ANN ARBOR, MI — Ann Arbor is getting another $1.5 million in marijuana tax revenue from the state of Michigan in 2025 and city leaders propose spending it several ways.
That includes $150,000 for the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County that operates the Delonis Center homeless shelter downtown, $250,000 to help launch an unarmed crisis response program and nearly $800,000 to continue criminal legal system diversion and deflection programs.
Nearly $60,000 is planned to continue a criminal record expungement program, while $75,000 is to go toward ambulatory nursing care through Michigan Medicine, plus $75,000 to help fund a new community space inside the Dunbar Tower being built at Fourth Avenue and Catherine Street.
Those are all ongoing commitments from the annual revenue the city collects due to marijuana businesses operating in the city, City Administrator Dohoney said, and he’s proposing one new commitment: $84,000 for the Home of New Vision Engagement Center, an addiction treatment facility in Ypsilanti impacted by sudden federal funding cuts under Trump.
The center provides supervised crisis intervention and the city is trying to help it get stable, Dohoney said, calling it “a casualty of federal policy.”
Dohoney noted the city is receiving about the same amount of marijuana money as last year.
“We seem to have peaked in the interest in buying marijuana from the 23 outlets that we have,” he said. “It stays essentially flat every year.”
Detroit, Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids among top recipients of Michigan marijuana tax money
Because costs for some ongoing commitments are rising, there’s less leftover money for City Council to decide how to spend, Dohoney said in a budget presentation to council Monday, April 21, though he told council members there’s still about $616,000 they will get to make decisions about in May. That’s an existing fund balance from marijuana revenue.
Dohoney emphasized his budget plan continues the practice of setting aside some of the annual marijuana funds for an unarmed crisis response program the city hopes to eventually launch as an alternative to police for certain situations.
“The administration has the same goal that it’s had: We need to do it right versus doing it fast,” Dohoney said of the initiative that’s been in the works several years.
The city is taking notes from seeing such programs in action in Albuquerque, Atlanta, Denver and Durham, he said.
“They all have a very narrow range of situations that they respond to,” he said. “None of them are 24/7.”
Many of them agree 24/7 service is not attainable and they all say starting with a pilot program is the way to go, he said.
“You must have a system to track all data — when did the person call, how long did you talk to them, how long did it take for the dispatch to happen, etc., and it’s very expensive,” he said. “In Atlanta, as an example, it’s $6 million a year.”
Atlanta contributes $2 million annually to its program, while the NFL and foundations also kick in money, Dohoney said.
“And in every place that we’ve looked, the person in charge is not a clinician,” he said. “They’re the one chasing the dollars. The clinician is managing the response teams.”
Dohoney said he intends to present a proposed unarmed response model to council this fall.
“And then we’ll see what it takes to actually get it started,” he said. “But we would say that the way that we’re going about it, which has been affirmed by other communities who have been in our place, is the right way to proceed.”
Ann Arbor reallocates $3.4M in federal stimulus funds intended for unarmed response
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Ann Arbor is getting another $1.5 million in marijuana tax revenue from the state of Michigan in 2025 and city leaders propose spending it several ways. Read More
