Background
Matthew Turner Jr., Steven Taylor, and Marcia Montgomery submitted a petition to amend Sidney’s city charter by adding a procedure for recalling elected city officials. The petition, which contained 561 signatures, sought submission of the proposal to voters at the November 3, 2026 general election.
City Clerk Kari Egbert rejected the petition without sending it to the Shelby County Board of Elections for signature verification. She concluded that the petition was facially invalid because the relators had not filed a certified copy of the proposed amendment before circulating it, as R.C. 731.32 requires for municipal initiative and referendum petitions. The relators sought mandamus relief compelling the city council to adopt an ordinance certifying the petition and compelling the elections board to verify the signatures and, if sufficient, place the amendment on the November ballot.
The Court’s Holding
The Supreme Court of Ohio held that R.C. 731.32 did not apply. A petition to amend a city charter is neither an initiative petition nor a referendum petition, and Sidney’s charter did not incorporate the statute into its charter-amendment process. The petition’s attachment of a draft ordinance labeled an “initiative ordinance” did not transform the submission into an initiative because the petition plainly proposed a charter amendment.
The court nevertheless concluded that the relators’ requested relief was premature because the elections board had not yet determined whether the petition was legally sufficient. It granted a limited writ ordering Egbert to transmit the petition to the board for a sufficiency determination and, if the petition is sufficient, ordering the city council to provide by ordinance for submission of the amendment to voters at an election within the 60-to-120-day parameters of Article XVIII, Section 8 of the Ohio Constitution.
The court denied relief against Sidney Law Director Robert Ratliff because the relators presented no argument for relief against him, and it denied relief against the elections board as premature because the board had not received the petition or failed to perform a present duty. It also denied attorney fees for lack of a showing of bad faith and required the parties to bear their own costs. Chief Justice Kennedy and Justices Fischer, DeWine, Brunner, Hawkins, and Shanahan joined the per curiam opinion; Justice Deters concurred in judgment only.
Key Takeaways
- R.C. 731.32’s precirculation filing requirement does not govern a proposed city-charter amendment unless the municipal charter incorporates that statute into its amendment process.
- A city’s legislative authority need not submit a proposed charter amendment to voters until the petition’s legal sufficiency, including its signatures, has been determined.
- When requested ballot-placement relief is premature, mandamus may still issue in limited form to require the proper officials to complete the necessary review and then act if the petition is sufficient.
Why It Matters
The decision distinguishes charter-amendment petitions governed by Article XVIII of the Ohio Constitution from ordinary municipal initiative and referendum petitions governed by R.C. 731.32. Municipal officials therefore cannot reject a charter-amendment petition for failure to satisfy that statute unless the local charter makes it applicable.
The ruling also clarifies the required sequence: election officials must first assess petition sufficiency, and only then, if the petition qualifies, must the city council arrange its submission to voters within the constitutionally prescribed election window.