Title: State ex rel. Hazel v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Elections

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

THE STATE EX REL. HAZEL ET AL. V. CUYAHOGA COUNTY BOARD OF ELECTIONS ET 
AL. 
[Cite as State ex rel. Hazel v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Elections (1997), ___ Ohio 
St.3d ___.] 
Elections — Mandamus compelling Cuyahoga County Board of Elections to 
submit proposed building code ordinance to the city of Parma electorate 
at the November 4, 1997 election — Writ granted, when. 
 
(No. 97-1822 — Submitted September 22, 1997 — Decided September 23, 
1997.) 
 
IN MANDAMUS and PROHIBITION. 
 
In July 1997, relators, resident electors of the city of Parma, filed an 
initiative petition with the Parma auditor.  The petition contained over 7,000 
signatures and requested that a proposed ordinance be placed on the November 4, 
1997 election ballot.  The title and text of the proposed ordinance, as set forth in 
the initiative petition, provided: 
 
“PART FIFTEEN — BUILDING CODE be Amended by adding the 
following section thereto: 
 
“CHAPTER 1529.  General Building Regulations. 
 
“(1529.44) Penal Facilities Acquisition/Construction/Regulation 
 
“(A.)  The City of Parma, Ohio may establish, erect, maintain, and regulate a 
jail, workhouse, station house, prison, and farm school, so as long as the combined 
total number of inmates, prisoners, detainees, or arrestees held throughout the 
entire City at anytime, does not exceed 15.  [Sic.] 
 
“(B.)  The City of Parma shall not maintain any facility which houses for 
any period of time an inmate, prisoner, detainee, or arrestee who is not or was not 
incarcerated as a result of an offense committed within the boundaries of the City. 
 
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“There is an exception in this subsection (B.), for inmates, prisoners, 
detainees, or arrestees who are awaiting an appearance before the Parma 
Municipal Court; however, such an inmate may not be incarcerated in the facility 
for longer than 24 hours. 
 
“(C.) The City of Parma shall not maintain any facility as noted above in 
any residentially zoned area or an otherwise zoned area that abuts any residential 
area; there is an exception in this subsection (C.), for the current facility that exists 
at West 54th Street. 
 
“(D.) All ordinances, resolutions, proclamations, motions and provisions 
inconsistent with this Section, and these Subsections (A.), (B.), (C.), (D.), (E.), are 
hereby repealed and declared null and void. 
 
“(E.) This section shall be severable if any Subsection, Part, Word or 
Application thereof is held invalid for any reason by a court of competent 
jurisdiction and the holding of invalidity of any subsection hereunder or word 
hereunder shall not have an effect upon the rest of the section hereof.” 
 
After holding the initiative petition for at least ten days, the auditor 
transmitted a certified copy of the text of the proposed ordinance and the petition 
to respondent Cuyahoga County Board of Elections.  The board returned the 
petition to the auditor with a statement attesting that it contained signatures of the 
required number of electors for placement on the ballot.  The auditor then certified 
the validity and sufficiency of the petition and requested that the board place the 
proposed ordinance on the November 4, 1997 election ballot. 
 
On August 5, 1997, Walter A. Savage filed a written protest with the board, 
claiming that the petition was invalid and could not be lawfully submitted to the 
electorate.  Savage set forth the following grounds for his protest: 
 
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“1)  The Petition attempts to control administrative actions, and therefore 
contravenes Article II, Section 1f of the Ohio Constitution; 
 
“2)  The title of the proposed ordinance is omitted, a violation of Section 
731.31 of the Ohio Revised Code; the Petition does not present a fair, accurate and 
unambiguous question for the electors of Parma, Ohio.”   
 
On August 26, the board held a hearing on the protest.  At the conclusion of 
the hearing, the board sustained the protest and held that the initiative petition was 
invalid because it violated the requirement of R.C. 731.31 that initiative petitions 
contain a full and correct copy of the title and text of the proposed ordinance.    
The board thus refused to place the proposed ordinance on the November 4, 1997 
election ballot.  
 
Two days later, relators filed this action. Relators request a writ of 
mandamus directing respondents, the board and its members, to submit the 
proposed ordinance to the Parma electorate at the November 4, 1997 election and 
a writ of prohibition to prevent the board from granting the protest and refusing to 
submit the proposal to the Parma electors on the November 4, 1997 election ballot.    
Respondents filed an answer and a motion for summary judgment, and the parties 
subsequently filed evidence and merit briefs. 
 
This cause is now before the court for consideration of the merits. 
__________________ 
 
Law Offices of R.A. Pelagalli and Rodger A. Pelagalli, for relators. 
 
Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Cuyahoga County Prosecuting Attorney, Patrick J. 
Murphy and Jeffrey I. Sherwin, Assistant Prosecuting Attorneys, for respondents. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam.  Relators initially request a writ of mandamus.  The board’s 
decision to uphold the protest will be set aside and a writ of mandamus will issue 
 
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to compel placement of the proposed ordinance on the November 4 ballot if the 
board engaged in fraud, corruption, abuse of discretion or clear disregard of 
statutes or applicable legal provisions.1  State ex rel. Hawkins v. Pickaway Cty. Bd. 
of Elections (1996), 75 Ohio St.3d 275, 277, 662 N.E.2d 17, 19.  Relators assert 
that the board abused its discretion and acted in clear disregard of applicable law 
by refusing to certify the proposed ordinance for the November 4 election ballot.  
An abuse of discretion connotes unreasonable, arbitrary, or unconscionable 
conduct.  State ex rel. Richard v. Seidner (1996), 76 Ohio St.3d 149, 151, 666 
N.E.2d 1134, 1136. 
 
The board determined that the initiative petition was invalid because it 
violated the requirement of R.C. 731.31 that each petition part contain a “full and 
correct copy of the title and text of the proposed ordinance.”  Omitting the title 
and/or text of a proposed ordinance is a fatal defect because it interferes with the 
petition’s ability to fairly and substantially present the issue and might mislead 
electors.  State ex rel. Thurn v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Elections (1995), 72 Ohio 
St.3d 289, 292, 649 N.E.2d 1205, 1208. 
 
The board ruled that the requirement of R.C. 731.31 was not satisfied 
because the title and text of the proposed ordinance are ambiguous and 
misleading.  But the board erroneously relies on cases in which the title and/or text 
of the ordinance was omitted or which involved the requirement of a summary for 
zoning referendum petitions.  See State ex rel. Esch v. Lake Cty. Bd. of Elections 
(1991), 61 Ohio St.3d 595, 575 N.E.2d 835 (petition did not include title of 
proposed ordinance); State ex rel. Burech v. Belmont Cty. Bd. of Elections (1985), 
19 Ohio St.3d 154, 19 OBR 437, 484 N.E.2d 153 (petition did not include title and 
text of county resolution sought to be repealed); Shelly & Sands, Inc. v. Franklin 
Cty. Bd. of Elections (1984), 12 Ohio St.3d 140, 12 OBR 180, 465 N.E.2d 883 
 
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(zoning referendum petition summary); Markus v. Trumbull Cty. Bd. of Elections 
(1970), 22 Ohio St.2d 197, 51 O.O.2d 277, 259 N.E.2d 501 (zoning referendum 
petition summary).  As we recently held in Christy v. Summit Cty. Bd. of Elections 
(1996), 77 Ohio St.3d 35, 38, 671 N.E.2d 1, 4, such cases are inapposite. 
 
As in Christy, 77 Ohio St.3d at 38, 671 N.E.2d at 4, the initiative petition 
parts fully complied with R.C. 731.31 because they contained a full and correct 
copy of the title and text of the proposed ordinance.  Contrary to the board’s 
argument, the proposed ordinance contains a title, which is designated as “Penal 
Facilities Acquisition/Construction/Regulation.”  See, generally, Black’s Law 
Dictionary (6 Ed.1990) 1485 (“[I]n legislation, the title of the statute is the 
heading or preliminary part * * *.”). 
 
In addition, as in Christy, 77 Ohio St.3d at 39, 671 N.E.2d at 4-5, even 
assuming that the standards of the zoning referendum petition and ballot language 
cases applied, inclusion of the full title and text of the ordinance satisfied 
constitutional and statutory requirements.  See, e.g., State ex rel. Williams v. 
Brown (1977), 52 Ohio St.2d 13, 19-20, 6 O.O.3d 79, 83, 368 N.E.2d 838, 842.  
 
Furthermore, Paragraph D of the proposed ordinance, which repeals and 
declares void all municipal legislation that is inconsistent with the ordinance, is 
not, as the board contends, ambiguous or misleading because it fails to specify the 
inconsistent legislation.  Cf. R.C. 1.52(A); State ex rel. Finegold v. Lorain Cty. 
Bd. of Commrs. (1928), 29 Ohio App. 364, 371, 163 N.E. 585, 587 (“When the 
Legislature declared in plain language that the procedure set forth in the [new act] 
should supersede the procedure inconsistent therewith provided by other laws * * 
*, it in effect repealed such other laws, not by implication, but by express 
enactment * * *.”). 
 
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The board thus abused its discretion and acted in clear disregard of 
applicable law by refusing to place the proposed ordinance on the November 4 
election ballot because of asserted noncompliance with R.C. 731.31. 
 
The board next suggests that other reasons support its decision to refuse to 
submit the issue to the electorate.  It notes that although it granted the protest 
because of the alleged noncompliance with R.C. 731.31, the protestor also 
contended that the ordinance was not subject to municipal initiative powers 
because it constituted administrative rather than legislative action.  Mandamus will 
not lie to compel a board of elections to submit an ordinance proposed by 
initiative petition to the electorate if the ordinance does not involve a subject 
which a municipality is authorized by law to control by legislative action.  State ex 
rel. Rhodes v. Lake Cty. Bd. of Elections (1967), 12 Ohio St.2d 4, 41 O.O.2d 2, 
230  N.E.2d 347. 
 
Section 1f, Article II of the Ohio Constitution provides that “[t]he initiative 
and referendum powers are hereby reserved to the people of each municipality on 
all questions which such municipalities may now or hereafter be authorized by law 
to control by legislative action * * *.”  Administrative actions are not subject to 
municipal powers of initiative and referendum.  Donnelly v. Fairview Park (1968), 
13 Ohio St.2d 1, 42 O.O.2d 1, 233 N.E.2d 500.  “The test for determining whether 
the action of a legislative body is legislative or administrative is whether the 
action taken is one enacting a law, ordinance or regulation, or executing or 
administering a law, ordinance or regulation already in existence.”  Id. at 
paragraph two of the syllabus. 
 
Parma has general authority under R.C. 715.16(A) to enact the proposed 
ordinance.  In addition, the enactment of the ordinance would constitute a 
permissible legislative act because it does not simply administer laws already in 
 
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existence.  Id.; cf. State ex rel. Zonders v. Delaware Cty. Bd. of Elections (1994), 
69 Ohio St.3d 5, 11, 630 N.E.2d 313, 317 (“Generally, the adoption of a zoning 
amendment, like the enactment of the original zoning ordinance, is a legislative act 
which is subject to referendum.”). Therefore, the board could not rely on Section 
1f, Article II of the Ohio Constitution to refuse to place the proposed ordinance on 
the election ballot.  In fact, the board did not base its ultimate decision on this 
contention. 
 
A final asserted reason to invalidate the proposed ordinance that the 
ordinance violates R.C. 731.19 by containing more than one subject, addresses the 
substance or propriety of the ordinance rather than the validity and sufficiency of 
the initiative petition under the pertinent constitutional and statutory requirements 
for initiative petitions.  These contentions are thus premature.  Thurn, 72 Ohio 
St.3d at 293, 649 N.E.2d at 1208 (“[A]ny claim alleging the unconstitutionality or 
illegality of the substance of the proposed ordinances prior to their approval by the 
electorate is premature.”); Cincinnati v. Hillenbrand (1921), 103 Ohio St. 286, 
133 N.E. 556, paragraph two of the syllabus (“[W]here the mandatory provisions 
of the constitution or statute prescribing the necessary preliminary steps to 
authorize the submission to the electors of an initiative statute or ordinance have 
been complied with[,] the submission will not be enjoined.”). 
 
Based on the foregoing, relators established that the board abused its 
discretion and acted in clear disregard of applicable law by sustaining the protest 
and refusing to submit the proposed ordinance to the electorate at the November 4 
election.  This conclusion is also supported by our duty to liberally construe 
municipal initiative provisions to permit the exercise of such power.  Christy, 77 
Ohio St.3d at 40, 671 N.E.2d at 5.  Accordingly, we grant a writ of mandamus to 
 
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compel the board and its members to submit the proposed ordinance to the Parma 
electorate at the November 4, 1997 election.2 
Writ granted. 
 
MOYER, C.J., DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur. 
FOOTNOTES: 
 
1. 
Respondents concede that relators do not have an adequate remedy in the 
ordinary course of the law. 
2. 
This moots relators’ alternative claim for a writ of prohibition.