Salem officials to allow public vote on annexation

By D.A. WILKINSON

wilkinson@vindy.com

SALEM

Residents picketing a special council meeting Thursday evening got what they wanted.

Mayor Jerry Wolford withdrew his plan to add an emergency clause to an ordinance to block a pending referendum over the city’s plan to obtain about 99 acres in Perry Township in Columbiana County and Green Township in Mahoning County. The area is on the west side of U.S. Route 62.

Wolford wanted the land for expansion of the city, and a judge upheld the annexation measure.

But Wolford said that after Wednesday’s meeting, he had “come to the conclusion that at the present time, it would be prudent of city council to either table or dismiss the issues” and let people vote on the annexation in the November election.

The mayor had said that the emergency clause would halt the referendum effort and could not be challenged, but he said that was his interpretation of the law.

Council voted unanimously to table the issue.

Wolford said that the 977 signatures of city residents gathered on the petitions indicated that “Those who signed for it to be put on the ballot did so out of various reasons, but the main one seems to be that they want the people to vote on it.”

Wolford said he would try to clear up any misinformation about the issue.

Aveyah Cline of the Veterans and Citizens Group Watch said that members had circulated petitions to put it on the ballot.

“We didn’t feel that everyone was educated,” she said.

She was among the people who protested outside city hall before the meeting with signs that read, “Let us vote” and “Power to the people.”

A key property owner in the annexations that would connect Mahoning and Columbiana counties, Robert D. McCluggage, had tried to back out of the plan. He said after the meeting that he had been “lied to” by a friend about the annexation proposal. That person no longer works for the city.

The city has no money to develop the land.