Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

Remember Mapes telling everyone that this Referendum petition on ordinance 2002-94 was just an administration type procedure? Even if the petition would reverse the council?’s passage of the ordinance, houses would still be built? Do any of you remember that?

So this Tuesday, OCTOBER 1ST 2002 at 7:30 PM the PICKERING CITY COUNCIL WILL RESCIND ORDINANCE 2002-94 and pass a new ordinance 2002-126 in its place. Now tell me is the Pickerington city council using their power of declaring an emergency on an ordinance just as a convenience or are they trying to stop the referendum petition circulating around the city? Does passing Ordinance 2002-126 as an EMERGENCY have anything to do with any necessity for an emergency?

Does the city of Pickerington care about the laws of OHIO? Recently the Ohio Supreme Court ruled against the City of London Ohio for doing the same thing. Is the Law Director about ignore the law again?

Everyone that reads this WEB site should attend the Pickerington City Council meeting this Tuesday. You don?’t need to speak. You can be a witness to the freedoms of the city of Pickerington being stolen from you. You can watch the leadership of the Fairfield County Republican Party violate the law to give favors to a developer. You can watch Craig Maxey abstain again but he does work for them. Really! You can watch the Pickerington Law Director figure out a new way to explain why this ordinance must be passed as an emergency with total disregard for any court cases that have gone before him.

For those of you that don?’t know Pickerington City Council has done this before. On March 1st 2001 they rescinded ordinance 2000-137. That was the ordinance to rezone everything coming into Pickerington as R-4. The circulator got 490 signatures in one day and the city wouldn?’t let the voters have a chance to vote on it. Now they are doing it again.

But what is also happening this time around is that the schools are asking for more money to operate on and this council wants to allow 340 more homes to be built in the school district. Are they concerned at all with YOUR CHILDREN AND GRAND-CHILDREN ARE THEY CONCERNED ABOUT YOUR ABILITY TO PAY THESE NEW TAXES? This community better wise up in a hurry. If you cower in your homes n Tuesday night you will have let this happen to you all. This city council is not more than thugs and bullies. Bullies run when you stand up to them. Its time you stood up. Its time we all stood up. Tell them your mad as hell and you are not going to take it anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


By Patrick Henry

Important clarification/correct

Important clarification / correction

The matter of passing legislation by a local government and then rescinding that legislation to avoid the outcome of a referendum is the next form ?“abuse?” being indicated here in Pickerington.

A correction is necessary so that readers are correctly aware of previous facts.

The previous poster made reference to a late 90?’s or year 2000 decision by the Ohio Supreme Court case in which the governing body of London pushed though a large annexation of 800+ acres under ?“old annexation laws?”. Citizens of the area successfully processed a referendum to have a citizen?’s vote on the issue of that annexation. London?’s governing Council then repealed the original annexation ordinance and passed a new annexation ordinance by ?“emergency?”, thus disallowing the citizen?’s vote on the issue.

That process (repealing a referred Ordinance before a citizen?’s vote and passing a like Ordinance via Emergency) was appealed to the Ohio Supreme Court. The Court?’s decision was by vote of 5-2 that this action was legal. So that our readers are aware the dissenting Justices were Pfifer and Stratton. In their arguments of disagreeing with the majority Justices Pfifer & Stratton indicated it was their opinions that this practice denied the voters their Constitutional rights to referendum and would set up a precedent whereby this abuse of the use of ?“emergency legislation?” would create the potential for future abuses. The Supreme Court never defined the ?“proper?” uses of ?“Emergency Legislation?” in a manner to avoid further application of this practice.

Justice Stratton now faces considerable pressure in her bid for re-election. Some of which comes from people who think her actions against this uncontrolled use of governmental emergency powers are not in their best interest.

My reason for posting is that their is previous case law (the London case) that allows this repeal and passage of an identical Ordinance by ?“Emergency?”. Personally, I concur with Justices Stratton & Pfifer in their vision to see the additional potential abuses.

Readers may additionally now understand why there has been so much ?“road blocking?” by this current Council and Law Director against any form a Charter change approved by the Pickerington voters to limit this Council?’s uses of ?“emergency?” ordinances & resolutions.

Recalls



Between now and Tuesday someone should prepare the recall petitions. We can all begin signing them at the council meetings. Fll in the name of anyone on council who votes to thwart the right of referendum.

As noted earlier, there should also be an proposed ordiance to placed on the ballot terminating Robert Mapes and Joyce Bushman.



By Oliver Wendell Holmes

PATA?’s impressive facts

True to their mission of getting out the facts PATA?’s Contact person has done it again. I took Mr. Harding?’s information and plugged it into a good search engine and there it was almost to the word.

I?’ll paste the URL to the website that search engine found and you can cut and paste it for yourself. Scroll down to the case Taylor vs. London
http://www.ohlawyersweekly.com/ohsup/990411.htm

Here were Justice Stratton?’s words exactly.
Lundberg Stratton, J., dissenting. I disagree with the majority?’s conclusion that property may be annexed through ''emergency'' legislation not subject to a referendum. I believe that allowing such a process deprives Ohio citizens of their right to a referendum provided under Section 1f, Article II of the Ohio Constitution.
This case presents a clear example of how such an interpretation can lead to an abuse of this important right. In this case, the Board of Commissioners of Madison County had approved two petitions annexing land to the city of London and the London City Counsel passed two ordinances accepting the annexations. Referendum petitions were timely filed. The city of London then repealed the two annexation ordinances, and passed them again as ''emergency legislation,'' thereby circumventing the referendum attempt. It is difficult for me to imagine a more deliberate attempt to thwart a constitutional right. I fear that the majority?’s approval of this procedure will provide a road map to each municipality in the future to avoid referendums when they have been filed, as we set forth no guidelines or exceptions for allowing such circumvention but rather grant wholesale approval to the emergency process.



By I?’m awed