Linndale v. State - Ohio Supreme Court Opinion - Ohio Supreme Court Decision

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VILLAGE OF LINNDALE, APPELLEE, v. THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLANT; CITY OF
BLUE ASH, APPELLEE.
[Cite as Linndale v. State (1999), ___ Ohio St.3d ___.]
Municipal corporations -- Motor vehicles -- Statute prohibiting issuance of
speeding and excess weight citations on interstate freeways by local law
enforcement officers, inter alia, when municipality has less than eight
hundred eighty yards of the interstate highway within its jurisdiction --
R.C. 4549.17 is not a general law and is unconstitutional as violative of the
Home-Rule Amendment.
(No. 97-2493 -- Submitted December 2, 1998 -- Decided March 24, 1999.)
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 97APE03-314.

The Ohio General Assembly enacted R.C. 4549.17 in 1994. The statute
prohibits local law enforcement officers from issuing speeding and excess weight
citations on interstate freeways when all of the following exist: (1) the locality has
less than eight hundred eighty yards of the interstate freeway within its
jurisdiction; (2) the local law enforcement officers must travel outside their
jurisdiction to enter onto the interstate freeway; and (3) the local law enforcement
officers enter the interstate freeway with the primary purpose of issuing citations
for speed or weight violations. Approximately twenty-five municipal corporations
within Ohio meet the geographic criteria and are thereby foreclosed from
enforcing their local speed and motor vehicle weight ordinances on the interstate
system located within their jurisdiction.

The village of Linndale ("Linndale"), one of the affected municipal
corporations, sought a judgment declaring that R.C. 4549.17 is unconstitutional as
violative either of Section 26, Article II of the Ohio Constitution (the "Uniformity
Clause") or of Section 3, Article XVIII of the Ohio Constitution (the "Home-Rule

Amendment"), or both. Linndale named the state of Ohio and the city of Blue Ash
("Blue Ash") as defendants to the action. Blue Ash cross-claimed against the
state.

The trial court ruled on cross-motions for summary judgment, finding that
R.C. 4549.17 does not violate the Uniformity Clause, but that it is unconstitutional
because it does violate Sections 3 and 7, Article XVIII of the Ohio Constitution.

Cross-appeals followed the decision of the trial court, and the Franklin
County Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's judgment. The court of
appeals, having determined that the statute violated Sections 3 and 7, Article
XVIII of the Ohio Constitution, did not take up Linndale's cross-appeal, in which
it argued that the statute was also unconstitutional based on a violation of the
Uniformity Clause.

The cause is now before this court upon the allowance of a discretionary
appeal.
__________________

Gareau & Dubelko Co., L.P.A., and James M. Dubelko, for appellee village
of Linndale, Ohio.

Betty D. Montgomery, Attorney General, Arthur J. Marziale, Jr., Elizabeth
A. Scott and Jeffrey B. Hartranft, Assistant Attorneys General, for appellant.

Dinsmore & Shohl, L.L.P., Mark A. Vander Laan and James V. Schuster, for
appellee city of Blue Ash, Ohio.
__________________

COOK, J. This case turns on the question of whether R.C. 4549.17 is a
general or a special law. If it is a general law, then it prevails over the local traffic
laws of affected municipalities because a municipality's police regulation must
yield to the state's general police regulation when the two conflict. If, however,

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R.C. 4549.17 is not a law applying to citizens generally, but an attempt to limit the
powers of a municipal corporation to adopt or to enforce police regulations, it
must be struck down as unconstitutional. Because R.C. 4549.17 is not a general
law, we find it unconstitutional as violative of the Home-Rule Amendment.

The Home-Rule Amendment grants to Ohio municipalities "authority to
exercise all powers of local self-government and to adopt and enforce within their
limits such local police, sanitary and other similar regulations, as are not in
conflict with general laws." Section 3, Article XVIII, Ohio Constitution. Thus, a
municipality may regulate in an area such as traffic whenever its regulation is not
in conflict with the general laws of the state. Geauga Cty. Bd. of Commrs. v.
Munn Rd. Sand & Gravel (1993), 67 Ohio St.3d 579, 583, 621 N.E.2d 696, 699.
"Municipalities in Ohio are authorized to adopt local police, sanitary and other
similar regulations * * * and derive no authority from, and are subject to no
limitations of, the General Assembly, except that such ordinances shall not be in
conflict with general laws." Struthers v Sokol (1923), 108 Ohio St. 263, 140 N.E.
519, syllabus.

The state argues that R.C. 4549.17 is a general law that is part of a
comprehensive statewide regulatory scheme covering the interstate highway
system and that the General Assembly enacted it to assure the traveling public that
law enforcement on the interstate highways was not occurring merely as a
revenue-raising plot. Linndale and Blue Ash, on the other hand, posit that R.C.
4549.17 is a special law and therefore cannot rightfully enjoin their police officers
from enforcing local traffic laws within their boundaries.

General laws are those enacted by the General Assembly to safeguard the
peace, health, morals, and safety and to protect the property of the people of the
state. Schneiderman v. Sesanstein (1929), 121 Ohio St. 80, 82-83, 167 N.E. 158,

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159. General laws "apply to all parts of the state alike." Id. at 83, 167 N.E. at 159.
This court held in W. Jefferson v. Robinson (1965), 1 Ohio St.2d 113, 30 O.O.2d
474, 205 N.E.2d 382, paragraph three of the syllabus, that "[t]he words `general
laws' as set forth in Section 3 of Article XVIII of the Ohio Constitution means
[sic] statutes setting forth police, sanitary or similar regulations and not statutes
which purport only to grant or to limit the legislative powers of a municipal
corporation to adopt or enforce police, sanitary or other similar regulations."
(Emphasis added.) This court also defined general laws as those operating
uniformly throughout the state, prescribing a rule of conduct on citizens generally,
and operating with general uniform application throughout the state under the
same circumstances and conditions. Garcia v. Siffrin Residential Assn. (1980), 63
Ohio St.2d 259, 271, 17 O.O.3d 167, 174, 407 N.E.2d 1369, 1377-1378 (citing
Schneiderman, supra). " `Once a matter has become of such general interest that it
is necessary to make it subject to statewide control so as to require uniform
statewide regulation, the municipality can no longer legislate in the field so as to
conflict with the state.' " Ohio Assn. of Private Detective Agencies, Inc. v. N.
Olmsted (1992), 65 Ohio St.3d 242, 244, 602 N.E.2d 1147, 1149, quoting State ex
rel. McElroy v. Akron (1962), 173 Ohio St. 189, 194, 19 O.O.2d 3, 6, 181 N.E.2d
26, 30.

Given these parameters, we determine that R.C. 4549.17 is not a general
law. Because a municipal corporation's authority to regulate traffic comes from
the Ohio Constitution, State v. Parker (1994), 68 Ohio St.3d 283, 285, 626 N.E.2d
106, 108; see, also, Munn, supra, a statute that, like R.C. 4549.17, purports only to
limit this constitutionally granted power is not a "general law." W. Jefferson v.
Robinson (1965), 1 Ohio St.2d 113, 30 O.O.2d 474, 205 N.E.2d 382, paragraph
three of the syllabus. As the trial court properly found, R.C. 4549.17 is "simply a

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limit on the legislative powers of municipal corporations to adopt and enforce
specified police regulations." The statute before us is not a part of a system of
uniform statewide regulation on the subject of traffic law enforcement. It is a
statute that says, in effect, certain cities may not enforce local regulations;
precisely the type of statute West Jefferson denounced. Moreover, this enactment
does not prescribe a rule of conduct upon citizens generally as required by this
court. See Garcia, supra.

Because R.C. 4549.17 is not a general law, it unconstitutionally impinges on
the home-rule powers of the affected municipalities. Having decided that, we, like
the court of appeals, need not address whether R.C. 4549.17 violates the
Uniformity Clause.

Accordingly, the judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.

DOUGLAS, RESNICK and LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur.

MOYER, C.J., dissents.
F.E. SWEENEY and PFEIFER, JJ., dissent.
__________________

PFEIFER, J., dissenting. We have all heard the quip about the town so
small that "Welcome" and "Thanks for Visiting" are contained on the same road
sign. Linndale, Ohio, adds another line: "You're Under Arrest."

Linndale has a population somewhere under two hundred. In 1993,
according to the state, Linndale police officers issued five thousand traffic
citations along the less than half-mile stretch of I-71 that runs through the
municipality. If the State Highway Patrol issued tickets at the same per capita rate,
it would hand out thirty-three million citations a year. That would be over a thirty-
five hundred percent increase over what the patrol did in 1998. This case is not

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about the sanctity of self-determination. It is about whether a tiny town can use an
interstate highway as its personal ATM.

The Home-Rule provision of the Ohio Constitution was meant to protect the
ability of local authorities to regulate matters of purely local concern. The power
of local self-government granted by the Constitution relates to the government and
administration of internal affairs. In enacting R.C. 4549.17, the state is not trying
to tell Linndale how many traffic lights it should have, how to enforce its
jaywalking laws, or how many police officers to hire. The state is only trying to
run the interstate highway system in an efficient manner. R.C. 4549.17 affects the
enforcement of state-imposed speed limits on interstate highways and addresses
the potentially dangerous situation of concentrated enforcement of speed limits.

Moreover, the statute is a general law that, as an exercise of the police
power, prevails over any conflicting municipal ordinance. The whole idea behind
an interstate highway system is its inter-connectedness. What happens in certain
stretches of highway can affect the traffic flow of the entire system. Not every
stretch of highway in the system has the same speed limit. Certain areas, certain
grades, and certain traffic densities require certain attention. Because every
regulation does not apply to every mile of roadway equally does not mean that
each regulation is not a part of a uniform statewide regulation.

In view of the comprehensive scheme of regulation established by the
General Assembly to promote safe travel on the interstate highway system, I
would find R.C. 4549.17 not violative of home rule, and therefore constitutional.
F.E. SWEENEY, J., concurs in the foregoing dissenting opinion.

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