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Right to petition often repressed
(by Dave Lange - September 11, 2008)
Right to petition often repressed
The good citizens of South Russell Village and Chester Township who recently circulated referendum petitions in the good faith that they hold for democracy, only to have them unceremoniously dumped by local government, are understandably disillusioned. They just don't understand how the system works.
Oh, sure, the First Amendment to the Constitution supposedly guarantees Americans the right "to petition the government for a redress of grievances." Unfortunately, they don't have the right to a government that will listen. In order to guarantee its right not to listen to the citizens, the government has set up a petition system so laden with idiosyncrasies and minutiae that it can stomp out dissent and wipe out valid signatures at will.
And that is what usually happens.
The salaries of local law directors, solicitors and elections board directors may be paid by the citizens, but the taxpayers would be mistaken to believe that those public officials actually work for the public. No, they work for local politicians, and sometimes that means working against the citizens, especially when they dare to file petitions.
In South Russell, 247 valid signatures were gathered by residents seeking a vote by the citizenry on the village's decision to pursue a sewer line on Maple Hill Drive. The village solicitor declared the petitions "deficient" based on details relating to the attachment and filing of the ordinance being challenged, even though the petitioners had based their procedure on advice from Village Hall.
In Chester, 487 signatures were gathered by neighbors asking for a vote by their fellow citizens on the township's agreement to rezone land along Chillicothe Road (Route 306) from residential to commercial. An influential lawyer hired by the developer of that property convinced the Geauga County Board of Elections to throw the petitions out based on "deficiencies" associated with the inclusion of maps and details regarding deed restrictions in the rezoning summary.
Not only must petitioners jump through twittering hoops, but the government can raise or contort those hoops however it wishes.
Back in the mid-1990s, the government of Orange Village found so many ways to thwart citizens' petitions that it would have been comedic, except that it was so anti-democratic.
When Orange citizens sought a vote on a new $3 million municipal building, they were blocked for failing to include a warning about imprisonment and fines for falsification. When they launched a recall petition against elected officials, then-Mayor Joseph Dubyak threatened them with a $6 million lawsuit for making "false and defamatory" claims, which actually proved their point about "political manipulation" and "consistent disregard for the citizens." And when Orange residents called for the installation of bike paths, the Village Council clerk, despite having no handwriting expertise, claimed forgeries were on enough petitions to deem 94 percent of the 286 signatures invalid, including the mayor's.
Finally, after the law director tried to scuttle a petition for voters to decide on unionization of the Orange Police Department, based on another inventive "deficiency," it was the village's logic that was found to be flawed. The 8th District Court of Appeals unanimously ordered the charter amendment on the ballot, and voters overwhelmingly approved the police union.
Once in awhile, there still is such a thing as government by the people -- but not if the government can avoid it.
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