Illinois Investors Jump into Marijuana Business

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) - Investors around Illinois are jockeying for positions in the marijuana business as they wait for the state’s new medical marijuana law to kick in. And some of them are politically connected.

According to the Springfield bureau of Lee Enterprises, Sam Borek has reserved at least three-dozen marijuana-related business names. Borek was a college roommate of the legislator who sponsored the law, Democratic state Rep. Lou Lang of Skokie.

Those companies have names like Illinois Medical Marijuana Sales Inc., Illinois Cannabis Realty Inc. and Cannabis Medical Centers of Illinois Inc.

And then there’s David Rosen of Chicago. He was Gov. Pat Quinn’s chief fundraiser in 2010 and also raised money for Hillary Rodham Clinton and Al Gore.

Rosen has filed paperwork to open a medical marijuana business in Nevada called Waveseer. But he’s registered that business name in Illinois, too. Rosen’s investors, according to state records from Nevada, include a number of Quinn donors.

But Borek says he has already run into a potential hurdle.