YOUNGSTOWN — A charter amendment on city council term limits, overwhelmingly approved by voters, isn’t retroactive — so incumbents can serve for two more terms, if re-elected, without having to leave, according to the Youngstown law director’s legal opinion.

“There is no language which would suggest that this term limit legislation has retroactive or retrospective application,” Law Director Jeff Limbian wrote in his legal opinion. “Any term of any council member that commences after Jan. 1, 2023, will be subject to this legislation. Current members, regardless of the number of terms they have served and regardless of the number of years they have served, will be able to run for and, if successful, serve two new terms.”

The term limits amendment received 81.91 percent support in the November 2022 election.

All seven incumbent council members — including three seeking a third four-year term and one seeking a fourth four-year term — are on the ballot this year.

The charter amendment’s language stated council members shall be elected “for a maximum of two complete consecutive terms of four years each. A councilperson will be eligible for election after an intervening term effective Jan. 1, 2023.”

John White, one of the main backers of the charter amendment, said it was designed to stop incumbents, including the current ones, from running over and over again.

“They shouldn’t be allowed on the ballot again because the voters had their say,” he said. “We believe they should be term limited out by the charter amendment. We might go to court over it.”

LEGAL OPINION

In his legal opinion, Limbian pointed to various court decisions including a federal one in 2013 that upheld a 1993 Ohio Supreme Court ruling “in which the court struck down a provision retroactively applying term limits to city council members holding office prior to the effective date of the amendment on the basis that such provision violated the Ohio Constitution.”

Limbian added: “As a forecast of potential future questions, any attempt to create retroactive charter amendments will be met with great resistance. Based on the foregoing Ohio Supreme Court and federal case law, there would be extraordinary constitutional challenges. In addition, any attempt to create retroactive charter amendments for the purpose of retroactively limiting the candidacy of sitting elected officials would most certainly violate the Ohio Constitution and the U.S. Constitution.”

White said he is currently working to help his wife, Amber, get enough valid signatures to run in the November election as an independent candidate for the 7th Ward council seat, currently held by Democrat Basia Adamczak, a two-term incumbent seeking her third four-year term.

Amber White ran in 2021 as a write-in candidate for mayor, finishing third, after it was determined that John White wasn’t eligible to be an independent candidate for the seat because he voted in the Democratic primary after filing nominating petitions and because he didn’t meet a qualification in the city charter of being an elector in Youngstown for five years.

When working last year on the term limits charter amendment for council members, White said his group was going to seek to put a similar amendment on the ballot in 2023 for mayor and council president.

But he now isn’t as determined to do that despite the success of the council member term limit amendment’s success.

“It might be something we might do for November, but it’s a lot of work,” White said. “Fighting with these guys on term limits fills your plate up a lot.”

AGREEMENT

Councilman Mike Ray, D-4th Ward, the most senior member of council who is running this year for his fourth four-year term, said he agrees with Limbian’s legal opinion.

“It’s overwhelmingly how charter amendments work,” Ray said. “That’s not surprising in the least. My understanding is it’s virtually not possible to make retroactive charter amendments. There may be scenarios (where that can occur), but not when it comes to the term limits of elected officeholders.”

Ray added: “The clock resets to the next election. It’s the next time a person is elected that they can serve two consecutive terms.”

City council, council president and the mayor had two four-year term limits approved by voters in 1993 with the ability to run again after sitting out for an intervening term.

Voters eliminated term limits for the mayor in a Nov. 6, 2012, vote with 61.87 percent backing the removal. That proposal was recommended to council by a charter review commission.

In the Nov. 6, 2018, election, voters agreed to eliminate term limits for council members with 51.05 percent support and for council president with 51.98 percent of voters supporting it. Putting those two items on the ballot that year was initiated by city council. If that failed, Ray would not have been permitted to run for re-election in 2019.

Last year’s citizen initiative overturned the 2018 vote to get rid of term limits for council members.