Medical marijuana backers plan Mount Clemens protest

Supporters of the Michigan Medical Marihuana law plan to descend on Mount Clemens on Thursday to object to the state and local government trying to shut down a Chesterfield Township facility that provided a site for marijuana transactions.

Protesters from the Macomb/Oakland Compassion Club, Michigan Medical Marijuana Association, local representatives for Americans for Safe Access and advocates will rally before a court hearing regarding the township and state Attorney General Bill Schuette vs. Big Daddy’s Management Group, which operates the Chesterfield and other “compassion centers.”

An evidentiary hearing is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. in front of Judge John Foster of Macomb County Circuit Court. Schuette joined the case recently after the township filed a legal action asking the judge to declare the Gratiot Avenue facility between 23 and 24 mile roads a nuisance and in violation of the zoning ordinance.

MMA advocates say the case’s outcome will be significant because it could encourage or discourage dozens of medical marijuana facilities around the state to open. Many sites stopped transactions at their facilities following the state Court of Appeals’ August ruling in People vs. McQueen, which arose from Isabella County.

“If the distribution model is struck down it would signal a close to some of the remaining 100 distribution centers still servicing the sick and injured statewide,” said Rick Thomson, Big Daddy’s board member and editor of Michigan Medical Marijuana Magazine, in a prepared statement.

He said Schuette’s intervention in this and other cases show his aggressive stance against the MMA.

The Act was passed by voters by 63 percent in 2008, allowing those with patient or caregiver cards to possess certain amounts of marijuana and plants.