
VICTORIA — B.C.’s largest First Nation is accusing the provincial government of stalling its application for a retail cannabis licence while it races to open its own public store in the community’s prime retail location.
The Cowichan Tribes on Vancouver Island are in the sixth month of trying to get approval for two retail store licences from the provincial government. As the Cowichan wrestle with a wall of red tape, and are repeatedly rejected for nation-to-nation talks with the province, the B.C. government is competing against the First Nation for the municipal rights to open a store in the community’s largest shopping centre.
Government’s licensing delay on one hand and its attempt to outflank the Aboriginal community on the other, have left Cowichan Tribes Chief William Seymour outraged.
“It seems as if they are delaying us so they can ensure their store opens in Cowichan,” Seymour said.
At issue is who gets to open a cannabis store at the busy Cowichan Commons shopping plaza across the highway from the province’s popular Forest Discovery Centre just north of Duncan.
Both Cowichan Tribes (through a partnership venture called Costa Canna) and the government’s cannabis branch have applied to the District of North Cowichan.
But without a security check and licence from the province, the district can’t hear Costa Canna’s application. The situation was inflamed further in April when the government’s cannabis branch wrote a letter to the district requesting it move on from the Cowichan Tribes and focus solely on its application because another arm of the same government had yet to approve Costa Canna’s application.
[…]