Michigan has issued a statement that forces the shutdown of unlicensed medical marijuana facilities by March 31, 2019. The shut down has been a long process as the impacted parties sued Michigan twice over the past six months. Michigan originally attempted to shut down the unlicensed entities on September 12, 2018. Effected parties brought an action against the state, and the court agreed to stop the shuttering process. The parties were to return to court on December 15, 2018 to continue the proceedings. Michigan then adopted emergency rules that accelerated the closure date to October 31, 2018. The emergency rules require temporary marijuana operations to cease operations on October 31st if a municipality has not authorized it to operate pursuant to an adopted local ordinance, or is in the process of adopting a local ordinance. Another series of lawsuits again stopped Michigan from forcing the closure of unlicensed medical marijuana facilities.
Now, marijuana facilities that receive a state operating license must record the beginning marijuana product inventory in the seed-to-sale tracking system, test the product prior to sending to dispensaries, and for untested inventory, dispensaries must obtain a certification from the patient or primary caregiver that the product has not been tested.