I will not be voting for Earl Martin
There was a time when my parents and I supported Ohio state representative Earl Martin (R-Avon Lake) because he supported the historical society, but I've become less impressed with him as time goes on. Just add this little vignette to the pile:
There is currently a bill pending with the state of Ohio that would move the public trust of beaches from the high water mark down to the low water mark. Not surprisingly, Earl Martin, who lives on lakefront property in Avon Lake, supports this legislation.
But his statements in the Chronicle-Telegram Friday take the cake:
Martin, who owns a lakefront home in Avon Lake, said the bill he’s sponsoring only clarifies the law.
Incorrect. The current law says the public is permitted on land adjacent to Lake Erie up to the high water mark. This bill would move it to the low water mark -- a significant difference. That's not "clarifying"; it's outright changing it.
“It doesn’t extend or grant any land to people that they didn’t already own,” he said.
This is true, if one focuses on the word "own." However, the area from the high water mark to the water is considered a "public trust," and anyone can use it without being considered a trespasser. This doesn't mean you can walk through Earl Martin's driveway to get there, but if you enter from the water or a neighboring property, you can use the beach.
“I have a stake in everything that happens in Ohio and this bill will do nothing to increase my property,” he said.
Again, true that it won't increase the size of his property; it simply dictates who may use which piece of it. The reason for the current Ohio law, with the public trust up to the high water mark, is because the "land" underneath the water there is temporary. Ohio owns the water; there's no dispute there. But the water is constantly moving, and at low tide, more beach is exposed. Who gets to own that beach? The current law says the adjoining property owner also owns that area of beach, but that the public is still allowed to use it. It's a compromise.
However, property owners who wish to build a dock out into the water must pay an annual fee to the state of Ohio. And there, as they say, is the rub. Restricting the trust to the low water mark all but eliminates it, and also opens the possibility of not having to pay fees to the state.
For more about what's at stake here, read this article about a case in Michigan. That will give you a synopsis, but you can read the Michigan Supreme Court's opinion here as well, where they explain their reasons for ruling in favor of the woman who enjoyed walking on the public trust of the beach.
But regardless of whether or not one agrees with the current or proposed Ohio law, to claim that Earl the Pearl doesn't have a conflict of interest here is absurd.
Stupid politics. If I feel up to it, I may rant a bit about the two (so-called) smoking "ban" amendments that will be on the ballot this year...
Edited to add: Be sure to click the "comments" link below for more information and discussion on this issue.
11 Comments:
I'm seriously conflicted about the smoknig bans. On the one hand, I'd have to say that this smoke-free like in BG is absolutely wonderful. Literally, I am shocked when I go into a restaurant and smell smoke these days, because I am so used to BG.
On the other hand, if I owned a store and wanted to let people smoke, I might be pissed, especially if the place across the street were in a different city/state and allowed it.
Of course, in the end, I think my job of a smoke-free city trumps my belief in property rights, mostly because I get so damned sick from smoke......
I'll also ad that my father knows a restaurant owner who went smoke-free in a city without a ban, and found that after a year, he had more customers and far lower cleaning and "replacing the curtains and getting the ceiling tiles scrubbed" costs. And many places in BG also said that they had no drop in profits as expected (some did though)...
-Skootch
My boss started smoking again last year (he had quit for about seven years), and it really can be a distraction if I'm near it. I suppose I could whip out the cancer card, since I'm more susceptible to lung cancer due to my chemotherapy, but I really don't get that much exposure. The main problem is that it stinks and it's sometimes hard to concentrate. It fills the whole front office area, even from room to room, so if I absolutely have to do work there, it's hard to escape. And it rarely stops -- he smokes all day. None of us has the guts to speak up though, since he's the top guy.
Plus, I don't want to sound like one of the snotty kids on the Truth.org commercials (which, in my humble opinion, do a grave disservice to the anti-smoking campaign with their smart mouths and sassy attitudes).
Restaurants are one thing, because one can choose to patronize another establishment or eat at home. The workplace is another story. It's not that easy to get another job -- and besides, why should I have to? When did libertarians decide that the "right" of a smoker to smoke trumps the "right" of an employee to breathe fresh air? So I have to spend months finding a new job, switching health insurance, possibly finding a new place of residence, all because some smoker can't take it upon himself to step outside when he needs some stress relief?
Thank You Earl Martin....
Ignorance of an issue, of what exactly is going on in this state is rapant in this district. Let me educate you what Earl Martin is fighting....
When the ODNR came into my home on the premise to help me with a broken breakwall in 1998, I felt I was in NAZI Germany... The marched in and claimed ownership of my property that has been deeded over 100 years, forced me to lease the land I own ( I now pay the state for my deeded dry property) and they forced me to pay taxes on the property they just confiscated...
They have doen this to me and others along the lake.
For over 200 years our deeds have been honored... but when a few zealots were empowered at ODNR ... they had there sights on all lakefront property regurdless of what deeds read. Thier plan: a new set of regulations along with a new definition of shoreline that nulified most of the 15,000 deeds along the lake. This new regulation will soon be used to confiscate ptoperty along rivers and streams as well as parks in this state.
Me and my nieghbors did noy know what to do... so we turned to Earl Martin, Sally Conway Kilbane and other State reps....
Earl Martin stood up and helped--- I am a lifelong Democrat worked with the Clinton Whitehouse and would never want any one else going to bat, fighting this injustice other than Earl Martin.
Anyone that opposes this fight - or opposes Earl for this fight does not belong in this country...
This issue is simple... should the state be allowed to take private property without just compensation -- through a regulatory taking??/ NO!
That is why there is now a class action lawsuit against the State.
Thank you Marty.... for standing up to the Bullies in this State! For standing up for justice. -- Jim O'Connor
My heart bleeds for those poor, downtrodden beachfront property owners. I certainly hope that Earl Martin can gain justice for these disenfranched, these veritable little guys that have been brutalized by an uncaring bureaucracy. Oh, for the days when such do-gooders were rightly branded as the Communists they are!
- Publius
Yeah, well, as I said, whether or not I agree with the current or proposed laws regarding Ohio's beaches, I still think it's a conflict of interest for Martin.
I'd have a hard time believing he'd be there supporting this if he himself weren't a lakefront property owner. It has very little to do with supporting private property rights, but very much to do with self-interest. That's what bothers me.
Just like most politics. ;)
Byron... What Bothers me is that so little people know the whole story... thier ignorance is overwhemling with this issue...
This issue has NOTHING to do with beaches...
The fact is Earl Martin and MANY other reps did not get invovled with this issue untill myself and others had thier property confiscated... and that is the truth... WE WENT TO THEM FOR HELP!
This issue has been twisted like everything in todays's politics to support a view - or misrepresent the facts---- rather than tell the truth...
Opinions should be based on fact.
The fact is this has nothing to do with Earl personaaly except he and the other reps saw the crap that me and my neighbors have gone through and they have tried to stop it. It has nothing to do with beaches.
Chris Redfern has supported our efforts as well and has voted for HB 218 to make the State honor our deeded property, that is all.....
The below text is that of an artcle that appeared in the Morning Journal in December 2000, when this fight started and before the "twisting" began.
They tell the story better than most:
----------------------------------------
Property Owners Along Lakefront Deserve
Relief from State's Bullying
Imagine this: In the schoolyard, a bully grabs the hat off your head. When you try to grab it back, the bully starts yelling to a gathering crowd that you are trying to steal ''his'' hat. Then he makes you ''lease'' your own hat from him in order for you to wear it.
That's something like what's been happening to the people who own property along the shore of Lake Erie in recent decades. Their ''hat'' is their shoreline property. The bully is the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.
Only a few decades ago, it was accepted that a property owner along the lake owned the land to the low water mark (defined as about 569 feet above sea level), as most deeds designate.
Then state officials changed their tune and started claiming that the state owned the land below the high water mark (about 573 feet above sea level), despite what deeds said and despite the fact property owners must pay tax on that strip of shoreline between the high- and low-water marks - a strip sometimes as much as 50 feet wide in gently sloping lakefront areas. The state also began requiring property owners with new or existing structures below the high water mark, such as for erosion control, to lease their own ''submerged land'' back from the state.
Many property owners along Lake Erie's shoreline have banded together in the Ohio Lakefront Group, headed by Dave Carek of Sheffield Lake. They've allied with some state lawmakers proposing legislation that will give them relief.
Sponsors of this fine-tuned version of HB 218 include Rep. Earl Martin, R-Avon Lake; and Rep. Tim Grendell, R-Chesterland. They hope the bill will make it out of committee this week and win Ohio House approval by year's end, on its way to becoming law by next year.
Grendell is from landlocked Geauga County, but wants to head off the potential for state bureaucratic tentacles putting a similar squeeze on property owners along Ohio's inland lakes and rivers.
The legislation proposed by Martin and Grendell says you own the land to wherever your deed says, which is usually the low water mark. Their bill eliminates the renewable submerged land leases for residential properties, replacing them with one-time permits. It acknowledges that the public has use of areas covered by water. It preserves coastal management controls so that the state won't lose federal funds for coastal projects, as critics fear.
In short, it rights the wrongs done to lakefront property owners while protecting the public's interest in the lakefront.
Some state officials and allies in environmental groups have cried that lakefront property owners are trying to grab control of ''the public'' lakefront; they've thrown up scares about loss of public access and fears of fenced-off beaches.
That's absurd, and they've got it backward.
The state is the one who's done the land-grabbing from lakefront landowners and has benefited from submerged land lease fees and bulked-up administrative ''turf'' controlled by the ODNR. The lakefront property owners have been the victims. Rather than being greedy rich people as critics sometimes portray them, many lakefront property owners are ordinary people who've had their land passed down through generations.
They've been done wrong for too long.
State lawmakers should do the right thing by giving the reform bill prompt approval
©The Morning Journal
###
----------------------------------------
... to have the state come in and then confiscate your deeded land that has been in you family for decades should not happen to anyone who lives anywhere at any time... except maybe Publius.
respectfully... JO
.... I forgot to add....
bryan said:
"Incorrect. The current law says the public is permitted on land adjacent to Lake Erie up to the high water mark. This bill would move it to the low water mark -- a significant difference. That's not "clarifying"; it's outright changing it."
Show me where it states "the current law says the public is.... " .... you can't! - there is no law that says that....
--- that is all a lie - bull- ODNR crap- there is no definition in Ohio law, code or statute other than the
"shoreline" of Lake Erie... Which Attorney General Lee Fisher stated determining private ownership in 1993 as " where the water meets the dry land on a calm day.." (Low water is defined where the water meets the land in many states)
ODNR can not cite "high water" as a definition of private property boudary anywhere in Ohio law because it does not exist....anywhere..
ODNR has made all the vitims in this issue like me, out to be villians... all because we want what we paid for back... we want the propety they stole back... we want the staet to stop and honor our deeds that were honored until 1997...
I have been fighting these lies for almost ten years and it is unbelieveable how ODNR lies again and again and again... to steal private property....this bill changes nothing -- for decades my propety was just that - mine... then the state stole it... this bill says back off - honor our deed.. Martin should be thanked... by all because if they can do this to me ... they most certainly can come after you...
There is a class action lawsuit against the state for this illegal taking of our private propety...
Please get your facts right -please.
Just to keep the discussion flowing...
j.o. has posted a more detailed story at his own blog, rightfromtheleft, which shares his and his neighbors' experiences with the laws in question.
I know this is an old post, probably moot since Martin lost the election, but......
J.O. said on his blog:
a ODNR official went in to my neighbors home and claimed ownership right through the miiddle of his house
Oh really? Was your neighbor's home built past the high water mark? So the "middle of his house" is built right into the water? I have a hard time believing this. Speaking of getting facts right.
And presumably, if you THINK you own land right up to the water's edge, then you'd be willing to pay taxes on that land every time it's not covered with water, yes? Are you going to let the state treasurer set up a live camera feed of your beach so they'll know exactly how much time out of the year your property was X acres instead of Y acres? Or perhaps you'd just like to own property all the way out INTO Lake Erie. You can feel free to pay tax on that too, bub.
Here's a good writeup on the issue, and it seems to be pretty neutral, complete with references...
The National Sea Grant Law Center
The way I see it, even if your property has been in your family for 200 years, even if your deed CLAIMS you own all the way into the water or wherever, that doesn't necessarily make it legal. Your fricking deed doesn't supersede state law. Plenty of folks had deeds that claimed Toledo was a part of Michigan, and we even fought a war over it, but again that doesn't mean it's right. Your deed could say your property extends all the way to Pelee Island, but don't be surprised when Canada wants it back.
Oh, so there's no Ohio law that says "high water mark," but apparently you and your ritzy-titzy buddies like to believe there IS an Ohio law that says "low water mark"?
But I guess you guys won, since last week Gov. Strickland decreed that all deeds will be honored. Which is fortunate for me, since my family has had a deed to the Sandusky Bay Bridge for over 300 years. But those NAZIS in Columbus don't believe me. How typical.
Post a Comment
<< Home