Medical marijuana will soon be available for the masses in Portage Michigan.

Mlive has reported that..

The Portage City Council voted 4-2 to approve two ordinances allowing five types of state-licensed medical marijuana facilities to operate within Portage.

The ordinance for the growing, selling and processing the plant comes after over 500 hours of talks and plenty of rules and regulations regarding the drug.

Medical Marijuana facilities must stay 1,000 feet from...

  • public housing
  • schools
  • playgrounds
  • pool,
  • recreation areas
  • and parks
  • religious institutions
  • vocational schools
  • colleges or universities
  • state-licensed child care
  • preschool centers
  • rehabilitation facilities
  • public or private youth centers
  • public swimming pools

On top of that all facilities can not be located near a residential zoning district.

There are a number of supportive votes  for the ordinance, one comes from Jevin Weyenberg who represents Lake Effect. Jevin told Mlive...

"This is about the health for our community, this is about dignity for patients, It's the right thing to do for many other reasons than that. (It's) very conservative; we won't be inundated with medical cannabis facilities in my opinion."

Another pro push for the business comes from David Benac, a democratic candidate for the 6th Congressional District...

"The things we are consistently hearing is public opinion is drastically in favor of moving on this. This is a really important economic development opportunity for the district."

Stores will not be opening anytime soon. The process to obtain a license takes at the very least six months and they can not be transferred or sold without the cities approval.

I guess we will see in a few months how these businesses take flight or crash.

 

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