MERIDIAN TOWNSHIP - After a discussion over the recreational use of marijuana the Meridian Township Board voted 7 to 0 to introduce an ordinance prohibiting the sale of recreational marijuana until the Board can then determine whether they want to allow it once they've gathered more information on recreational use.

Meridian Township Treasurer Phil Deschaine said, "We've spent a lot of time discussing marijuana the past few months. Mainly aren't almost entirely on the medical marijuana side in here. Now we're moving onto recreational marijuana and I believe we need opt out of recreational marijuana, we can at some point opt back and the majority of this board decides to opt in. But as we've been given caution by legal counsel by taking no action at all we can in effect open the door for recreational marijuana facilities to open up in the Township by our inaction. I think we need room to settle down first to see how the medical marijuana facilities and based on that we'll know how to act on recreational marijuana at some time if you ..but I don't believe that future to allow recreational marijuana is here today. So for that reason I'll be supporting this ordinance."

Trustee Patricia Herring Jackson said, "We also don't know how the state is going to implement the results of the referendum vote relative to recreational marijuana. We may know that as soon as at the end of this month, but the state actually has until the end of the year to provide that information for us."

Supervisor Ronald J. Styka said, "Once we do have the right experience etc. with the medical marijuana and know what we want to do how we want to do it, I will support opting out at this time from the recreational. I would also point out that although we spent almost two years dealing with the medical and coming up ordinances and we might think well it won't be that hard with recreational, we can piggyback on that."

This was just an introductory vote, the Board will look to discuss this at the next regular Board meeting.