ACHTUNG: The following is not a “fair and balanced” article. It is an editorial by the editor.
The public hearings Tuesday night at the Wayland City Planning Commission were disappointing, mostly for three huge reasons.
The first reason could be summed up in three quotes: “That ship has sailed.” “That train has left the station.” “The horse is out of the barn.”
A number of people who showed up to discuss the merits and demerits of marijuana as a substance, but their arguments were lost in the understanding that Michigan voters twice, in 2008 and in 2018, have agreed to have cannabis use legalized.
Four years afterward, the City of Wayland finally adopted a local ordinance permitting the sale and distribution of marijuana. So that ship has sailed and debate about whether it should be bought and sold are as useful as trying to bring back alcohol prohibition.
The second reason is the hypocrisy and discrimination associated with the notion that alcohol sale and distribution is perfectly OK and family friendly while the same for marijuana is not. Now that cannabis is legal, it behooves local government not to discriminate or it could face legal repercussions.
It was astonishing that a local business owner talked about the family friendly and positive atmosphere of Wayland’s downtown, which includes two places that sell alcohol, two bars, a brewery and formerly a distillery. But a marijuana establishment would ruin it?
I call hypocrisy and discrimination.
The third reason was that the very same people who so often extol the virtues of the invisible hand of the free market say there will be too many marijuana businesses in “Weedland.” Though I agree four pot shops right now probably are too many, we should let that invisible hand of the free market decide the winners and losers, not the government.
Kudos to the Planning Commission and Chairman JD Gonzales for steering this debate into a more rational discussion and explaining that a majority of voters have declared weed legal, so it’s their job to follow the law.
As an added footnote, those who assert a majority of Wayland folks oppose pot in our city, 58 percent of them voted in 2018 to legal recreational use.
It’s OK and understandable for some folks to express their opinions in opposition, it’s a free country. It’s also OK for our elected officials to follow the law, even if we don’t like it.
