Medical marijuana fight loses buzz as Saginaw council squashes moratorium plans

January 11, 2010, 10:00PM
By Justin L. Engel | The Saginaw News

All was relatively quiet along the medical marijuana front Monday, three weeks after 30 advocates crashed a City Council meeting to protest a temporary freeze on the legalized drug’s sale, use and cultivation within city limits.

Two people — included one regular attendee — showed up at the latest council meeting to support medical marijuana.

Days earlier, Saginaw Mayor Greg Branch said City Hall officials decided to skip a planned six-month moratorium, in part, because of the public outrage. Instead, they will move ahead on plans to adjust zoning language to fit state law legalizing the drug for medical purposes.

Gregory R. Switala, secretary of the Tri-City Compassion Club, a Great Lakes Bay Region medical marijuana advocacy group, spoke out at the sometimes-rowdy December session.

He returned Monday with a different message:

“I want to start out by thanking the city for taking a second look at this,” the Clio resident said. “I think the city made the right decision here.”

A main complaint was that the freeze would make it illegal for a person to register as a medical marijuana patient during the six-month period.

Leaders said the intent was to stop business prospectors from capitalizing on Saginaw’s lack of medical marijuana zoning while planners rewrote the ordinance.

Switala encouraged the city to zone against capitalists who might make their medical marijuana businesses too public.

“This wouldn’t be a storefront,” he said. “Please, by all means, zone that. We would understand that.”

Earl G. Jesse, a longtime council critic and Saginaw Housing Commission member, also chimed in on the topic.

“(Marijuana) is not the great danger it’s made out to be,” Jesse said. “It’s not much different than other painkillers. It’s kept a lot of sheriffs, judges and NARC squads busy.”

Branch said officials, including City Manager Darnell Earley, agreed planners can outpace business capitalists by finishing the new zoning language in four to six weeks rather than the six-month period the moratorium would have allowed.