a threat to our fundamental rights to life, food, water and health. We are 25 children from 17 different cities and municipalities of Colombia, who are that are very vulnerable to climate change. So if we don't stop deforestation right now we are going to suffer the effects of climate change in our cities by 2030. So we don't want that future and we say that there's an imminent threat to our fundamental rights.

CW: Victoria Barrett, the trial for your case is set in the United States for October 29. What argument will your attorneys be making?

VB: Predominantly our attorneys are making the argument that the US federal government has taken direct action to perpetuate the global climate crisis is therefore put my life, liberty and property at risk ,violating the US Constitution and disproportionately doing that to young people and also by violating the public trust doctrine, which is common law that asserts that governments have the responsibility to take care of public land and public resources for their constituents and for the public.

CW: Victoria tell me a bit about your co-plaintiffs. What motivated them to get on board?

VB: Yeah. So my co-plaintiffs are from all around the United States and every single one of them is facing different types and varying degrees of climate impacts and climate disaster. We have plaintiffs from Alaska, from Florida, from Louisiana, from Colorado, plaintiffs that live on the coast, plaintiffs that live off the coast, plaintiffs being affected by sea level rise, plaintiffs being affected by drought, just showing the diverse array of ways that young people around the United States are being impacted by this issue.

CW: And what kinds of reactions have you been getting for your involvement?

VB: Definitely a lot of support from my peers because they're understanding the stake that they have in the issue of climate change and the fact that it's going to be something that we are going to have to deal with in a way that no other generation before us has had to. And then from adults it's usually a lot of surprise, a lot of intrigue. And it's interesting because as a young person, there is this concept or this idea that you don't have a certain level of autonomy or a certain amount of level to just do things by yourself. So usually I get asked a lot you know if my parents were environmentalists, if people in my family have been activists in the past because it's hard for people to understand the idea that young people really just want to take control of their own future without any input from generations before us necessarily.

CW: Some people have accused you of being either used or influenced by older climate activists. Right?

VB: Exactly. Yeah.

CW: And what do you say to them when you get those accusations?

VB: Just that it's not true and that young people really are ready to hold a stake in how our decision and how our future is decided because fact of the matter is that we really are the only people who could care to the level that we do about the fact that the Earth isn't going to be the same because of the actions that humans have taken.

CW: Gabriela, Victoria mentioned that some of the young plaintiffs that are involved in her court case are seeing directly the effects of climate change in their communities. Was that the case also in Colombia?

GE: Yeah that's the case for four of the our plaintiffs who live in the Amazon rainforest. They have witnessed the changes of the rainforest themselves. They know where areas are deforrested and where there are people cutting down trees. So they are leading the changes of the ecosystem right now.

CW: How is it affecting their daily lives?

GE: For example their right to food. They have changed the food they consume every day. The fruits they eat have changed. There are other plaintiffs who live in the San Andreas island and they have changed their food. They don't eat more fish, they started to eat other things because fish has become expensive because of the changes on the ecosystem.

CW: So Gabriela can you explain the ruling a bit more. What exactly did the courts tell the government to do?

GE: The Supreme Court said that the Amazon rainforest is an entity subject of rights. This means that it is on a special ecosystem that needs to be protected and restored. And it also ordered the government to present an action plan within four months to combat deforestation in the Amazon, as well as to build an intergenerational pact for the life of the Colombian Amazon. So the government needs to join with communities and with us the plaintiffs, to create this pact for the life of the Colombian Amazon. What is more important is that the Supreme Court recognizes that our future generation have environmental rights. So yeah.

CW: Were you surprised by the ruling?

GE: I'm really surprised. I I felt like Victoria just said that many people think that as young people we don't have like we cannot decide for ourselves and many people thought that when we presented this lawsuit, it was a symbolic act and they didn't trust that we really wanted to do something about the Amazon rainforest. So it was really surprised and we didn't expect the Supreme Court to recognize the Amazonas as a subject of rights. I think that's historic in our country. It's the second case in which a court recognises an ecosystem as a subject of rights.

CW: Victoria Barrett on Sunday in an interview with CBS, US President Donald Trump, questioned whether climate change was manmade. How optimistic are you that this case will make a difference in the United States?

VB: I'm really optimistic. I think whether we win or lose that we've created this precedent for people in the United States. People all over the world, especially young people that you can hold your government accountable. There are facts and true facts that support what we're saying and support what we're scared of and I think that if you take the opportunity or get the opportunity to put that directly in front of your governance, in front of the people who make the decisions that are going to impact your future, it really gives you a better chance and I think it's really empowering because we've lived in a world where young people have to do a lot to get attention. Young people have to do a lot in order to protest and be activists and show what we want the future to be and what world we want to live in. And I think this lawsuit shows that we could take some of that control into our own hands.

CW: I'm curious what the reaction was in your family. I mean you joined the lawsuit before you were of legal age and so you would have needed your parents permission. How did they react to your involvement?

VB: I remember my parents initially be cautious. My mother is from Honduras. So she grew up in a country where you necessarily can't take action like that against your government and you can't necessarily stand up to your government in that way without heavy repercussion or risk. So she was initially a little weary, but she was excited that as a young person I was taking the chance to really engage in the world and engage in my politics and engage in what was happening around me and outside of me. Not necessarily just in my life, but in my family's life and the global south and in other families in the global south.

CW: Gabriela, what was it like for you working with a group of children and youth on this case?

GE: It was really inspiring because what we feel like join us is that we are the first generation of Colombians who are going to live in peace. So two years ago the Colombian government signed a peace agreement with all those the guerrilla in Latin America and we felt like, if we are the first generation who is going to live in peace, we need to do something about nature and we have to make peace with nature. So we were really conscious about our ecological footprint in our everyday life. Some of us are vegetarians, some of us ride our bikes to school or to university, but we wanted to do something else. Something to protect our most biodiverse ecosystem. So I think for us to understand peace is that we need to understand it just like a process and we have to make peace with nature. That's what drives us to make this lawsuit.

CW: We heard clips from some earlier youth who talked about how it gave them and the people working with them hope. How did it make you feel about the future?

GE: We are very, we have hope. It's hard to live in a country that has had a war that lasted more than five decades. My parents and my grandparents didn't know what peace felt like. So we felt like we need to do some change, some real change and we need to start protecting our environment. Colombia is the second most biodiverse country in the world. So we need to change the way we relate to nature and by doing so we need to change our economy and our social relation with those ecosystems. So I think we are a generation that is really conscious and we can make change in this country.

CW: Victoria what about you, one last question, what do you think your future will look like decades from now? I think that what my future will look like decades from now has a lot to do with the decisions that we make in the next few years, in the next decades and I'm really hoping that leaders, young people everyone in the world decides to step up and actually protect what we've been existing in you know for centuries and protect that for young people and make sure that we have the same capability to thrive in this planet that we've lived on.

CW: Well thank you both very much for joining us.

GE: Thank you.

CW: Victoria Barrett is one of the 21 young plaintiffs taking on the US government on climate change. She was in Madison, Wisconsin. And Gabriela Eslava is a lawyer who works with the Colombian organization, the Dejusticia. She was in Bogota, Colombia. My next guest says litigation is a tool worth using in the fight against climate change. David Boyd is the UN's special rapporteur on human rights and the environment. He's also an associate professor of law, policy and sustainability at the University of British Columbia. David Boyd is on the line from his home on Pender Island, British Columbia. Hello.

DAVID BOYD: Good morning, Connie.

CW: David what were you thinking as you listened to our last two guests talk about their legal cases to fight climate change?

DB: Well I found it incredibly inspiring to listen to two such articulate and eloquent young people talking about their hopes and their passions for the future and their inspired activism to actually tackle this problem in a way that is bold and I would say visionary.

CW: How effective do you think climate litigation against governments can be?

DB: Well I think litigation is actually one of the most powerful tools for holding government's feet to the fire and forcing governments to be accountable. I mean if we look at this problem of climate change, governments started signing international treaties like the UN Convention framework convention on climate change back in 1992. So it's over 25 years and in some countries there has been significant progress towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions and protecting forests, but in other countries like Canad,a cough cough, there has been a lot of talk and very little action. And similarly in the United States and Colombia. So using litigation to force governments to live up to their commitments, whether those are international law commitments, whether those are human rights commitments or other legal obligations that governments have is a very very powerful tool.

CW: What are the challenges that people face in fighting climate change in courts?

DB: Well you know going to court can be a very expensive time consuming process. So you need to you know in the case of these youths they have to raise money in order to hire lawyers to go to court and then probably the biggest challenge is that there's uncertainty. At the end of the day you don't know for sure whether your arguments are going to carry the day with the courts. And so, cost, time and uncertainty would be the three big challenges.

CW: If a legal challenge on climate change is successful to what extent are governments actually held accountable?

DB: Well if you look back at the history of this kind of litigation over the past hundred years, whether it's look at the look at the cases that were brought in order to advance women's rights in Canada. The persons case back in the 1920s that eventually led to women being recognized as legal persons and eligible for the appointment to the Senate or the cases brought in the United States by the civil rights movement that culminated in the 1950s decision in Brown vs. Board of Education about segregated schooling being a violation of the constitutional rights of African-Americans. These court decisions can really serve as turning points in the trajectory of a society. So that's what these cases about climate change are about. They're really about can we stop this freight, this runaway train of fossil fuel burning and deforestation and can we transform ourselves into a society that runs on renewable energy and that as Victoria and Gabriela both said, respect the natural world upon which we're so dependent. And we really do need that kind of a transformation. You know what, last week's newest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said that we need "rapid far reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society." That's about the clearest warning from the scientific community that I can imagine. And so litigation is one of those tools that can be used to bring about that transformation and to turn the ship around.

CW: How does that litigation tool fighting climate change accord compare to other efforts in the fight against climate change such as voting or lobbying?

DB: Well it's such a massive problem that I think there's no one right answer to what's the best way forward. I mean we do need to elect representatives that are cognisant of the dangers of climate change. We need people to write letters to their elected representatives. We need people to support businesses that are switching towards renewable energy. So it's really kind of an all hands on deck strategy, but litigation is one of those tools that just, it not only has legal power, but as I mentioned it has transformative cultural power. It can actually contribute to the evolution of our values in a positive way.

CW: What is the difference between climate change legal cases against governments compared to lawsuits against oil companies or other corporations?

DB: Well in some ways they're similar, in that they're trying to get at this problem of climate change. But in terms of lawsuits against governments what people like Victoria and Gabriela and others around the world are trying to do is they're trying to get governments to take action. To pass the laws, the regulations and the standards that will phase out fossil fuels, that will accelerate the transition to renewable energy, whereas in lawsuits against corporations, the goal is to really hold them accountable for the damage they've done and so often those types of lawsuits will be seeking monetary damages in much the way that lawsuits against tobacco companies resulted in hundreds of billions of dollars in damages over the course of the past two decades.

CW: Could you see this kind of legal action on climate change play out here in Canada?

DB: I would love to see this play out in Canada. And I know that there are lawyers across Canada who are working on trying to bring these kinds of cases to the Canadian courts. Lawyers with organizations like Ecojustice and the Canadian Environmental Law Association. And there are solid grounds for doing that. I mean Canada has the right to life and it has the right to life in the Dutch case that you talked about, the Urgenda case that led the Dutch appellate court to order the Dutch government to take stronger action on climate change. And of course the right to life is a part of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. There's Canada ha,s as I mentioned, signed international agreements that obligate us to take action on climate change. The public trust doctrine, which is being relied upon by the plaintiffs in the litigation, in the children's litigation in the United States as a part of Canadian law. So there are many different legal arguments that could be brought to bear against climate change in Canada and we have you know there have already been cases in Canada that have been brought. There's a case involving Syncrude in the Federal Court of Canada where the Federal Court said that global climate change is a real measured evil and the harm has been well documented. So I think that time is really ripe for this type of litigation to make a big impact in Canada.

CW: OK. Well we'll have to leave it there. Thank you very much, David.

DB: Thanks very much, Connie.

CW: David Boyd is the UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment and an associate professor of law, policy and sustainability at the University of British Columbia. He was on Pender Island in BC. Coming up in our next half hour, Rocky Mountain high. What legal marijuana looks like in Colorado, four years on. I'm Connie Walker sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

What Canada can learn about legal pot from Colorado

Guests: Geoff Turner, Wanda James

CW: I'm Connie Walker sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current. As of tomorrow Canada will be the first G7 country where recreational marijuana will be legal. And here on The Current, Anna Maria Tremonti will bring you a special edition tomorrow, that we're calling Into the Weeds. But right now we're going to take a trip south of the border, to one of the states that has already gone down this road. Colorado was the first US state to legalize marijuana in 2014. Late last year the CBC's Geoff Turner host of the podcast, On Drugs, visited the Rocky Mountain state to look into the effects of legalization there. Here he is with, On Drugs: Cannabis in Colorado.

SOUNDCLIP

If you guys haven't been able to tell by the smell that we've engrained in the bus. This is a 420-friendly vehicle. And what that means, light it up, spark it, pass it around. If you didn't bring anything, make friends with somebody who did. Marijuana is the most social drug on planet Earth. On the cocaine tours, nobody shares shit.

[Laughter]

GEOFF TURNER: What you're hearing behind me is the sound of about 30 people getting high on a bus in Denver, Colorado. Just to be clear, I was not one of the people smoking, but granted that on a small bus full of people blazing away, it's pretty hard to keep the smoke out of your lungs. But I was willing to take that risk to do some important reporting. In January 2014, Colorado was the first of a handful of states to open up sales of recreational weed. So Coloradans are four years into a pretty major social experiment. For the next little while I'm going to give you my highly subjective take on how that experiment is shaping up and that's why I'm here on a bus full of pot smokers, all on our way to visit a greenhouse full of cannabis plants.

[Music]

GEOFF TURNER: So marijuana wasn't always illegal in the United States, but from about 1906 on, individual states began various forms of regulation and prohibition. And in 1937, the Marijuana Tax Act passed into law and that effectively criminalized plot. And as it turns out, the first person ever charged and convicted under the law was in Denver. It was actually right here at this house on California Street.

[Music]

GEOFF TURNER: The house is a classic brick Victorian and it's been really nicely restored. All the gingerbread work is just so. But in 1937, the house had fallen from its original glory and was operating as a rooming house. That's where Moses Baca lived with his wife. Moses Baca was what they used to call a drifter, traveling from state to state, job to job. He was only 23, but already had a pretty good rap sheet in the works. When he was 17, he and two of his drinking buddies were collared for stealing suits from a tailor shop. There was a burglary conviction when he was 20, then came arrest for vagrancy, larceny, assault and then more vagrancy and several arrests for drunk and disorderly conduct. So by the age of 23, Moses Baca was well on the way to establishing himself as a petty criminal. But on the night of October 3rd, 1937, he found a way into the history books. According to an arrest report from the Denver police, Baca had come home drunk and beaten his wife. He was initially charged with drunken disturbance, but in the course of the investigation, police found something else, a quarter ounce of cannabis. So the Marijuana Tax Act had come into effect on October 1st and two days later, Moses Baca earned the distinction of being the first arrested under the new law. And then you flash forward 80 years and Colorado is at the leading edge of legalization, which in part means that people are traveling here from all over the world to ride around on a bus smoking weed. There are people here from New Zealand and Australia and all over the US. Even some of the locals are getting in.

SOUNDCLIP

GEOFF TURNER: So who are you?

VOICE 2: I'm a person.

[laughter]

GEOFF TURNER: You guys are actually from Denver.

VOICE 1: I've been here three years, she's been here 20 years.

GEOFF TURNER: And have you ever been on this bus before?

VOICE 1: Never in my entire life. Quite an experience.

GEOFF TURNER: And why now? Why today?

VOICE 1: Well visitors from out of town came in and the weather kind of sucked. We thought, there's got to be something we can do indoors and have some fun. This showed up and we all were in.

GEOFF TURNER: What was your, prior to today or even prior to Amendment 64, what was your perspective on marijuana?

VOICE 1: I came through the 60s and 70s, we invented this stuff back then. So I'm really familiar with it.

VOICE 2: I think my perspective has changed because I have children. So what I did in my youth is different from what i wanted them to do in their youth, right. Wisdom and experience, but that shipped because they're adults. So it's time to embrace happy.

GEOFF TURNER: Embrace happy. What's your take on the scene here so far.

VOICE 2: It's a little smoky for me.

GEOFF TURNER: I'm going to be asking for danger pay. My throat is getting raw.

VOICE 2: Oh yeah, me too.

GEOFF TURNER: Now Colorado legislators didn't just wake up one morning with the notion to legalize pot. When the law finally changed, it was only after decades of effort by activists. My own favourite episode happened in and around the ski resort town of Aspen. In 1970., Hunter S. Thompson ran for sheriff at Pitkin County, Colorado, which includes Aspen and the decriminalization of marijuana was a major plank in his platform.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: When you got a whole generation that grows up as felons and I know the law is ridiculous and you're told all this gibberish about it. It drives you crazy and makes your brain soft and your feet fall off. Even the police know it's a silly law. It's time we either bring that chasm, bridge that chasm with some kind of realistic law enforcement or else I don't think it's going to be bridged in this country. We're going to revolution.

GEOFF TURNER: Thompson lost. I don't know maybe his promise to jackhammer city streets and replace them with saw didn't connect with mainstream voters, but he was partly right about the looming revolution. It's just it wasn't the gonzo revolution that he imagined. It was something more suited to the ballroom of the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Denver. That's where on a chilly night in November, some major players in marijuana politics and business got together to celebrate. They're marking five years since a great victory, a victory that came when Colorado voters were asked.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Shall there be an amendment to the Colorado Constitution concerning marijuana and in connection there with providing for the regulation of marijuana, permitting a person 21 years of age or older to consume or possess limited amounts of marijuana. Providing for the licensing of cultivation facilities, product manufacturing facilities, testing facilities and retail stores, permitting local governments to regulate or prohibit such facilities, requiring the General Assembly to enact an excise tax to be levied upon wholesale sales of marijuana. Requiring that the first $40 million in revenue raised annually by such tax, be credited to the public school capital construction assistance fund and requiring the General Assembly to enact legislation governing the cultivation processing and sale of industrial hemp.

GEOFF TURNER: And of course, Colorado voters said yes to that extremely long question and two years later the law came into effect. So the people in this ballroom have all sorts of reasons to be happy about that. Unlike some previous legalization efforts the campaign for Amendment 64 wasn't a pitch for freedom, it was a pitch for regulation. In fact, the organization that got Amendment 64 on the ballot went by the very catchy name Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol. Instead of promising a utopia founded on hemp handicrafts and the freedom to blaze, the campaign emphasized regulation as a kind of moral responsibility in a society where pot's being used anyway. And it paid a lot of attention to the relative safety of marijuana.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: The man leading the charge for legalization is challenging Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and Pete Coors to a duel. Mason Tvert says that he'll be waiting for Coors and Hickenlooper outside the Great American Beer Festival at high noon tomorrow. And for every alcoholic beverage they consume inside, Tvert says he'll smoke marijuana to prove once and for all, his claim that pot is safer than booze.

GEOFF TURNER: Well Mason Tvert is no longer the scrappy underdog fighting for attention for the cause. He now runs a consulting company that advises legalization campaigns around the country. His office is in the expansive headquarters of a Denver law firm and the place just kind of radiates success. But five years ago, he was leading a winning campaign across the finish line.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: It really was geared around talking about the relative safety of marijuana compared to alcohol. And Colorado is a state with a long history, an affinity for alcohol and there just been a couple alcohol overdose deaths on college campuses that were really they made this a great environment to have this discussion about the fact that cannabis is a less harmful substance. Marijuana became illegal because people were led to believe it's so harmful it couldn't possibly be allowed. And so if you simply say, we could generate tax revenue or we could take it out of the underground market or we could take it away from cartels or control it and make sure it's tested, none of those arguments, while they're all very good and very valid. None of those address people's concerns about how harmful marijuana is or how harmful they've been led to believe. So we wanted to first address those concerns. Once adults know marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, now they will be more likely to agree it's worth the tax revenue. It's worth taking out of the hands of cartels. It's worth regulating and testing and so on.

[Music]

GEOFF TURNER: I think this was the most striking thing to me about my visit to Colorado. Just how quickly the whole marijuana industry has become normalized. Here in Denver, legalization just looks like another commercial opportunity. You see it on the so-called Green Mile, this long stretch of Broadway that's dotted with pot shops. You see it in the slick informative packaging. You see it in media coverage, the venerable Denver Post now runs a sister publication called The Canabis, that is tightly focused on the business and culture of marijuana. And then there's the cannabis tourism. The bus I was on was packed on a dreary day in November and that's just one of several cannabis tour operations in town. I could have taken a stone painting class. So there were a lot of people getting a piece of the marijuana action around here.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I'm Bobby Reginelli, marketing director for Euflora.

GEOFF TURNER: What am I looking at here on this table, Bobby?

VOICE: Every table has a different types of cannabis on it. We have a Sativa table. Two hybrid tables and an Indica table. Each cannabis strain is paired with a computer tablet so that you can do the research on your own. We believe in kind of an open free flowing shopping.

This is one of the stops on the bus tour, the Euflora dispensary in downtown Denver. Bobby is showing me around a table of samples. There are clear plastic containers with different strains of bud. Each one has this little access port so you can give it a shake and open and sniff. Along with each of the samples there's a tablet computer that's loaded with info about the weed.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Green tints throughout the buds, some orange hairs and very resinous for not having a lot of tricombs. Once broken up, the colours of lavender, orange and amber purple float through to tricomb heads and into the stems.

GEOFF TURNER: Right.

VOICE: Yeah it's really fun to be able to interact with cannabis on a level that's more than just you know the old factory one. It's nice to smell the strains and take a look at them, but we really believe in providing you information so that you can kind of curate your own experience.

GEOFF TURNER: So all in all, it's a pretty slick experience as far as pot shops go. And that's reflected in the surprisingly middle aged and middle class clientele. But I don't know I grew up with a freakier vision of legalization. The activists of 80s, 90s Vancouver were something closer to the vision of Hunter S. Thompson that we heard. The freedom to ingest mind altering substances was connected to a whole constellation of issues around personal freedom and social justice and in that old school version sexual liberation, racial justice, economic equality, they're all going to be fertilized by the liberation of weed. Some of that spirit still lives on here in Denver.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Geoff?

GEOFF TURNER: How you doing Miguel?

VOICE: How are you?

GEOFF TURNER: I'm good, how are you man?

VOICE: Good. Welcome.

GEOFF TURNER: Miguel Lopez is a past organizer of Denver's annual 420 festival. It's a celebration of all things cannabis, but mostly just a chance to get high in the park with like minded freedom lovers. I picked up Miguel at the social housing project where he lives and he got right down to business.

SOUNDCLIP

GEOFF TURNER: Since we're radio. Can you describe what you got there?

VOICE: I got my rolling tray that has artistic work on it. It's from.

GEOFF TURNER: Miguel happily partakes of the legal weed, but for him the experience of legalization falls short of the promise of liberation that earlier generations of activists were pushing for.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: Even as regulation comes in, it's still here, it's still evident, it's still obvious that you know the sole source of income for the classes selling marijuana were people of colour and now all of a sudden, it's turned into a major cash cow for white people and so people who are still trying to sell it as some sort of source of income are still going to jail in prison for the same laws that were not repealed under Amendment 64. So you are regulated to smoke and the classes that are smoking are still the people of colour who are building the state's economy and deserve a little bit more respect.

GEOFF TURNER: You got to a bunch of stuff there before me because I was going to ask you and I think a lot of people, who don't, aren't maybe super familiar with the issues here would come and say Miguel what's the big deal? Colorados legalized pot. What are you going on about? Will you ever be happy?

VOICE: You know, happiness comes by mutual respect and that comes along with peace. And when the forces in this government and the forces in the status quo begin to give us some peace, to give us some equality, not just make it another word. You know is equality, but another word?

GEOFF TURNER: Miguel guided me on some of the significant sites in downtown Denver. And then we wound up at the Civic Center Park, which is smack dab between Denver's city hall and the state capital. It's also where 420 happens. And it's been the scene of all sorts of demonstrations and rallies that Miguel has been a part of.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: We'll come down Colfax and skinheads and the Klan.

GEOFF TURNER: He's just been regaling me with past tales of confrontations with fascists and other showdowns with authorities.

SOUNDCLIP

GEOFF TURNER: What about on a personal level for you Miguel like obviously pot means something to you, personally. Do you smoke every day?

VOICE: Of course. I mean it brings me a lot more content dealing with the stresses of you know being indigenous and surrounded into a world of confusion in a white man's society.

GEOFF TURNER: Now I felt a bit sheepish even bringing it up, but I mentioned the MPP event and I just had to ask Miguel.

SOUNDCLIP

GEOFF TURNER: What does it say to you that there's a $250 a plate dinner happening at the Ritz Carlton for them to celebrate the drafting of Amendment 64.

VOICE: It's celebrating the you know the continuation of economic injustice and they're celebrating their victory of profit and greed. We are not shocked or surprised and that's why we know that from the 4th of July 1776, when they were saying all men were created equal, but they didn't really teach you past that point that there was a comma that said except for these merciless savage Indians and our slaves. Nothing's changed.

GEOFF TURNER: Miguel notes the poor people of colour have been disproportionate casualties in the war on drugs and he argues that was never an accident. And with that in mind, it's worth noting that Moses Baca, remember the first person arrested and convicted under the 1937 Marijuana Law, well if you look at his arrest report, he's listed as Mexican. And I will tell you one thing about that event at the Ritz Carlton, if that gathering was any kind of reflection of the face of the marijuana industry, well that face is pretty darn white. But there are some notable exceptions.

[Music]

WANDA JAMES: Hey Geoff.

GEOFF TURNER: Hi Wanda. Nice to meet you again. How are you?

WANDA JAMES: Hi, my name is Wanda James and I am the CEO of Simply Pure dispensary. And my husband, Scott Durrah and I, were the first African-Americans in the United States licensed to own a dispensary and edibles company and a grow facility.

GEOFF TURNER: Wanda is actually underselling herself a bit there. She's also a former Navy lieutenant. She has decades of experience in the food and restaurant business and she's a veteran political campaigner. And when Wanda James mentions the fact of her blackness with regards to her business, it's with good reason.

WANDA JAMES: It's hugely significant because even five years after legalization in Colorado, I believe we only have two black dispensary owners and then across the nation, I believe we have less than 10 actually licensed black dispensary owners. Now when I say licensed, that doesn't include California because California is going through the licensing process now, which will obviously bring on you know more minority faces and more female faces. But currently as it stands right now across the nation, there's less than 10.

GEOFF TURNER: And I know there's some sort of family history that makes this especially significant to you and the implications of black people, people of colour, being involved in this business. Can you tell me a bit about that?

WANDA JAMES: When I met my brother. We grew up same father, different moms, we grew up in different households. And when I met my brother he was just coming out of prison and he said to me, you know sis I just got out of prison and I said, what were you in prison for? And he said you know it was four and a half ounces of cannabis. And I didn't believe him because in my world, which is a very white middle class, upper middle class world, University of Colorado, nobody got arrested for smoking pot. I mean even after graduation when I looked at my circle of people who got high or that I got elevated with, I prefer elevated to high, I mean it was elected officials and doctors and lawyers and other business people. None of us ever went to jail. So when I met my brother coming from a poor black background, I quickly found out that that we are targeting a group of people that don't have the means to defend themselves against what I would probably call extremely racist and biased laws. And to people out there that don't know what four and a half ounces of cannabis is please don't confuse that with being a lot of cannabis by any stretch of the imagination. If you take your four fingers and put them together and imagine a baggie with your four fingers full of a baggie, just a sandwich bag, with four fingers full, that back in the day was basically an ounce of weed or $40 of weed. My brother went to jail for four and a half ounces, which would have been $60 per ounce. So my brother went to jail for about, what is that, four times six, $240 worth of cannabis. And yes, he went to jail for simple possession and my brother had to pick a 100 pounds of cotton every day. So he worked every day. I think he got one day off a week of which he picked 100 pounds of cotton to buy his freedom. So what's important about that is a young black man in the United States of America had to pick cotton to buy his freedom. And that is cruel and unusual punishment in my estimation because there is nothing more sickening to an African-American than to pick cotton.

GEOFF TURNER: How hopeful are you that there are more opportunities for people of colour to seize that opportunity like you have?

WANDA JAMES: I mean of course I think that we're going to see more and more people get involved in the industry of colour. But here's my issue right is we're moving across legalization across the United States right now. And to be honest with you, people of colour are already being left out. Here in Colorado we came out and said that if you had a drug felony, you could not be an owner in this industry when it first started out. You couldn't even work in the industry, which was why we had to fire my brother. So my brother initially was my grower and after 1264, which was the rules here passed, I had to fire my brother because he had a drug felon, so he could not work for me. Now if my brother was a rapist, he could have worked for me. It was just the drug felony part, which made no sense because in my mind, those were the visionaries. So just like Bill Gates and you know Steve Wozniak for creating computers in their garage in 1976, these were the people that were growing cannabis in the garage in 1976. You know so these were the visionaries behind the plant that we weren't allowed to hire. So are things going to get better and are we going to see more people of colour? Yeah we are. But what's critical right now is we're losing ground on being the owners of this industry and making the real money in this industry. White America was quick to put us in jail, so I'm kind of demanding that we are quick to be owners because if we can be inmates, we should be able to be owners on the other side.

[Music]

GEOFF TURNER: So the big highlight of the My 420 bus tour was a visit to the Euflora greenhouse. This is where they grow a lot of the bud that Bobby was showing off to me back at the dispensary. Among grow operations in Colorado this one is small potatoes, but it does give a sense of the capital investment behind this industry. There's a lot of expensive looking lighting and those fans that you can hear. And along one wall are several very imposing looking safes. That's where all that valuable bud stays for a while before it hits the stores. For many of the folks on the bus this is kind of a pilgrimage. There's almost a reverent hush as we enter and standing in the midst of the greenhouse, you're reminded of what the fuss is all about. A modest looking plant that you wouldn't think twice about if it didn't have such power when it meets the human brain.

CW: You've been listening to Cannabis in Colorado with Geoff Turner. It was produced by Rafferty Baker, Jessica Linzey and Geoff Turner who was also the host of the CBC podcast on drugs. You can find the podcast, including another episode from Colorado at cbc.ca/ondrugs. And be sure to tune into The Current tomorrow, as we take an in-depth look at what legalization will mean for Canadians with our special program, Into the Weeds. That's our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q. Musician Dan Mangan is on the show today. Finally we're going to leave you with a scene from the brand new season of the CBC original podcast, Someone Knows Something. In season 5, host David Ridgen travels north to Thompson, Manitoba to investigate the cold case murder of 15-year-old, Kerrie Brown. We'll leave you with Nicole Zarodhney, one of the last people to see Kerrie alive. You can subscribe to the new season of Someone Knows Something wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Connie Walker. Anna Maria Tremonti will be back tomorrow. Thank you for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: PTSD is funny eh. As soon as I talk about it I can feel and smell everything that I did back then and it was just starting to snow. It was October, but and it was Thompson and it was just slightly snowing and I can just feel a little snowflakes on my face. And I was calling her and I walked around the back of the house and I could see her footprints in the slight snow.

VOICE 2: Did you notice any other footprints next to hers from the house?

VOICE 1: There were no other footprints. There were only hers and they stopped at the end of the driveway. There were fresh tire tracks, which at the time I I thought you know I didn't pay a lot of attention to. I just thought they had covered up her footprints. So then I couldn't tell, which way she would have gone. I followed the footprints to the end of the driveway and there were no more footprints. There was a moment when I just felt like we are never going to find her and I was like I was losing my mind. And I was hollering at my friends like we're not going to find her. It's hard to get over stuff like that.

Back To Top »

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

Oct. 16, 2018 episode transcript

More Stories Like This