LAKE ISABELLA ADOPTS MEDICAL MARIJUANA REGULATIONS

The village of Lake Isabella has become the first mid-Michigan
community to adopt an ordinance regulating medical marijuana distribution.

Village Manager Tim Wolff said the Village Council adopted a law that
classifies an individual medical marijuana caregiver as a "home
occupation," not subject to further village review. At the same time,
it outlaws medical marijuana dispensaries, where groups of caregivers
provide medical marijuana to groups of patients.

"The law seems to be intended to have a very personal relationship
between the patient and caregiver," Wolff said. A registered
caregiver, who cultivates marijuana under the voter-passed law, would
have to comply with the law.

But Wolff said the Lake Isabella Planning Commission had problems
with the idea of a dispensary.

"We don't think that a dispensary is legal under the Michigan Medical
Marijuana Act," Wolff said. The term is not mentioned in the law.

"A dispensary would, honestly, be an inviting site for crime," he said.

Dispensaries have opened in some communities, including Mt. Pleasant,
and have been subject to legal challenges. A court case involving the
Compassionate Apothecary, a dispensary that opened in downtown Mt.
Pleasant, is pending.

Wolff said the planners exhaustively documented their research into
the effects on neighborhoods of medical marijuana dispensaries. He
said that might be necessary if the village's law is challenged in court.

"The Michigan Medical Marijuana Act is so vague it probably invites
litigation," Wolff said.

The law, adopted by voters in 2008, passed overwhelmingly statewide
and in the area that includes Lake Isabella. Village voters in that
election voted in Sherman or Broomfield townships, and it's not
possible to break out the vote for village, but Wolff noted that the
initiative passed by more than a 60 percent margin in both townships.

He said it's clear that the law, meant to provide a way for people
suffering from chronic pain to obtain a drug they feel might be the
only way to provide that relief, has support. But, he noted, the
Michigan law appears to conflict with federal law, and the process of
sorting things out is only beginning.

The changes in the village zoning ordinance are part of an overall
revamp of the law that regulates home-based businesses, Wolff said.

Lake Isabella, when it incorporated 12 years ago, simply adopted the
language of the Sherman Township zoning law. Since then, the village
has gradually updated the law to meet its own needs.

The former law put restrictions on many home occupations, such as
hairdressers, tax preparers or people engaged in e-commerce.

"Why make them jump through hoops when they have no impact on the
neighbors?" Wolff said.