Quasi-Legal Marijuana Smoke Room Opens in Regina

It has been nearly three weeks since Dean Foster, owner of Field of Dreams in Regina, opened a safe-inhalation room—where medicinal marijuana users can toke up—in the back of his 11th Ave. store, and it has yet to be raided by police.

Foster, who has still not received any confirmation as to the legality of the smoke-room, opened the doors to his safe-inhalation room on March 5 not knowing whether the police would come and raid his business. Foster says that he tried contacting the Regina Police Service and Health Canada, adding Nobody’s told me that it’s illegal, and nobody’s told me that it’s legal.

As far as Foster is concerned, he is not breaking any laws. Only licensed medicinal marijuana users can use the room. The safe-inhalation room uses equipment that minimizes the health-risks of smoking. There’s no combustion, the THC is vaporized so there’s no smoke, says Foster.

The room is through the back door of his shop. Graffiti art covers the walls. Comfortable seating is available. The air is filled with the mellow sounds of reggae music, but what the air is lacking is the smell of marijuana, attesting to the fact that pot is being inhaled, but not smoked. According to Foster, people assume that because a person is licensed to smoke pot, that they are somehow lucky. It’s not a lucky thing, he says, these people are ill and the reason they’re smoking pot is because nothing else has worked for them.

Foster believes that medicinal-marijuana users are being persecuted. He says that because his clients are ill, they are often on a fixed budget. Many are forced to rent homes or apartments where the landlords don’t even allow cigarette smoking, let alone pot. Those who do have their own homes also have need for a safe-inhalation room. Foster recalls one woman who was licensed to use medicinal-marijuana, but nearly lost her children to Child Protection Services, after neighbors complained about the smell.

Foster’s safe-inhalation room has seen quiet success. Foster says that the room is being used daily. He is insistent that it is not a haven for so-called ‘pot-heads’. There are only maybe 50 people who have licenses in Saskatchewan. Many don’t live in Regina, or are able to smoke at home. The most people I have seen in the room at any time was three.

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