Last night, with Councilor Chris Rodriguez leading the way, Council continued the assault on your rights as citizens of Whitehall. I can write my typical explanation of it all but Lana Pennington summed it up SO succinctly that I defer, for the first time in this blog’s 6 year history, to her summation of the issue.
Lana is a Whitehall resident, administrator of the Facebook page ‘Whitehall Engaged: Citizen Action Network (We Can) and the name listed in the case of ‘Pennington v Bivens’* that went to the Ohio Supreme Court to compel our City Attorney Michael Bivens to ‘certify the sufficiency of petitioners’. Here is what she said about the actions at last night’s council meeting:

“Not only was Chris Rodriguez silent when the City Atty was stomping on your rights to vote and be heard, he is now leading the charge to take away your court ordered right to vote on the zoning change to allow the apartments on Maplewood.
After presenting the original ordinances allowing the apartments and listening to the groundswell of our voices against the building of these apartments, current Ward 1 Council member Rodriguez not only dismissed us, but also voted “yes” to the passage of the ordinances. During the entire time the City Attorney was building roadblock after roadblock while the citizens tried to exercise their voice per City Charter and petition to put the zoning change to allow the apartments on the ballot, Rodriguez remained silent. Rodriguez remained silent while the people had to take the issue to the Ohio Supreme Court to be heard. Now the council has taken our court ordered right to vote on these ordinances away. Rodriguez, under the guise of “hearing our concerns” after the highest court in Ohio ordered them to do so, has introduced and helped pass an ordinance which rescinded the earlier zoning change. Great, right? No. They are going back to the developer and asking them to talk to us, to perhaps make changes, and to give us time. At least until the day after the election where we were supposed to vote. Then they will introduce and pass essentially the same zoning change, and do so again without giving us the right to vote. They will likely do so calling it an “emergency” which then takes our right to petition away per the City Charter. They did not want to put this on the ballot because they believed we would vote overwhelmingly against it – against their agenda – and suffer another embarrassing loss after the Supreme Court of Ohio determined their City Attorney abused his discretion in silencing our vote. This is the underhanded way they are circumventing the courts and continuing to do as they please without concern for the citizen. They ALSO did not include it on the posted agenda. The fewer citizens that were aware of and attended the meeting, the better. We must stop this machine which continues to believe they can operate with impunity. We must stop this machine which continues to neglect not only the voice of the people they promised to represent, but also their own Charter. Do not forget what they have been doing, and continue to do when you go to the ballot box.”

To add to Lana’s well-made points:

I feel assured that this legislation was given to Rodriguez to introduce in order to try and score him political points he actually doesn’t deserve. Particularly when he voted FOR the original legislation despite the loud chorus of his constituency’s disapproval at the time. Mr. Rodriguez’ callous disregard for his constituents (I’M talking now!) made him vulnerable to lose his 20 year council seat. Realizing that his usual behavior (yes, yes, yes**) was now being paid attention to by the people he’s supposed to be representing, he’s now backpedaled (with the help of his teammates at City Hall***) in order to save his own political neck. NOW he wants to listen to you? No. NOW he wants to save his seat of power where, as history has shown us, he will still NOT listen to you in the future for years 21 thru 24 in that seat. His and their disrespect for our Charter and your rights under it are beyond acceptable. It is outrageous. (This video shows Mr. Rodriguez, so eager to gain false redemption with voters, jumping the gun on introducing this bill which wasn’t even listed on the agenda, never seen by the public and passed without citizen review):

*https://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/0/2021/2021-Ohio-3134.pdf
highlights: “Therefore, Bivens abused his discretion in rejecting a
referendum petition on the ground that the petitioners failed to comply with R.C.
731.32’s requirement to submit a certified copy of the zoning ordinance to the city
auditor before circulating their petition.”
“Bivens therefore abused his discretion in determining that the
petitioners’ referendum petition was insufficient because they had not complied with
R.C. 731.32.”

**From my 2017 blogpost examining Chris Rodriguez’ official record:

‘Yes’ votes by Chris Rodriguez:  1,502

‘No’ votes by Chris Rodriguez:  18                                                                                                  
 (Mr. Rodriguez dissented only 1% of his entire time on Council, a mere fraction of the time. A third of that fraction was in agreement with everyone else (five times). He only stood away from the pack 0.50% or half of one percent of his entire time on council.)

***It is my opinion that this ‘gift’ to Chris Rodriguez’ political future was done so by abusing the processes of government. Using the very processes at their fingertips in order to politically bolster one of their own. That is a misuse and abuse of OUR government for their own political gain.