Celebrating 20 Years 1991-2011 

"WITH GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE"  Ohio State Motto

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - PROTEST OF FINDING INVALIDATING REFERENDUM PETITION


Mon, Nov 18th, 2019 3:26:58 pm

 PROTEST OF FINDING INVALIDATING

SIGNATURE OR SIGNATURES ON REFERENDUM PETITION

Medina, OH - Concerned Citizens of Medina City today submitted a protest appeal to the Medina County Board of Elections and the Ohio Secretary of State regarding the Medina City Ordinance 112-19 that was passed by Medina City Council on July 8, 2019. This ordinance is an LGBTQ comprehensive special rights ordinance. Citizens in the community of Medina had expressed concerns about the comprehensive nature of the ordinance before Medina City Council passed it.

 

Citizen volunteers with assistance of the Ohio Christian Alliance circulated a referendum petition to place the measure on the ballot.  1,173 signatures were gathered in just fourteen days. On July 31st, the citizens committee submitted the referendum petition in accordance with the Ohio Revised Code to City Finance Director Keith Durham. Mr. Durham held the petitions for ten days before submitting them to the Medina County Board of Elections for review. On August 12th the Board of Elections reported that they had invalidated 234 of the signatures.  983 signatures were needed to place the measure on the ballot. The Board determined that the referendum petition committee had 939 good signatures, 44 signatures short of what was needed.

 

The Ohio Christian Alliance made a public records request from the Medina County BOE and began a review with its attorneys of the Board’s findings. The Medina County Board of Elections officials had invalidated 59 signatures for what they called “non-matching signature.”  In other words, these are registered voters in the City of Medina about whom the Board of Elections officials made a judgement call by stating that their signatures did not match what the Board had on file. The Concerned Citizens of Medina City Committee and its volunteers informed the petition signers whose signatures were rejected that the Board had invalidated their signatures for what they termed “non-matching”. These citizens were more than eager to sign sworn affidavits attesting to their identity, and that they had indeed signed the referendum petition and wanted it on the ballot.

 

This material proof has been submitted as testament that these signatures were valid and that these petition signers wrongfully had their signatures invalidated by the Board’s review. We are confident that upon further review, the referendum effort will be certified for the November 2020 ballot.  It is important that the people’s right of referendum be upheld.  



 

 

Home | About | Mission | Contact | Contributions | Forms | Email List
---
All content, Images and text.© 2006 Property
of The Ohio Christian Alliance
 

..