Board of Trustees hear marijuana appeals, approve building portal

HARRISON TOWNSHIP — The evening of Aug. 26 was for taking care of business. Marijuana business, that is.

The Harrison Township Board of Trustees heard appeals from two marijuana businesses during its final meeting of August. Appeals are made when a marijuana business loses its license to operate in the township for failing to become operational within two years. With any number of factors determining whether a business begins operating in that window, appeals for an extra year of pre-operations are allowed.

First up for appeals was Hazel Park Growth, which has not been able to begin operating due to unfinished construction at its Production Drive site.

“This is our only marijuana business that is from the ground up starting as a new building,” Township Clerk Adam Wit said. “They purchased the location from another business right before the start of the pandemic and have been building out the location since then.”

Having appeared before the board twice to request appeals since 2022, trustees believed Hazel Park Growth’s claims that the site was close to completion and granted them a third appeal. Construction is expected to end within two months though state licenses still need to be granted before operation can commence.

Pure Roots was the second and final company of the night to appeal the loss of its license. The company’s Joy Boulevard location currently operates as a processing facility with work underway to add a growing operation. Growing requires a license from the state, which Pure Roots did not have at the time of the meeting but expected to acquire by the end of September. The company also has some owed taxes that are expected to be paid once the grow license is awarded. Wit and Township Supervisor Ken Verkest initially proposed a limited appeal lasting through Nov. 15, while Trustee Biran Batkins proposed extending the deadline through Dec. 1.

“I know it’s only two weeks but it’s a little bit more time,” Batkins said. “I did go by there today. It looks 100% better than it did this time last year.”

Trustees approved the Dec. 1 permit extension for Pure Roots. Pure Roots has also come to the board for two extensions in the past, both for unpaid taxes. Appeals were granted in both 2022 and 2023.

 

Building Department online upgrade
Trustees approved adopting the BS&A Online portal for the Building Department, adding a new suite of options for the department and its customers. BS&A Online allows for people to apply for, request and view project documents online.

“This creates additional access to data for users,” Verkest said. “If someone wants to look something up and see what’s happening on a particular project — I see my neighbor is working in their backyard, but I don’t know if they have a valid permit — you can go on here and see that there’s a permit associated with it. Right now, you can’t.”

Wit said the ability for residents and contractors to access documents online could cut down on people visiting the department’s desk, such as what happened when the township adopted an online assessing portal.

“(Assessing) data didn’t used to be online. You used to have to pay for it,” Wit said. “So we said let’s make that free for residents, and the counter traffic went from dozens a day to nobody a day, and long term allowed us to outsource our assessing department and realize costs. I’m not saying we’re outsourcing (the) building (department) or anything like that, but once people have access online and are able to do it there’s a remarkable drop in in-person visits.”

Wit said about 50-60 of the Freedom of Information Act requests this year have been related to building documents, which would be eliminated by allowing people to directly access documents through BS&A Online.

Trustees approved purchasing BS&A Online for an initial cost of $10,065 including the first year of service, project management and planning, on-site training and related travel expenses. The yearly cost of service is $5,105. Applying online will cost $3 per application.