Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon accidentally approved his own term limits, likely setting off a fight between the county attorney and legislature lawyers over whether the approval is enforceable.
If the approval sticks, the term limits — which would also apply to the county comptroller — would come before voters in referendum.
Democrats held a news conference on Wednesday afternoon at which they said they would attempt to enforce McMahon’s accidental signing.
“Everybody knew before the hearing was held that it was going to be vetoed, and it’s a simple error that no court is going to punish anybody for,” said County Attorney Bob Durr. “Unfortunately, to make something of this is to make something of nothing. It’s rather junior high civics.”
County spokesperson Justin Sayles told Central Current on Tuesday afternoon that he did not know if the County Executive would veto the local law.
The Onondaga County Legislature last week passed a local law that would allow voters to choose whether to limit the county executive and the county comptroller to three-four year terms.
The law passed 10-7, with Republican Ken Bush siding with the Democrats in favor of the law and Democrat Charles Garland siding with Republicans against it.
On Wednesday morning, after a public hearing in which County Executive Ryan McMahon expressed his intention to veto the law, he signed both an adoption and a veto of the law.
Both the adoption and the veto were separately emailed to the county legislature. The adoption document arrived at 11:38 a.m. The county clerk confirmed receipt at 11:50 a.m. Then, at 11:57 a.m., the veto arrived.
Later, physical copies of the two letters arrived in separate envelopes delivered at exactly the same time.
At 3:38 p.m., minutes after the planned start-time of a legislature press conference on the subject, the county law department told legislators that the approval had been an error, and only the veto was valid. The press conference began at 3:50 p.m.
After consulting with their outside counsel, the county legislature determined that under Section 210 of the county charter, that the first received electronic document is “legally actionable and adopts the law,” said Legislature Chair Nicole Watts. In order to overturn a law, the county must pass another law, making the veto void.
A copy of the law will be delivered to the Board of Elections to be put on the ballot later today, said Watts. Elections Commissioner Dustin Czarny said he had not seen a copy of the adoption document arrive at the Board of Elections.
Durr blamed himself for the mistake, saying he had told McMahon to sign all the documents in a folder that included both the adoption and the veto.
“He generally trusts me,” Durr said. “He read the document.”
He added that “everybody knows” that the veto was what the executive had intended to sign, and that no court would side with the legislature.
Asked if he saw the disagreement going to court, he said: “It’s not my call. But if it goes to court, [there’s] a clear winner, and it’s a waste of everybody’s time.”
“Things can be transmitted by email all the time,” Durr said. “That doesn’t make things set in stone once it’s transmitted by email. Everybody in the world makes mistakes.”
McMahon did not return a phone call from Central Current.
McMahon vetoed a previous version of the law which would have limited the terms he can serve but did not include the county comptroller.
He has said that 12 years, or three terms, is not long enough for a county executive to see projects through. McMahon has said he does not intend to remain in power long enough for the law to affect him.
“This is ultimately the voter’s choice,” said Watts. “So we will be continuing to practice the law as it was handed to us.”
Editor’s note: The subheadline of this story was updated to reflect that County Executive Ryan McMahon emailed the Onondaga County Legislature’s clerks with his adoption and veto documents.
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