Pierreville, Quebec
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pierreville, Quebec is a community in Nicolet-Yamaska Regional County Municipality, Quebec, located at the confluence of the Saint Lawrence and Saint-François rivers, at the edge of Lac Saint-Pierre.
Pierreville faces the town of Saint-François-du-Lac from across the Saint-François river, and lies at the junction of Route 132 and Route 226. Part of the Indian reserve of Odanak is an enclave within the city limits of Pierreville; in fact, the limits of the reserve begin only a short walk away from the town's main street.
[edit] Cannabis culture
The town of Pierreville has gained notoriety in recent years owing to the increasingly widespread industry of illicit cannabis culture. The industry is lucrative by all accounts, with workers being paid $25 CAD per hour to harvest the crop.[1] One group of observers reported spotting at least $10 million CAD worth of cannabis plants during an aerial flyby.[2] In some cases, farmers seem to have adopted the new crop themselves to increase their revenues; in others, the plants have been introduced into the fields of unsuspecting farmers by criminal gangs, who often resort to coercion and intimidation to prevent farmers from interfering with their operations.
The ubiquity of marijuana culture has earned Pierreville the nicknames of "Cocotteville" (Budtown) and "la Petite Colombie" (Little Colombia)[3], as high school students are routinely recruited to work in the fields—with parents sometimes recruiting their own children—and local politicians begrudgingly welcoming the economic prosperity the pot industry brings.
[edit] References
- ^ La politique régionale en bref Le Sorel-Tracy Magazine, December 2004.
- ^ À Pierreville, la marijuana devient une industrie ! Radio-Canada Estrie.
- ^ Un impact social majeur Radio-Canada Estrie.
[edit] External links
- (French) Culture du pot: les gens de Pierreville s'inquiètent, Le Devoir, September 24, 2004
|
||||||||||||||
 |
This Quebec location article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
