Bill
HB 823
Allows deployed elected officials to attend and vote in meetings remotely without being counted as absent or vacating office, preserving duties and vacancy rules.
Title: Regards deployed elected official’s office, meeting attendance
Purpose
- To allow an elected official who is deployed on active military duty to retain the official’s position and participate in public body meetings remotely (via teleconference, video conference, or similar synchronous electronic technology).
- To create protections and clarify status for such officials while on active duty, ensuring they are not treated as absent or having vacated the office due to deployment.
Key Provisions and Changes
1) General framework for misconduct removal remains (Sections 3.07, 3.17)
- Maintains authority to remove or discipline elected officials for misconduct or failure to perform duties, as currently described in the Revised Code.
- Provisions clarify that removal actions supplement, not replace, existing impeachment/removal methods.
2) New active-duty deployed elected official provisions (Section 3.171)
- Defines key terms:
- Active duty: full-time duty in the U.S. armed forces or Ohio National Guard (including training and state active duty for guards members).
- Elected official: person holding an elective state or political subdivision office.
- Public body: as defined in Ohio law.
- Provisions for deployed elected officials:
- Copied ability for the official to attend public body meetings remotely and to hear and vote on matters via teleconference, video conference, or similar technology.
- The official is not considered absent for attendance purposes, even if attending virtually.
- The absence does not count against meeting-attendance requirements or vacation/absence provisions.
- The official is not deemed to have vacated the office due to deployment.
- Absence due to deployment does not constitute nonfeasance or failure to perform duties.
3) County-level governance and other offices (Sections 305.03, 503.241)
- Adjustments clarify that deployment-related attendance is not a vacancy trigger due to absence for deployed officials in:
- County officers (Sec. 305.03): deployment-related virtual attendance is recognized; the section defines vacancy rules triggered by long-term absence due to sickness, etc., and notes deployment under 3.171 is exempt.
- Township officers (Sec. 503.241): similar deployment exemption; long-term absence triggers vacancy provisions only if not deployed.
4) Education boards (Section 3313.11)
- Vacancy rules for boards of education are clarified in light of deployment-related attendance; the text preserves existing vacancy mechanisms but notes 3.171 deployment status as an exception to certain absence-based vacancy triggers.
5) Repeal and statutory alignment
- The bill repeals certain existing sections (3.07, 3.17, 305.03, 503.241, 3313.11) and enacts modernized language, aligning with the new section 3.171.
Affected Parties
Procedural and Timeline Aspects
Bottom Line
HB 823 modernizes Ohio law to accommodate deployed elected officials by allowing virtual attendance and voting while on active duty, while preserving accountability mechanisms and clarifying vacancy and attendance implications across various local government structures. It aims to prevent deployment from causing inadvertent vacancies or penalizing service members serving the state and public interests.
Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.
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