The Ohio Supreme Court has issued a slip opinion, meaning it is consistent with the majority or principal opinion by the Justices, on the Mill Creek MetroParks bike trail.

The court has issued an opinion on the case filed by Edward Schlegel, one of the property owners whose property the park district has been attempting to acquire through the use of eminent domain for an extension of the MetroParks Bikeway since 2019. 

While that case was pending, the Ohio General Assembly enacted a law that prevents park districts with less than 220,000 and not more than 240,000 shall appropriate property for a recreational trail.

Schlegel asked that Mahoning County Commons Pleas Court to dismiss the appropriation case, and filed a lawsuit with the Ohio Supreme Court for a writ of prohibition.  

Judge Maureen Sweeney, who is the judge on the case in Mahoning County, asked that the Justices deny the writ, as it was created after the case was filed, and doesn't apply.

On Tuesday, November 1, the Justices agreed with the lower court's request and denied Schlegel's lawsuit, stating he is not entitled to a writ of prohibition, based on the fact that he has not been able to show that Judge Sweeney's court exceeded its authority in the case. The opinion also stated that Schlegel also has an adequate remedy in this case with ordinary course law, unless he can show that the trial court patently and unambiguously lacks subject-matter jurisdiction.

Schlegel's case is expected to continue in Mahoning County, with no date set at this time, but, Schlegel will also have the opportunity to revisit his case after a ruling in Judge Sweeney's court, the higher court stated in the opinion.

In May, the seventh district court of appeals of Mahoning County ruled against Mill Creek MetroPark in a dispute over a land dispute for the construction of a bike trail that would run through several property owners yards. 

Mill Creek Park was planning to use the land to further the development of a bike trail that would run from Western Reserve Rd. in Mahoning County going south into Leetonia. 

The court ruled that Mill Creek Park does not have the right to take land by eminent domain, and that the benefits of the bike trail, does not outweigh the damage done to the property owners. 

 
While the bike trail would promote public benefit and transportation, the courts ruled that did not justify the appropriation of private property.  
 

Property owner Diane Less and twelve other landowners property would have been affected by the park's construction of the bike trail.