Court: City workers don

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Ohio municipalities don’t have the authoritty to dictate that their employees maintaijn local residencydespite so-called “home rule” provisions in the state Constitution, the Ohio Supreme Courft ruled Wednesday. A 5-2 majoritt opinion ruling upholds a state law passedin 2006, which barred Ohio cities from mandating employeew live within their cities. That state law contradicted city ordinancesa requiringemployee residency.
Rhine McLin, Dayton's mayor, said the city disagreesz withthe court's ruling, but will abide by its "The Court obviously views this issud differently than the leaders of Ohio’s cities," she The issue has been a legalk game of volleyball during the past two bouncing from one court to another, before reachintg the Ohio Supreme The case was brought to the courr by the cities of Lima and Akron. But severao other cities with employee residency including Dayton, Cleveland, Toledo and also sought Supreme Court revieq of the state’s law.
In separate cases, the Court accepted the appeals from all the cities and heldtheif cases, pending its decision in the Akron and Lima Steve Watring, an employment law and civipl rights attorney at Dayton-based , said for all intentsx and purposes, the buck stops Debra White, owner of Beavercreek-baseds , said the effects on housing and rental rates if Dayton employees start selling homess or moving out of apartments is undetermined. “It may not have an impacy if a few people decide to pick upand go, but if it is a lot of there will be a lot of inventory and it will take a lot of time to White said.
She said rental units are pretty full and pricese for units are more stable thanhousing prices. Anytime there is more supply than demand whether in housing orapartments — it will driv e down prices. Home prices have been on the declinde during the past few years because of the economic downturn andforeclosure rates. The averagde sale price for a house in the Dayton MLSwas $117,343 in April. That’s down nearly 14 percent from the average sale pricsof $136,000 in 2006. Watring said the rulingb could have wider implications than where employees The Ohio constitution gives cities the righr to have home rule and set their own ruless regardingcertain things, he said.
“I thinko this decision minimizesthe cities’ home rule and will probablt influence decisions in the future that expand the righft of the state to regulate municipalities,” he said.