CIRCLEVILLE, Ohio — An Ohio Supreme Court ruling that faulted an Ashville village official for using an “emergency” designation to block a referendum vote has prompted a Pickaway County advocacy group to raise a similar question about Circleville: Could City Council use the same legislative tool on a proposed 1,200-home annexation that has already drawn resident pushback?
The Ohio Supreme Court ruled Aug. 7 in State ex rel. McNamara-Smith v. Grube that Ashville’s fiscal officer had no legal authority to refuse to certify a referendum petition on a village council resolution tied to a proposed EdgeConneX data center project. The fiscal officer had argued the underlying resolution was exempt from referendum because council had passed it as emergency legislation. The court’s per curiam opinion found the resolution’s emergency clause contained only “conclusory statements” that never explained why a 30-day delay would have harmed the project, and it ordered the petition sent to the Pickaway County Board of Elections.
Under Ohio law, most city and village legislation takes effect 30 days after passage — a window that gives residents time to gather signatures and force a public referendum on the measure. Legislation passed with a valid emergency clause takes effect immediately and skips that window, along with residents’ chance to challenge it at the ballot box.
According to a Facebook post from Teays Valley Against Overgrowth, a group that has organized opposition to large-scale housing and data-center development in the region, a Circleville City Schools parent named Ashley Willison began reviewing Circleville City Council’s legislative record after the Ashville ruling came down. The group said its review found that “declaring an emergency” is a recurring phrase in the city’s 2026 legislation.
City records bear that out in at least one case. An ordinance Circleville City Council passed Jan. 20, granting a municipal income tax credit to the medical supply company Health Care Logistics, was “declared to be an emergency measure necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety of the citizens,” according to the city’s official record of the legislation, allowing it to take effect immediately rather than after 30 days.
Circleville City Council’s own rules of order require an emergency ordinance or resolution to pass with the votes of at least five of the council’s seven members, and require the reasons for the emergency to be spelled out in the legislation itself. A measure that draws only four votes still passes but takes effect the standard 30 days later, giving residents the same referendum window at issue in the Ashville case.
The group’s post ties the question to a much larger pending matter: an annexation linked to a proposed development called Scioto Preserve, which could add more than 1,200 homes to the Circleville area, with part of the property falling within the Teays Valley Local School District. The annexation has not yet come before City Council for a final vote, and the group was careful to note that the city has not signaled it plans to declare that vote an emergency. “Nobody is saying Circleville has already decided to declare this annexation an emergency,” the group wrote. “It hasn’t.”
Still, the group argued the Ashville ruling means the question is worth asking before any vote, not after — whether a future emergency declaration on the annexation would reflect a genuine threat to public peace, health or safety, or simply a way to move the project forward without giving Circleville voters the chance to weigh in.
This story is based on a Facebook post from Teays Valley Against Overgrowth, the Ohio Supreme Court’s Aug. 7, 2026 opinion in State ex rel. McNamara-Smith v. Grube, and records from Circleville City Council, including its rules of order and a Jan. 20, 2026 ordinance.
