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Federal Lawsuit Filed Over State Ballot Initiative Process
By: WOUB News Team
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ATHENS (WOUB) — Residents of two local counties have joined others around the state in a federal civil rights lawsuit claiming elections officials have violated their right to put initiatives on the ballot.
The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund filed the suit Friday in a U.S. District Court in Youngstown against Boards of Election in Athens, Meigs, Portage, Medina counties; Youngstown, Toledo and Columbus; and Secretary of State Frank LaRose.
The process to get initiatives on the ballot has become a moving target for citizens, according to CELDF’s Ohio Community Organizer Tish O’Dell.
“Especially like in Athens, they proposed a charter three different years and we would try to make adjustments based on what the court had said,” she said. “But then it would change. Next year they would change their mind and say ‘Oh, you did that but now you have to do this.’ It becomes very difficult to get anything on the ballot.
The charter government initiative in Athens County sought to keep the county from being a disposal site for fracking waste and seeks to regulate the county’s water supply use in fracking.
The proposal, submitted by The Athens County Bill of Rights Committee and written with the help of the CELDF, was rejected in 2015, 2016 and 2017.
“The complaint says that the entire Ohio ballot initiative process is a violation of the separation of powers doctrine,” according to a release sent out Monday by the CELDF. “It states that unelected administrative election boards (in the executive branch) have turned away ballot initiatives based on their content, thus usurping the powers of the judicial branch. The courts, in upholding those decisions, have been complicit in defendants’ unlawful actions.”
The organization assisted citizens with unsuccessful petitions to state courts. This will be their first attempt at the federal level.
The Boards of Election in Athens and Meigs counties did not comment on the lawsuit.