Menominee grants three conditional marijuana licenses

MENOMINEE — The City of Menominee has granted conditional marijuana retail licenses to three businesses that are built out and prepared to open.

“We have started moving forward and have issued a retail license to the following: Highwire Wire Farms, Per I/Urb and Per II/Puff,” City Manager Brett Botbyl stated in an email.

He said the licenses are contingent on the businesses passing all state and local inspections, codes, rules and full payment of application fees and/or past due/current taxes.

This action comes as the result of a Nov. 3 ballot initiative that saw about 60% of voters approve increasing the number of marijuana licenses from nine to 13. There currently are eight licensed marijuana retailers in the city.

All three of the businesses granted conditional licenses took different paths to get to this point. Highwire Farms, 1015 10th St. (corner of 10th Street and 10th Avenue), was part of a 2023 settlement agreement. Puff Cannabis, 2305 10th St. (the former Family Video location), was built out and ready to open last summer but could not get approval from the city. Urb, 1015 26th Ave. (the corner of 10th Street), has been ready to open for more than a year.

All three have lawsuits against the city. Botbyl, in a follow-up email, said waiver language (to not sue the city) is contained in the city’s original and renewal applications. He stated the licenses expire every Feb 28, and a new renewal application must be submitted with appropriate application fees every year.

Puff owner Nick Hannawa said he’s pleased and ready to move forward.

“This is what we wanted from day one,” he said. “Just to get our license. Puff looks forward to opening and doing a major grand opening and celebrating not just the opening of Puff, but the ending of a really bad era for Menominee. I’m really honestly happy for the the city. I’m happy for the people that voted yes because they ended the lawsuits and they basically are going to make Menominee a better place now.

“There’s no reason for all this stuff to have taken place, outsiders that came in and did some really bad things.”

Hannawa said he didn’t want to talk about lawsuits.

“We never wanted to sue the City of Menominee,” he said. “What we wanted was our license. We just wanted to do business and to be allowed to do what we were told we could do when we applied for our permits and received our license, quite frankly, but you know how that went. This whole concept of suing is because we weren’t allowed to open our store.”

Highwire Farms co-owner Eric Kennedy called the action “progress” but said he’s leaving everything up to his legal team. He said he was told he would get his certificate of occupancy (CFO) today (Thursday).

“I will let our attorney handle the details,” he said. “The reality is if you don’t make the state happy, it doesn’t matter what the city wants.”

Hannawa said although he’s not a resident of Menominee he’s glad for the community.

“If I was that person that was able to help the city through this dark, dark time,” Hannawa said. “Thanks to me and the mayor (Casey Hoffman) who never gave up. We never gave up. Otherwise there would have been who knows how many years of litigation, right or wrong.”

Hannawa said he would like to open the store this month, hopefully by Thanksgiving (Nov. 26).

Urb co-owner Marvin Yono was not available for comment by presstime.