Attorneys at the Chandra law firm representing the Q deal referendum coalition filed a taxpayer demand letter Friday morning, demanding that the Clerk of City Council accept the initiative petition that was rejected earlier this week.
“Swift action is required,” the letter says. “Not only is the City apparently expending resources against the will of the electorate under the false pretense of a so-called ’emergency measure,’ it is invoking inapplicable constitutional arguments in an apparent effort to thwart the electorate’s statutory right to referendum.”
Read the full letter here.
The letter was addressed to the city’s law director Barbara Langhenry. It asked for assurances that the petition be accepted and certified by June 7. If the Clerk fails to perform her duties, the letter says, the Law Director must compel her to do so. And if the law director does not, the attorneys are prepared to file taxpayer litigation against the Clerk of Council, City Council, and the Law Director.
The taxpayer demand letter includes in its argument much of the Cleveland City Charter’s material pertaining to initiative and referendum (It’s Chapters seven and nine. The sections are very short and fairly easy to understand — 59, 60 and 64 are the relevant ones.)
Basically, as asserted in the letter and as previously suggested by councilpeople, the petitioners did everything properly; that is, in accordance with the charter: They collected signatures, exceeding by a factor of more than three the total required, (10 percent of the total electors in the preceding election), and they submitted the signatures to the Clerk of Council within 30 days of the ordinance’s passage.
The ordinance was passed as an emergency measure by a council vote of 12-5. The “emergency” designation was activated when the legislation achieved a two-thirds majority in council. Brian Cummins, recall, provided the vote that tipped the scales. Frank Jackson signed the ordinance into law the following day.
But as the Charter makes clear (in section 64), emergency ordinances “are subject to referendum in like manner as other ordinances” unless, unlike 305-17, they are “passed as emergency measures for the immediate preservation of the public peace, property, health, or safety and providing for the refinancing of bonds, notes or other securities of the City.”
But the rejection memo signed by Allan Dreyer and presented to the referendum coalition Monday morning makes no mention at all of the City Charter. In its two-sentence rejection, it merely claims that the petition “unconstitutionally impairs” an “already executed and binding contract.”
The demand letter, from Chandra law firm attorneys Peter Pattakos and Subodh Chandra himself, stresses that the U.S. Constitution’s Contract Clause, which was invoked in the rejection letter, does not apply to taxpayers’ petition for referendum.
The Contract Clause holds that, “No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.” (Emphasis added by Chandra law firm.)
“By its plain language, the Contract Clause only bars the passing of laws ‘impairing the obligation of contracts,'” the letter asserts. “It has no application to an electorate’s rejection of a newly proposed or newly enacted law subject to referendum. Not only has no Ohio court ever held to the contrary, but our research suggests that no Ohio party has ever advanced this specious argument. Indeed, it is unimaginable that the Contract Clause was intended to give government officials carte blanche to propose new laws against the will of the electorate and then rush into contracts in an effort to void the electorate’s statutory right to repeal those laws.”
In a statement released in conjunction with the demand letter, Pattakos (who has written for and legally represented Scene, and is a known opponent of stadium subsidies) decried the actions of city council.
“It’s shocking to see elected officials attempt to thwart their constituents’ will like this,” he said. “If the City Council members who passed this ordinance are truly confident in its merits, they should be glad to have it put to the test at the ballot. The law guarantees Clevelanders’ right to this referendum. The Clerk’s refusal to fulfill her legal duties should be met with a swift correction in court.”
This article appears in May 24-30, 2017.
“The demand letter, from Chandra law firm attorneys Peter Pattakos and…”
Ah, and there is the piece that has been missing to explain the source of the hyperbolic and vitriolic opposition in this fight. For someone who ran a Cleveland sports blog Pete sure loves to climb on his horse and decry the evils of the Cavs (ownership only, not the mega-rich players), Browns (Jimmy, and the fans who spearheaded Mangini’s firing), Indians ownership (specifically on the Wahoo issue).
I don’t live in the city and therefore don’t pay the taxes but I hope Pete’s tilting against windmills bankrupts his firm and ultimately forces him to fold up shop to go reside somewhere else and pit their fans against their sports franchises, businesses and politicians.
I also take issue with the unique hypocrisy of one Peter Pattakos, perhaps the only sports fan in America to take issue with the home team’s ownership.
Haha yes how dare anyone criticize Cleveland’s sports owners, especially when they blackmail taxpayers of a struggling city for handouts?
A good way to tell that a lawyer has a good case is when opponents (or anonymous internet commenters) try to smear his character without addressing the merits of his case.
“perhaps the only sports fan in America to take issue with the home team’s ownership.” Hahaha! Yeah, I for sure don’t have ANY issues with the Browns ownership, who went 1-15 after taking both Manziel and Gilbert in the first round, two players who were so bad they aren’t even IN the NFL anymore. No problems there! Who needs schools, let’s just give those geniuses a blank checkbook to the city. Maybe they can ruin the uniforms some more, the last reminder we had left of our rich football past. And now they brought on Grigson, literally the ONLY person in the NFL stupid enough to give up a first round pick for Richardson, another total bust. If you don’t’ have a problem with how that crook Haslan is ruining the Browns, you’re either a paid stooge or a halfwit who needs help finishing the maze on a Bob Evans placement. If those billionaires aren’t stealing our money, they should have no problem showing us all their paperwork. Being a fan doesn’t mean you have to be an idiot.
The Jake tore out 7,000 seats and still is half-empty on many home dates. Only the downtown yuppies, the tweeting Millennials , the well-off suburbanites, and the affluent folks in the boonies can afford tickets on a regular basis anymore. For the rest, including most city folk, regardless of skin tone,, a sporting event is a rare treat, maybe once a year…if that.
So let them all hit the road, and they can all depart America’s 48th largest city (and falling) and 31st largest metro area (also falling) for some other, more lucrative market—an Emerald City where they can build plastic sports palaces and then hold the city fathers hostage for “upgrades” and upkeep every decade, and where the citizen-suckers will pony up hefty sums to put their asses in the seats to watch spouse-abusers and druggies play their games for millions.
We won’t have anymore ransoms to pay, and maybe then, and only then, Cleveland can address the crumbling streets and schools that suck. So what if we turn into Tulsa…with more snow?
Chuckles the Clown
The city’s law department is a more incompetent version of the Keystone Cops.
The deal the city is being presented with stinks, and that’s because the people “negotiating” on our behalf are nothing more than puppets. I’m not opposed to making a deal, just not this one. The more funny business we hit into, the more I feel that things behind the scenes with this deal stink really bad. We deserve the right to vote on this. Anyone who disagrees with that, especially an elected official, absolutely astounds me. The people fighting this and trying to get this on a ballot are heroes as far as I’m concerned, and they are doing exactly what our forefathers intended us to do when government tries to ignore the will of the people.
second verse…same as the first
This issue is the absurdity of absurdities. Let me get this straight: the
purpose of the Sin Tax is to gouge those who purchase alcohol and cigarettes
not because anyone is trying to discourage consumption but rather so the
County can use that money to pay for sports stadiums that do not produce
anything but a fleeting moment witnessing the passing of a football, the
dribbling of a basketball and the throwing of a baseball so that such a minute
tidbit of diversion can be enjoyed by all. The stupidity of this proposition is
enough to make your head spin even though the spin doctors advocating
passage of this nonsense are already doing a pretty good job of hypnotizing
the voters to actually consider supporting it. At least the Robber Barons
of the previous centuries provided something tangible such as oil, steel,
railroads etcetera. These team owners do not even provide one tangible thing
that could ever be considered with the term value added. Almost everyone
discusses this enterprise as though it is the same thing as industry {which
it is not}. The price of admission is essentially a voluntary tax paid by those
who can afford it to pay those who dont need it. If this isnt a transfer of
wealth I dont know what is.
The real outrage here is the fact that taxes on alcohol and cigarettes will
not be used to aid in the reduction of addiction {hence the reference to sin}
but rather to stuff the pockets of all three teams who could easily afford to
pay for the repairs themselves. The vote was rammed through the last time
{under somewhat suspicious circumstances} and hear we go again. But this
time…not so fast!!! We the voters of Cuyahoga County are going to fight the
proponents on this one and we don’t care if the teams up and go somewhere
else {please see my views on entertainment below} because quite frankly there
are simply more important things than sports and the unearned money that
comes with it. Those in public office who are too stupid and lazy to find other
ways to grow a major American city need to resign and leave their self-seeking
political ambitions on the scrapheap of history. Dont ever let it be said that
this was time when the tide ran out on Cuyahoga County but rather was the
time when the voters rose up to welcome the rising tide of change and rebuked
this pathetic paradigm our previous elected leaders embraced.
Let the battle be joined.
And now to the real underlying issue at hand:
One of the most disturbing facts about our capitalist nation is the
misappropriation of funds directed to the salaries of entertainers.
Everyone should agree that the value an athlete, movie star, talk-show host,
team-owner, etcetera brings to the average citizen is very small. Granted,
they do offer a minuscule of diversion from our daily trials and
tribulations as did the jesters in the king’s court during the middle ages.
But to allow these entertainers to horde such great amounts of wealth at the
expense of more benevolent societal programs is unacceptable.
They do not provide a product or a service so why are they rewarded as such?
Our society is also subjected to the “profound wisdom” of these people
because it equates wealth with influence. Perhaps a solution to this
problem and a alternative to defeated school levies, crumbling
infrastructures, as well as all the programs established to help feed,
clothe and shelter those who cannot help themselves would be to tax this
undeserved wealth. Entertainers could keep 1% of the gross earnings reaped
from their endeavor and 99% could be deposited into the public coffers.
The old ideas of the redistribution of wealth have failed, and it is time to
adapt to modern-day preferences. People put their money into entertainment
above everything else; isn’t it time to tap that wealth? Does anyone think
this will reduce the quality of entertainment? It seems to me that when
entertainers received less income, the quality was much higher.