Written by Janet
Ronald Higgerson has his own solution to Flint Michigan’s ailments – grow and sell medical marijuana. But here’s the catch – he doesn’t want everyone smoking it — just growing, harvesting and selling tons of it as part of a local medical marijuana industry.
If he’s elected mayor in August, Higgerson plans to make the city a manufacturing hub for the drug, putting unemployed laborers to work. The political unknown is running as a write-in candidate for the Aug. 4 mayoral election. He says not only will it create jobs the medical marijuana industry could also unite a city with a history of racial tension.
Higgerson is stone cold sober about his plans to transform Flint from “Vehicle City” to “Cannabis City,” in which millions of marijuana users across the United States could get their supply from Flint.
A maverick candidate if there ever was one, Higgerson, 46, has entered the mayor’s race even though he realizes the odds are against him — at least for now. Voters in Flint and across Michigan overwhelmingly approved medical marijuana use, but the drug is still illegal under federal law.
He says the now closed Flint Central High School could be the growing site, part of what he sees as the larger Flint Cannabis Research Center. His message is clear - ”The people voted,” he said. “Let’s regulate it, tax it and educate.”
A little history on Higgerson > He is a fourth-generation Flint resident and former truck driver turned struggling artist who paints and sculpts. His great-grandparents owned and operated the local Budapest Cafe in the late 1920s.
He attended Atherton schools and went to college, only to stop a couple credits short of getting a degree in art, he said. He said he was a marijuana activist back in the 1970s and ’80s.
He lived in California and Nebraska for awhile before returning to Flint in 2007 and now lives on the city’s east side. Higgerson admits he’s not perfect, citing a past drunken driving conviction and a “not-so-good” personal credit rating. But he said he’s advocating for the cannabis research center for the benefit of all patients in need of medical marijuana. Higgerson himself said he uses the drug to help with lingering back pain from a car accident.
His campaign Web site outlines an elaborate effort to change federal law to allow for more “open and honest” production and research of the drug. Among his plans for Flint: construct a research center near the Flint River to partner with local universities and create “municipal grow rooms” in vacant buildings.
While it’s legal for those who have state-issued cards to possess the drug, there’s nothing in the law that spells out how people get hold of it, said Genesee County Prosecutor David Leyton. As for Higgerson’s ideas, Leyton said he’s not convinced of marijuana’s effectiveness as a medicinal drug, but understands it helps some patients deal with terminal illness.
Josh
/ 07/22/2009I am a 37 yr old male that has broke my back twice and have consistent pain and the only way to not be in pain and relax is to smoke marajuana. I live outside Ann Arbor and would be willing to move to Flint and help his cause. General Motors built Flint and now is gone, Michigan legalized medical marajuana but has no plan of distrubution and his plan seems to be the only plan as far as l have heard. Somebody besides Ronald needs to come up with a plan besides Ronald!! If l lived in Flint l would be out in the streets talkin to people and letting them know that this man has a point.