{"id":26045,"date":"2017-09-24T11:29:41","date_gmt":"2017-09-24T16:29:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=26045"},"modified":"2017-09-24T11:29:41","modified_gmt":"2017-09-24T16:29:41","slug":"ohio-communities-face-voter-suppression-in-push-to-rein-in-oil-and-gas-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=26045","title":{"rendered":"Ohio Communities Face &#8216;Voter Suppression&#8217; in Push to Rein in Oil and Gas Development"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2017\/09\/24\/ohio-communities-face-voter-suppression-push-rein-oil-gas-development\">Ohio Communities Face &#8216;Voter Suppression&#8217; in Push to Rein in Oil and Gas Development<\/a><\/h3>\n<article class=\"node-12148 node node-blog node-promoted view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<header>\n<p class=\"submitted desktop-only\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/styles\/full_width_blog_image\/public\/blogimages\/vote-scrabble-times_1280_pixabay_creative-commons.jpg?itok=Hf8wLLMF\" alt=\"scrabble tiles spelling out 'vote'\" width=\"826\" height=\"551\" \/><\/p>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"new-horizontal-social-bar clearfix\">\n<div class=\"new-horizontal-share-wrapper new-horizontal-email-wrapper clearfix last\">Three years in a row, communities in Ohio have attempted to vote on initiatives that would grant them greater say over oil and gas development in their jurisdictions, but over and over again, appointed officials, some with direct ties to the fossil fuel industry, have put up roadblocks preventing these initiatives from reaching the\u00a0ballot.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p><span class=\"dquo\">\u201c<\/span>We\u2019re losing our ability to legislate and be a check and balance on the government,\u201d Tish O\u2019Dell of the Ohio Community Rights Network told DeSmog on September\u00a015.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Dell had just learned that yet another local ballot measure \u2014 this one in Bowling Green, Ohio \u2014 was facing <a href=\"http:\/\/bgindependentmedia.org\/anti-pipeline-charter-amendment-now-in-limbo\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a possible legal challenge<\/a>. \u201cThe Bowling Green initiative is the only one that made it through all the administrative hurdles to get on [the ballot],\u201d O\u2019Dell\u00a0said.<\/p>\n<p>It is the latest in a flurry of anti-fossil fuel ballot initiatives across Ohio which have gained the required number of signatures but likely won\u2019t appear on ballots come election day. This year, initiatives in Youngstown, Medina County, and Athens County have all been taken off the\u00a0ballot.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Fracking\u00a0Backlash<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>These ballot initiatives are a response to the surge in activity related to hydraulic fracturing (fracking) and pipeline development in Ohio and would establish new county charters or amendments to city charters that elevate the communities\u2019 governing authority over legal privileges enjoyed by the\u00a0industry.<\/p>\n<p>Since 2015, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, non-elected local boards of elections, and the Ohio Supreme Court have struck a total of 10 proposed county charters from Ohio ballots. Initiatives have been removed for Athens (2015, 2016, and 2017), Fulton (2015), Medina (2015, 2016, 2017), Meigs (2015, 2016), and Portage (2016)\u00a0counties.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ohio Communities Face &#8216;Voter Suppression&#8217; in Push to Rein in Oil and Gas Development Three years in a row, communities in Ohio have attempted to vote on initiatives that would grant them greater say over oil and gas development in their jurisdictions, but over and over again, appointed officials, some with direct ties to the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,6],"tags":[5317,2498,16125,16126,5759,858],"class_list":["post-26045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","category-liberty","tag-desmog-blog","tag-ohio","tag-oil-and-gas-development","tag-simon-davis-cohen","tag-voter-suppression","tag-voting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26045"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26046,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26045\/revisions\/26046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}