If Mitchell Schneider truly believes that "people in the community would support development at Oakwood," why try to block the people's opportunity to vote on it? If Lograsso said, "How can I ignore the law? I’d be compromising my ethics" then I must ask, "how can South Euclid ignore hundreds of its citizens who signed those petitions for the right to vote on the rezoning?" The lack of ethical behavior here leaves me disgusted almost beyond words.

If South Euclid does not have an auditor, and if the other employees of South Euclid do not know the law, why should the voters, who signed a petition, be punished?

Sounds like the city is exercising due diligence to be sure that if put on the ballot inappropriately then the vote is subject to being declared invalid

This absurdity falls right in line with the deeper issues underlying this, that unfortunately has already needed to become a long, battle between government and its people. When listening deeply one could hear a group passionate about taking the Oakwood opportunity to finally prioritize the absolute long-term benefits of balance and justice for human life and community (without shopping,) for the environment, for health, and for sustainability, at least equally with the corporatized short-term money rush which has already overwhelmed essential human values in all corners.
And then in the face of no true serious consideration or ability to seriously input, the increasingly frustrated group additionally wanted to be authentically heard and actively integrated into decision making; while pretty palpably government and First Interstate just (barely) tolerated them, already knowing that nothing the group said or did could make any real difference to their already made decisions to go after their money priorities. (Obligatorily gracious public hearings and permeable parking lots just don’t make it.)

First Interstate has the money to pay big lawyers big bucks to find such a legal technicality, and to parse words and to argue those legally artful twists and turns, (which in effect are essentially meaningless to the major concept of this situation,). The South Euclid Council also has resources – the residents’- which are much bigger than the volunteer committee’s who feels passionately about this issue and who took yeoman's effort to do something about it with Council. To have to “fight city hall” however, they’re having to come up with even more, in effect to pay twice to be heard.

That no one in the city advised this group of the referendum details of the SE charter earlier; that no one there being paid with residents’ taxpayers' funds even knew; and that Council could so readily agree that “the people,” without their governmental "expertise" (since they work "otherwhere" for a living,) nor lawyers at hand, nor resources left for themselves, and already paying taxes for all the supposed expertise and wisdom among government "leaders," - are responsible for figuring out that there was an absence in the SE Charter, and thus, they had to turn to state law, and that in the absence of an auditor, it was not the (village) clerk (as stated in ORC 731,) who stepped in (though the SE Clerk has accepted all other referendum docs,) but the finance director, etc. etc. etc. Is absolutely absurd! It is so absurd that it reveals the real governmental/corporatized motives and trance - which are not in the best interest of ongoing human community, active democracy, or of all the people, but rather more in interest of covering themselves as they too just follow the money.

An all too similar issue occurred in SE last May, when without sufficiently telling or truly consulting with the citizens beforehand, and the night before an election, the Council blithely rolled back the income tax credit that SE residents had relied on for 27 years. (That time they argued that citizens couldn't fight that action- a virtual, though not technical "raising" of income taxes, saying that no referendum was possible because theirs was an "administrative" action, not a legislative one. )
Unfortunately now this passionate active group, standing for human values over human greed needs to raise more money for more of their own lawyers to take their fight to the courts. Thank goodness they will.

After all - all this group is asking is to have the issue on the ballot to determine the will of The People - which apparently is exactly what the Council and First Interstate are afraid of.

So is this the first time a petition for referendum has EVER been submitted in South Euclid, and the referendum then passed? If, as Michael Johns seems to imply, the certified copies of other ordinances were submitted to the wrong person, those referendums are now null and void?