It gets better
- Probably perfectly normal for a county (and might even be required); all of the county commissioners are honorary members of the agricultural society. The commissioner always liked to play like he had no idea what they do, had no connection, etc. In the interest of full disclosure, he should have told me that he was a member, even if it is honorary.
- Looking through the county records, I found a deed for a property that the AG society does actually own. It is not the fairground. The AG society has signed easements for its property(ies) as well, but nothing for the fairgrounds proper as far as I can tell so far. If they owned the fairgrounds, there would be deed(s) and at least easements. I'm going to check for county easements signed for the fair property. Just as there is no deed to the fairground in the AG society's name, there is no lease of any sort for them at that property. Per the ORC, if the county and the society purchase or lease a property together, there has to be a joint agreement drawn up. Undoubtedly, it would have to be recorded. Nothing, nada, so far!
- The constitution and bylaws of the AG society are published in this year's paper (probably required by open records law). In them, they list all of the regulations. Alcohol and lasers are prohibited but, curiously, firearms are NOT prohibited anywhere in there.
The more that I investigate, the more convinced I am that they knew full well that they couldn't legally ban firearms. Just my guess...
I'd love to find a local court case where they invoked immunity from liability, find in the transcripts where they argued that they are a political subdivision, and then present that. Nothing like that is likely to happen as I wouldn't have time in the presentation.
ETA: I used IE to view instead of FireFox (problematic with TIFF viewer) and see that they have signed some easements in the past decade but they use a different address for the property that comes up adjacent to the fairgrounds on web map sites.
- Probably perfectly normal for a county (and might even be required); all of the county commissioners are honorary members of the agricultural society. The commissioner always liked to play like he had no idea what they do, had no connection, etc. In the interest of full disclosure, he should have told me that he was a member, even if it is honorary.
- Looking through the county records, I found a deed for a property that the AG society does actually own. It is not the fairground. The AG society has signed easements for its property(ies) as well, but nothing for the fairgrounds proper as far as I can tell so far. If they owned the fairgrounds, there would be deed(s) and at least easements. I'm going to check for county easements signed for the fair property. Just as there is no deed to the fairground in the AG society's name, there is no lease of any sort for them at that property. Per the ORC, if the county and the society purchase or lease a property together, there has to be a joint agreement drawn up. Undoubtedly, it would have to be recorded. Nothing, nada, so far!
- The constitution and bylaws of the AG society are published in this year's paper (probably required by open records law). In them, they list all of the regulations. Alcohol and lasers are prohibited but, curiously, firearms are NOT prohibited anywhere in there.
The more that I investigate, the more convinced I am that they knew full well that they couldn't legally ban firearms. Just my guess...
I'd love to find a local court case where they invoked immunity from liability, find in the transcripts where they argued that they are a political subdivision, and then present that. Nothing like that is likely to happen as I wouldn't have time in the presentation.
ETA: I used IE to view instead of FireFox (problematic with TIFF viewer) and see that they have signed some easements in the past decade but they use a different address for the property that comes up adjacent to the fairgrounds on web map sites.
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