Justia Ohio Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

On June 26, 2015, Mark H. Curtis filed a nominating petition and statement of candidacy to become a member of the school board of the Twinsburg City School District. The filing consisted of six part-petitions. At issue in this case was the validity of “Petition 1.” The board of elections declared Petition 1 invalid and struck the part-petition in its entirety because the circulator wrote that it contained twenty signatures from qualified electors and the board determined that there were twenty-one signatures on that part-petition. Curtis subsequently sought a writ of mandamus to compel the board to count the valid signatures on Petition 1. The Supreme Court granted the writ of mandamus, as Curtis presented undisputed evidence that that the unregistered voter whose signature was at issue had crossed out his own signature. View "State ex rel. Curtis v. Summit County Bd. of Elections" on Justia Law

Relators circulated a petition to amend the city charter of Kent. The Kent city council voted against certifying the issue to the Portage County Board of Elections for inclusion on the November 3, 2015 ballot. Relators subsequently filed this a petition for a writ of mandamus to compel the city of Kent to certify the proposed charter amendment to the Board. At issue before the Court was how many valid signatures were required to place the charter-amendment initiative on the ballot. The Supreme Court granted the writ, holding that State ex rel. Huebner v. W. Jefferson Village Council established that Relators submitted sufficient signatures in this case. View "State ex rel. Wilen v. Kent" on Justia Law

On August 3, 2015, proponents of the "Community Bill of Rights" presented to the Youngstown City Council a proposed amendment to the city charter of Youngstown. The City Council passed an ordinance directing that the proposal be sent to the Mahoning County Board of Elections for placement on the November ballot. The Board voted not to certify the Community Bill of Rights to the ballot, concluding that it was an unconstitutional law. The City of Youngstown commenced this action against the Board of Elections, its individual members, and Secretary of State Jon Husted seeking a writ of mandamus to compel Defendants to certify the ballot measure to appear on the November ballot. The Supreme Court (1) granted the writ against the Board and its members, holding that the Board exceeded its statutory authority in rejecting the ordinance solely because it considered the measure to be unconstitutional in its effects; but (2) denied the writ against Husted, as Husted had not taken any action with respect to the proposed amendment, and therefore, any relief against him would be premature. View "State ex rel. Youngstown v. Mahoning County Bd. of Elections" on Justia Law

During the investigation of a complaint that Arlie Risner was hunting without permission, Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Division of Wildlife (“ODNR”) officers seized parts of an antlered white-tailed deer. Risner later pled no contest to hunting without permission, and the court ordered the meat and antlers forfeited to ODNR. ODNR subsequently notified Risner that he owed $27,851 in restitution to the state pursuant to Ohio Rev. Code 1531.201. Risner filed a declaratory-judgment action against ODNR alleging that the order of restitution was illegal and unconstitutional because the state had taken possession of the deer in the criminal proceeding. The trial court ruled in favor of Risner. The Court of Appeals reversed. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that section 1531.201(B) permits ODNR to file a civil action to recover the civil restitution value of an antlered white-tailed deer even though it had seized the deer meat and antlers as evidence in the investigation of an offender who was convicted of a violation of Ohio Rev. Code 1531 or 1533 or a division rule and was awarded possession as a result of the conviction. View "Risner v. Ohio Dep’t of Natural Res., Ohio Div. of Wildlife" on Justia Law

On August 18, 2015, the Ohio Ballot Board adopted ballot language for State Issue 3, a proposed constitutional amendment to Article XV of the Ohio Constitution. Secretary of State Jon Husted issued the ballot title one week later. On August 27, 2015, Relators, the signature-gathering organization ResponsibleOhio and others, commenced this action seeking a writ of mandamus compelling the Ballot Board to replace the ballot language drafted and approved to accompany Issue 3 on the November 2015 ballot. Relators also sought a writ of mandamus against Husted in connection with Issue 3’s ballot title. The Supreme Court granted a writ of mandamus with respect to four specific paragraphs of the ballot language and denied a writ of mandamus as to the title. View "State ex rel. ResponsibleOhio v. Ohio Ballot Bd." on Justia Law

Electors in the counties of Medina, Fulton, and Athens filed petitions to adopt charters their their respective counties. Secretary of State Jon Husted sustained protests against the three petitions, invalidated the petitions, and ordered that the charter proposals shall not appear on the ballots for the November 3, 2015 general election. Relators commenced this expedited election case seeking a writ of mandamus to compel Husted to reverse his decision and compel placement of the charter measures on the November ballots. The Supreme Court denied the writ, holding (1) Husted lacked the authority to reject the petitions on the ground that the charters unconstitutionally interfered with the State’s exclusive authority to regulate oil and gas operations; but (2) Husted’s alternative basis for invalidating the charter petitions, namely that the charters did not satisfy the threshold requirements that define a charter initiative, was within his discretion. View "State ex rel. Walker v. Husted" on Justia Law

This contract dispute was a portion of ongoing litigation initiated by the governing Boards of ten Cleveland community schools (“the schools”). Defendants were two private for-profit companies and ten subsidiary companies that operated and managed the schools (collectively, “White Hat”) pursuant to contracts with each school. The State Board of Education was also named in the complaint. The governing authorities of the schools filed suit challenging the operation of a buy-back provision of the contracts stating that the schools could retain personal property owned and used by White Hat in the schools’ daily operations after termination of the contracts only by paying certain payments to the management companies. The court of appeals affirmed the trial court’s judgment in favor of White Hat. The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the court of appeals to the extent that it held that the buy-back provision of the contracts was enforceable and that the schools were obligated under that provision to pay for the personal property purchased by White Hat as described in the contract. Remanded to the trial court for an inventory of the property at issue and its disposition according to the contracts. View "Hope Academy Broadway Campus v. White Hat Mgmt., LLC" on Justia Law

The Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District (the “Sewer District”) filed an action seeking a declaratory judgment that it had the authority to implement a regional stormwater-management program and to impose fees to be charged to landowners within the Sewer District. The trial court declared that the Sewer District had authority under Ohio Rev. Code 6119 and its charter to enact a regional stormwater-management program. The court of appeals reversed. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the Sewer District has authority to implement a regional stormwater-management program and to charge fees for that program. View "Northeast Ohio Reg’l Sewer Dist. v. Bath Twp." on Justia Law

A former administrative judge issued an order mandating that the board of commissioners of Lorain County appropriate an amount of money to the county sheriff to add security measures at the the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas’ adult-probation department (APD) and presentence-investigation unit (PIU). The current administrative judge, Mark Betleski, then issued an order giving the commissioners the option to appropriate the money to the court, with the court then giving the money to the sheriff’s office for the same purpose. The commissioners filed this action for a writ of prohibition forbidding enforcement of the order. The Supreme Court granted the requested writ, holding that Judge Betleski and the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas lacked jurisdiction, in the absence of a case or controversy, to enforce entries that ordered the commissioners to appropriate money to the sheriff’s office for security at the APD and PIU facilities. View "State ex rel. Lorain County Bd. of Comm’rs v. Lorain County Court of Common Pleas" on Justia Law

On November 20, 2014, the city council of Fremont, Ohio passed an ordinance authorizing the mayor to proceed with the process of removing the Ballville Dam. A referendum petition was delivered to Paul Grahl, Fremont’s city auditor, but Grahl did not transmit the referendum petition to the board of elections. Appellants sought a writ of mandamus in the Court of Appeals seeking to compel Grahl to transmit a certified copy of the ordinance, along with the petitions, to the board of elections. The appellate court denied the writ, concluding that the ordinance was not subject to referendum. The Supreme Court reversed and granted the writ, holding that the ordinance was subject to referendum. View "State ex rel. Szymanowski v. Grahl" on Justia Law