The charter form is pushed by "misinformed environmentalist."
I am against the proposed charter form of government here in Athens County because it calls itself an amendment to the Ohio Constitution when it does not in fact change or alter the already established Ohio Constitution of 1851.
The charter calls for a bill of rights to protect the soil, trees, property and whatever they have on their property. This was already in the state's constitution: Ohio Constitution Bill of Rights Paragraph 1.02, “By nature man is free and has inherent inalienable rights, the right to life and liberty and the right to owning and protecting property.”This alone should tell you that this was already established and not something that these charter bill-of-righters have said is nothing really new.
{{tncms-asset app="editorial" id="eb2b052a-2f44-11e5-b11b-23463e1f0f37"}}
Their second argument is to propose an amendment to the Ohio Constitution for the right to have referendums to alter, repeal or abolish a form of government already in the Ohio Constitution. It reads in Article One that all politics belong to the people and that the people have the right to repeal, alter or abolish the government. So this is not an amendment to the Ohio Constitution either. The proposed charter says initiatives are the right of the citizens to write our own laws and to submit them to our fellow citizens, the voters, for their judgement — necessary when institutions or government representatives fail. Referendums are the right of the citizens to vote on issues and laws generated either by the initiative process or by legislative process the charter bill-of-righters proposed and this is not any different than the Ohio Constitution Bill of Rights Paragraph 1.02.
{{tncms-asset app="editorial" id="5fd639b0-2ff1-11e5-8ca2-2bf9de4044d1"}}
But the real interest here is the proposed charter contains a bill of rights claiming the right to clean air, water and soil and the right to be free from chemical trespass by toxic substances. It protects water supplies with two specific prohibitions: the charter prohibits deposition of materials wastes from high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing fracking for shale oil and gas. These materials are known to contain toxins. The charter prohibits the taking of water from any source within the county for high volume hydraulic fracturing for extraction of shale gas and oil, so the real motives of these charters is not to pass a bill of rights but to prohibit a landowner or tell a landowner what he or she can do to his or her property. It’s not about getting a charter form of government it’s all about these misinformed environmentalists who want government control especially over fracking.
David Ernest Hartinger is a resident of Athens.
