Deadline Detroit | Hazel Park Lounge Could Be Michigan’s First Legal Pot-Smoking Establishment

A taste of the Netherlands is set to arrive soon at John R in Hazel Park, where one of Michigan’s premier marijuana parlors is scrambling to get the necessary permits to open.

Hazel Park and Kalkaska are the first cities where potential pot smoking sites have submitted state licenses, reports Crain’s Detroit Business. Unfortunately, however, the trade publication says you won’t be able to choose from a bud menu like you can at weed hangouts elsewhere – it will be BYOP.

The name of the cream-painted storefront along John R in Hazel Park reads in black letters: Hot Box Social. The company is set to become the first in Michigan where smoking weed in a company is legal. It submitted application documents in January and is awaiting some changes before it can potentially receive a consumer establishment license and begin operating.

A big problem for Hot Box Social and all other consumer lounges is that they cannot legally sell cannabis on site. Typically, they get around this problem by having customers buy the product from a nearby retail establishment and bring it themselves, or by having their edibles or flowers delivered to the consumption site. Delivery is allowed.

Hot Box is located at 23610 John R, north of Nine Mile Road.

Nearly 300 Michigan municipalities have reportedly approved ordinances authorizing the settlements.

In Metro Detroit, Hazel Park has no local limits on consumer lounges that have been registered by the state, while Ferndale and Warren have banned them. Highland Park allows three. Detroit, if its proposed recreational cannabis ordinance passes, will allow 35 consumer lounges to operate within its borders.

Although marijuana is legal for recreational or medical use in the majority of US states, bar-style consumption has been slow to develop. According to the Cannabis Industry Journal, fewer than 10 states currently allow lounges, and the pandemic has stifled growth where they are allowed.