It's Time to Clear the Haze and Define Medical Marijuana Law

The nation's most outspoken advocate for medical marijuana has advice
for anyone who wants to open a dispensary in Michigan: You better think twice.

"Running a dispensary in Michigan, under current law, is very risky,
and I would advise against it," Keith Stroup, founder of the National
Organization to Reform Marijuana Laws, told the Detroit Free Press in
a recent interview.

That is how murky the legal situation is in Michigan, where residents
strongly favor the concept of medical marijuana, but public officials
are struggling with even the most basic questions about how to apply
the new state law that allows it.

Ann Arbor, where public sentiment in favor of medical marijuana is
particularly strong and where an estimated eight or nine dispensaries
already are operating, is among the communities trying to find its
way through the legal haze.

Whatever Ann Arbor officials do, they should be guided by an
understanding that the community wants people who are eligible for
medical marijuana to receive it, and the purpose of local regulations
should be to facilitate that intent, and not to thwart it.

In 2004, a proposal to amend the Ann Arbor City Charter to allow the
growth and use of marijuana for medicinal purposes when authorized by
a physician passed locally with 75 percent of the vote. Four years
later, Michigan voters approved a referendum that legalized medical
marijuana statewide. That state law went into effect last year.

This week, the Ann Arbor City Council will take a first pass at
regulating medical marijuana when it considers final approval of a
proposed ordinance that would govern the location of dispensaries or
medical-marijuana growing operations in the city.

The carefully crafted ordinance was approved unanimously by the city
Planning Commission earlier this month after a process that included
input from medical marijuana users and the "care givers" who provide
it. Those discussions led to some seemingly unnecessary restrictions
being pruned from the measure.

Among other things, the proposed ordinance defines dispensaries and
limits them to downtown, commercial, and manufacturing/industrial
districts, as well as in some planned united development districts.
It wouldn't allow drive-through dispensaries, and no one under 18
could enter a dispensary without an adult or guardian.

We think the Planning Commission made a good faith effort in the
midst of significant legal uncertainty to create a sensible
ordinance. We encourage the City Council to approve it on Thursday.
But make no mistake: This is a first step only.

The city still faces important questions ahead. How will such
facilities be licensed? Will they be inspected? Should there be
purity standards for the product they grow or sell, as is the case in
some other states? Should the city require that the medical marijuana
be locally grown, as opposed to imported from other states?

As the city grapples with these and other questions, it should be
careful how far it ventures by itself into uncharted legal territory.
The same can be said of those who would operate dispensaries.

The state law, for all its good intentions, was a citizen-drafted
referendum that was vague or silent on many important issues. It does
not, for instance, address dispensaries at all. As state Appeals
Court Judge Peter O'Connell recently wrote in a recent opinion:
"Pressure and confusion result from trying to operate under a system
where no one has stepped forward and stated specifically what actions
are legal and what actions are not."

The uncertainty is only magnified by the reality that medical
marijuana remains illegal at the federal level, though the current
administration is taking a lenient stance toward states that have legalized it.

In Michigan, the best solution would be for the state to take a more
active role in defining legal issues that could then be applied
consistently statewide, as in California and Maine, where all
dispensaries are required to be non-profit organizations.

Some cities are simply refusing to allow dispensaries until the legal
situation becomes clearer. That's not a viable option for Ann Arbor,
where the support for medical marijuana is too strong to forestall.
The public is going to insist that the city move ahead on this issue,
and be a leader in setting standards for how and where medical
marijuana is distributed.

Absent clarity in Michigan, we will have to look elsewhere for best
practices. It would also make sense for cities and city attorneys
across Michigan to be in contact with each other to share information
and ideas on the issue. To some extent, that's already happening.

In the meantime, we'd like to see the Ann Arbor City Council approve
the ordinance that at least begins to define how dispensaries and
growing operations will operate locally, and put the same amount of
thought and effort into the regulations that necessarily will have to follow.