It appears increasingly unlikely that a proposal to legalize marijuana in Michigan will make the ballot in November, but organizers say they haven’t given up.

Supporters of the proposal, which would make cannabis legal for adults 21 and older, said on Wednesday they’ve collected about 40,000 signatures, reports Tim Martin at mlive.com . That’s a long way from the nearly 323,000 signatures they need by July 9 to make the ballot and allow voters to decide.

The effort to collect signatures is continuing, according to Committee for a Safer Michigan organizer Matt Abel. He said he hopes volunteers working on the campaign will submit thousands of signatures in the next few weeks and gain new momentum for the push.

“Unless things change, it looks like we won’t make it,” Abel said Wednesdayd. “Realistically, we have an uphill battle.”

Supporters of the campaign had hoped to build on the momentum of 2008’s ballot proposal which legalized medical marijuana in Michigan. That one was very popular, passing with 63 percent of the vote statewide. It carried every county in the state.

Frustration about court rulings and the unfriendliness of law enforcement to the medical marijuana law and patients were part of what motivated the campaign to legalize cannabis more broadly, according to Abel.

If the ballot proposal falls short this year, there will be continued efforts to make the ballot at a later time, according to Abel.