Please see the post I submitted on November 7th which is below.

This legislation was not written/passed by the House or the Senate, this legislation was drafted by the Committee representing the petitioners. The legislature has not proposed a Constitution Amendment ballot language because either no one wanted to change the Constitutions position or no one felt the majority of those in the legislature would support it and therefore didn’t take on the issue.

The debate that maybe should occur is should we make it harder to have a Constitutional Amendment? It is currently the right of Ohioans to effect change in Ohio when they believe the legislature is not acting on an issue in their best interest. When that is the case, our Constitution provides opportunity to address what Ohioans believe is wrong.

Part of my November 7th post…
Constitution Amendments –
There a two ways in which Constitutional Amendments can be placed on the ballot for consideration. By way of example in November we looked at three Constitutional Amendments…
SJR (Senate Joint Resolution) 1 (Grendell-R/Wilson-D) Persian Gulf-Afghanistan/Iraq conflict – compensate veterans – this was drafted by Senators Gibbs and Wilson, assigned and voted out of the Senate Finance and Financial Institutions Committee. It was passed on the Senate Floor 32-0 and assigned to the House Finance and Appropriations Committee. It passed out of committee and passed on the House Floor 92-3 meeting the 3/5th requirement to place it on the ballot. It passed with concurrence. SJR 1 became Issue 1
SJR 6 (Gibbs-R / Wilson-D) Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board – this was drafted by Senators Gibbs and Wilson, assigned and voted out of the Senate Agriculture Committee. It was passed on the Senate 32-0 and assigned to the House Committee on Agriculture and Natural Resources. It passed out of committee and passed on the House Floor 83-19 meeting the 3/5th requirement to place it on the ballot. It passed with concurrence. SJR 6 then became Issue 2
Initiative Petition – Committee representing the petitioners William Curlis, Matthew Hammond, John Campbell and Charles Luken. – To amend the constitution to allow for one casino each in Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus and Toledo and distribute to all Ohio counties a tax on the casinos. Necessary signatures were filed by the petitioners to the Secretary of State. Official Arguments and Explanations were filed for (by the petitioners) and against (by the Truth PAC, Michael Johrendt, Treasurer). The Office of Budget and Management and the Department of Taxation analyzed the impact of the constitutional amendment at the requested of the Secretary of State. The Ballot Board reviewed the Initiative Petition for procedural issues and requirements according to our constitution approved the Initiative Petition at its August 12th meeting. Initiative Petition then became Issue 3
November 7th, 2009 at 2:20 pm

The fact is, this was something that should have been up to them from the start.

These ballot initiatives are nothing but trouble and in my opinion should be done away with. They’ve caused this state nothing but pain and resentment.

There is of course an established precedence for the General Assembly ignoring voters. The Ohio Turnpike, is one example, which was voted on, was supposed to become free and the General Assembly changed that without going back to the voters.

I didn’t support Issue 3, but the reality is it was allowed on the ballot and now we are stuck with it unless someone else wants to put another ballot issue up to change the constitution again…Or create another turnpike scenario.

In fact, that’s the very reason we have a representative form of government to protect political minorities from the majority and the populace from the ignorance of the electorate.

Saying the “voters of Ohio have spoken” and hence we have to swallow a bad law is frankly crap.

I believe that in a horrible economy with high unemployment, what Ohioan’s voted for were jobs, not casino’s. How else can you explain the fact that the four previous gambling proposals were defeated. The economy is the only thing that changed.

The legislature has a role in determining how Issue 3 is carried out. As a person who lives in a county that did not want casino’s, I believe my state and local officials have every right to use any legal measures necessary to determine how Issue 3 is implemented in Franklin County.

“If this passes, my hope is that the legislature will step in,” Coleman said…

I agree with Robin, glasscitypatriot, and Coleman.