Youngstown council to vote on accepting 2 citizen proposals for ballot

YOUNGSTOWN

City council will vote Wednesday to accept two citizen-initiative petitions for charter amendments and pass them along to the Mahoning County Board of Elections to determine if they’ll appear on the fall ballot.

“Council’s passage doesn’t mean [its members] support the proposals,” said city Law Director Martin Hume. “It just means there are enough signatures and it is being moved to the board of elections.”

It’s a ministerial duty to vote on accepting the petitions, meaning council has no choice but to do so, Hume said.

Whether the board of elections will certify the proposals and allow them to be considered by city voters in the fall election will be determined at a Sept. 6 meeting. If rejected, petition supporters say they’ll appeal to the secretary of state and if needed, take the matter to court.

One proposal is a fracking ban that’s been rejected six previous times by voters and the other changes how elections are run in the city.

A state law that took effect April 6 requires a board of elections to invalidate a local initiative petition if it determines any part of the petition falls outside the local government’s constitutional authority to enact it.

State law gives jurisdiction over fracking to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

Read more about the situation in Wednesday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.