ANN ARBOR, MI – This year’s Hash Bash will be different now that Michigan voters have legalized recreational marijuana.

While that’s a milestone sure to be celebrated by thousands of pot enthusiasts at the 48th annual rally on the University of Michigan campus Saturday, April 6, their fight for cannabis reform continues.

“We’re going to refocus our efforts from state to federal, because federal policy needs to change,” said Mark Passerini, Hash Bash co-organizer and co-owner of the Om of Medicine marijuana dispensary on Ann Arbor’s Main Street.

“We won at the state level, so a lot of this year’s Hash Bash will be a celebration, as opposed to the big protest that it’s been for the past 48 years, but we don’t want to get anybody too excited.”

Because cannabis is still classified by the federal government as a Schedule I illegal drug alongside heroin and LSD, the ability to even do scientific research on it is limited.

“It’s really criminal that universities and health care professionals and scientists cannot touch this medication to just do science, just to study it,” said Evan Litinas, Om of Medicine’s chief medical officer.

Hash Bash comes this year as cannabis culture in Ann Arbor is at an all-time high, with dozens of marijuana-related businesses laying roots here, including new dispensaries and grow operations, and even cannabis bakeries and a high-tech science lab.

Hash Bash, as has been tradition, is still equal parts smoke fest and political rally, so the forecast is cloudy with a chance of politicians.

Scheduled to join cannabis activists at Saturday’s noon rally on the UM Diag is U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Dearborn.

She’s on a long speakers list that includes longtime activists such as John Sinclair and Adam Brook, as well as state Rep. Yousef Rabhi, D-Ann Arbor; state Sen. Jeff Irwin, D-Ann Arbor; Ann Arbor City Council Member Anne Bannister; and former state Sen. David Knezek, now legislative director for state Attorney General Dana Nessel.

As usual, Ann Arbor musician Laith Al-Saadi will be performing the national anthem on electric guitar to kick things off.

The event on the Diag runs from high noon until 4:19 p.m., after which attendees are encouraged to shift over to the Monroe Street Fair, a big street party taking place about a block south.

What attendees do at 4:20 p.m. is up to them, organizers say, but it’s expected many will be lighting up — or continuing to light up.

Smoking marijuana in public is still illegal, though, and UM police are typically on hand at Hash Bash and do enforce state law on campus.

The rules are more lax on city property. Ann Arbor decriminalized marijuana in the 1970s.

Longtime cannabis activist and business owner Dori Edwards offers this public service announcement: “Smoke it on Monroe Street. Do not smoke it on the university grounds.”

“I don’t want to see anyone arrested,” she said.

The Monroe Street Fair, featuring live music and street vendors, runs from noon to 6 p.m., overlapping with Hash Bash, and is billed this year as a “huge legalization victory party.”

Right in the middle of it all is the Green Planet medical marijuana dispensary off Tappan and Monroe streets.

“At Green Planet, our calendar doesn’t begin on Jan. 1. It really begins on Hash Bash, because that’s one day a year thousands of people come,” said dispensary owner Mike McLeod, who first attended Hash Bash as a UM student in the 1970s.

“The leaders in our movement throughout the state show up, as well as people from outside the area.”

While this year’s event will serve as a victory party, legalization activists like McLeod say they’ve still got a lot of work to do.

Michigan is still working on regulating the fast-growing marijuana industry, and products sold at licensed dispensaries are now required to go through safety-compliance testing at labs like PSI Labs in Ann Arbor. Many dispensaries are still working on getting licensed.

“It’s just kind of been an unfortunate aspect of prohibition that we’ve all been subjected to unregulated supply chains of cannabis, if you choose to use it medically or otherwise, so this is an important part of changing that to bring it more in line with other consumer goods,” said Lev Spivak-Birndorf, chief science officer at PSI Labs.

Irwin, who will be speaking as a state senator on Saturday, attended Hash Bash as a UM student in the 1990s.

“I go to a lot of different political events all over the state for a lot of different causes, and Hash Bash, ever since the 1990s, has been well attended and with a diverse attendance, so it’s really an interesting event,” he said. “I think a lot of people think certain things about it that are not aligned with how it really is. I just think people would be surprised at the breadth of people who come out to support cannabis law reform. You’ve got people of all ages, you’ve got people of all races, you’ve got gender diversity.

“Hash Bash is a rally to call for change with a lot of passionate speakers and then a couple politicians. You know, whether it’s Laith Al-Saadi shredding at the beginning or hearing from people who have been hurt by the war on drugs, I think it’s a compelling event.”