YOUNGSTOWN — Complaints raised by the Save the Deer of Mill Creek Park group that wants Mill Creek MetroParks commissioners removed from their duties will be heard 9:30 a.m. Aug. 28 at the Mahoning County Courthouse.

Visiting Judge John Campbell of Carroll County, a retired common pleas court (Probate and Juvenile divisions) judge, is hearing the complaints, which the deer group filed in Mahoning County Probate Court. Mahoning County Probate Court Judge Robert Rusu Jr. recused himself from the case.

Campbell met Thursday by recorded video conference with attorneys for the deer group and the MetroParks for a status conference. Afterwards, the judge issued a judgment entry stating an Aug. 28 hearing will take place at the Mahoning County Courthouse to hear testimony on the complaints.

The deer group will get two hours “to present their issues to the court,” and the MetroParks commissioners will get 90 minutes starting at 1:30 p.m. to “present their issues,” the judgment entry states.

The hearing is scheduled under a part of Ohio law that gives a probate court judge the authority to remove park commissioners from their position “either upon complaint filed with such judge or upon his own motion.” The law states that such removal can only take place after “giving such commissioner not less than 10 days notice and a full opportunity to be heard on his own behalf in a public hearing.”

Probate court judges also appoint members to various types of boards, including the Mill Creek MetroParks Board.

The entry warns that under the statute, the “parties are to direct witnesses to speak to the (judge), not the other parties in the room.” The hearing will be recorded.

The entry was being served on Marc Dann, attorney for the deer group; Andrea Ziarko, attorney for the park commissioners; park commissioners Lee Frey, Germaine Bennett, Thomas Frost, Jeff Harvey and Paul Olivier; deer group petitioner Mickey Drabison; and Mill Creek MetroParks Executive Director Aaron Young.

In February, Drabison and a handful of other deer supporters delivered a petition to the Mahoning County Probate Court containing 2,500 signatures asking Rusu to remove the MetroParks commissioners for giving their “their total support, without question,” to Young.

Since then, the deer group has formalized its complaint, and the MetroParks commissioners have responded to it in writing.

One complaint was that the MetroParks board never responded to a Dec. 11, 2023, Save the Deer group complaint asking that they fire Young. The MetroParks Board response, filed on May 9, 2024, states that the board “acknowledged the receipt of the petitions” and that Frey stated at the March 11, 2024, MetroParks board meeting that the board “would not be acting on the petitions.”

Campbell asked the MetroParks to respond to 11 specific complaints, which the MetroParks did in its May 9 filing.

There is another type of litigation pending involving the MetroParks and the Save the Deer group. Dann appealed a ruling by Judge Anthony Donofrio of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court when he ruled against the Save the Deer group last year.

That was a lawsuit asking that the judge stop the MetroParks from carrying out a deer reduction plan that eventually resulted in 204 deer being killed from Oct. 1, 2023, through late January 2024 to reduce the deer population. The MetroParks has said the reductions were needed to restore plant life in the parks.

Both sides have filed briefs in that matter and are awaiting a date for the 7th District Court of Appeals to hear oral arguments and rule on the appeal. The latest filing was Friday by the four residents who live near the MetroParks who filed the litigation, which argues that the MetroParks did not have the authority to carry out the reduction program.

Another round of deer reductions is expected to begin Sept. 29, the first Sunday of the statewide deer archery season, said Nick Derico, Mill Creek MetroParks natural resources manager.

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