Mt. Pleasant city planners made two recommendations for changes in the city’s proposed medical marijuana facilities ordinance following a public hearing Thursday evening.
The Planning Commission recommended that the city not put a limit on the number of processing centers, secure transporters and safety compliance facilities that could be in the city. The proposed ordinance currently calls for a limit of three.
Buffer zones – the issue that has taken up much of the discussions in the past year – also were discussed, with the board recommending that the businesses be allowed on the north side of Broadway Street downtown.
Currently, the city is considering a buffer zone of 1,000 feet from public schools, which would eliminate a good portion of the downtown.
The recommendations are not binding. They will be forwarded to the City Commission, which has a public hearing of its own set for May 29 and a work session set for June 4.
small crowd attended the meeting at City Hall and four people spoke during public comment. All four were in favor of the ordinance in general, but had some specific concerns.
City Commissioner Kristin LaLonde and City Manager Nancy Ridley also were in the audience to watch the proceedings.
City Commissioner Lori Gillis was among the four speaking during public comment, but she said she was there as a private citizen, not as a commissioner.
She urged the board to consider the facilities to be just like any other business, with a secure transporter being similar to a trucking business, a provisioning center being similar to a pharmacy, etc. Her comments drew applause from the audience.
Deborah Cary, who hopes to open a provisioning center at 309 W. Michigan St. with business partner Glenn Bordine, spoke at the public hearing, urging the commission to consider giving preference to local license applicants if that is possible.
When the Planning Commission discussed that aspect, City Planner Jacob Kain indicated the city’s attorney has said the city cannot give preference to local over nonlocal.
Planning Commissioner Glen Irwin noted the city could not legally require that the owner of any other type of business be a Mt. Pleasant resident.
Craig Aronoff, from Cannabis Legal Group, and Samuel Kilber, who are each representing would-be applicants, urged the city to reconsider its idea of using a lottery system if there are more applicants than licenses available.
Planning Commissioner Michael Kostrzewa had concerns about the 1,000-foot-buffer zone for the businesses to keep them away from schools, as he felt that would eliminate too much of “old downtown,” an area he thinks could benefit from having them.
Sacred Heart Academy and Mt. Pleasant Public Schools both sent letters to the city earlier this year, advocating for the 1,000-foot buffer zones.
Kostrzewa, who noted that he is a Sacred Heart graduate, said he isn’t concerned with medical marijuana facilities being near the school.
As a compromise, Planning Commissioner Corey Friedrich suggested using an approach the city is already using for part of Mission Street, where the east side of the street is exempted from a 500-foot buffer zone regarding CMU’s main campus. He suggested they allow the businesses on the north side of Broadway. That would keep businesses away from Sacred Heart but still would allow them in parts of the core of downtown.
Kostrzewa was willing to accept that, and the commission voted to approve the recommendation.
It would only affect provisioning centers. All of the other types of facilities have to be in industrial areas.
Planning Commissioner Kathy Rise proposed changing the limits on the number of facilities and the board supported her. The recommendation is no limit on the number of processing centers, secure transporters and safety compliance labs, which all would have to be in industrial zones.
Rise favored limiting the grow operations to three, as is the case with the draft ordinance now.
She also tried to get support for a motion that 1,500-plant grow operations could not stack their licenses (meaning more than one at the same location). That motion did not have support.
The public hearing before the City Commission will be part of the meeting at 6:30 p.m. May 29 at City Hall.
City commissioners have set a work session for 6:30 p.m. June 4 at City Hall to discuss the input they receive at the public hearing.