Override of O’Brien’s residency veto to be tried

Council requires seven votes to override the mayor’s veto.

By TIM YOVICH

VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF

WARREN — A city councilman says he will ask fellow lawmakers to override Mayor Michael J. O’Brien’s veto of legislation that would allow city workers to live outside the city.

Councilman Robert Dean, D-at-large, said Friday that he will make a motion from the floor during council’s Wednesday meeting to override the mayor’s veto and retain the city’s residency policy.

It takes seven votes to override the veto.

Dean said he won’t solicit backing of his measure but will “see where it goes.”

He said the continuing legal battle over the residency issue is going to cost the city money that it doesn’t have.

The state Legislature had approved effective May 1, 2006, a measure that allows city employees to live outside the city limits.

But O’Brien pointed to the state’s Home Rule Amendment that says, “municipalities shall have authority to exercise all powers of local self-government and to adopt and enforce within their limits such local police, sanitary and other regulations that are not in conflict with the general law.”

That amendment, the mayor wrote to council informing it of his veto, empowers cities to exercise all powers of local self-government and permits them to adopt and enforce, within their limits, police regulations that do not conflict with the state’s general laws.”

He asserted that limiting regulations, such as eliminating a residency requirement, “unjustly intrudes on the rights of cities and villages to govern as they feel necessary.”

City council has twice voted to support the state’s residency law, and it’s the second time the mayor vetoed it. Council couldn’t override the first veto.

In casting his veto, O’Brien wrote that on Dec. 4 the 3rd District Court of Appeals struck down the 2006 state residence law. However, it only applies to the 13 counties surrounding Lima.

The mayor said that city finances stand to become weakened with city workers residing outside the city by affecting city merchants and property tax income, which has already been battered by the downsizing of Delphi Packard Electric Systems.

In addition, the mayor asserts, the residency requirement promotes and stabilizes property values in the city and maintains strong neighborhoods that are anchored by stable wage-earning city employees and their families.

yovich@vindy.com