Thursday, August 18, 2016
YOUNGSTOWN
A citizen-initiative charter amendment in Sebring to fire the village manager without a severance package will not be on the Nov. 8 ballot because of a mistake with one of the petitions.
Corey Hughes, a former Sebring street department worker who led the effort, failed to write in “38,” the number of signatures he collected on one petition.
That’s considered a “fatal error” under state law and resulted in the rejection of that petition, according to Mahoning County Board of Elections Director Joyce Kale-Pesta.
Without that petition, only 86 signatures were determined by board employees to be valid. To get on the ballot, the proposal needed 97 valid signatures.
However, because of Sebring’s village charter, its clerk of council could have allowed the proposal to be approved, Kale-Pesta said.
But after getting a legal opinion from village Solicitor Theresa T. Tolson, Clerk Malea Sanor chose to not certify the petition.
“I’ve accepted the village solicitor’s opinion and it will not be on the ballot,” Sanor said.
In the opinion, Tolson wrote that the village could “challenge the decision of the board of elections of Mahoning County if the village believes the board engaged in fraud, corruption, abuse of discretion or clear disregard of statutes or pertinent law.”
Tolson concluded the opinion by writing the board did none of those and the village “has no basis for challenging the board of elections determination that the initiative petition does not contain the requisite number of valid signatures to be placed on the ballot.”
Hughes said, “It was a technical error on my part. I apologize to the people for my mistake. I messed up.”
High levels of lead in the village’s water garnered criticism and national attention, particularly when it was discovered that village officials were aware of the problem for at least five months before the public learned about it in January.
Village Manager Richard D. Giroux put James Bates, who operated the village’s public water system, on paid administrative leave while a state investigation into the high lead was ongoing.
He then fired Bates when the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency prohibited Bates from operating any public water system in the state and revoked his license.
Also, two EPA officials were fired and one was demoted as a result of the investigation.
Bates was charged last month with three misdemeanor counts for failing to provide timely notice of the high lead.
Before the public learned of the lead issue, The Vindicator reported that Bates had alerted Giroux in an email about the water condition. Giroux contended in January that he didn’t know about the water condition. Earlier, he said he didn’t remember the email.
Meanwhile, the board of elections Wednesday certified every other issue submitted to it by last week’s deadline to appear on the Nov. 8 ballot.
Before the board could vote, however, a Shell gas station at 2209 Wilson Ave. in Campbell withdrew two liquor options.
The board would have rejected the proposal for not having the proper paperwork if the business didn’t withdraw the petitions, Kale-Pesta said.