The term paper township refers to a

civil township A civil township is a widely used unit of local government in the United States that is subordinate to a county, most often in the northern and midwestern parts of the country. The term town is used in New England, New York, and Wisconsin to ref ...

under Ohio law that nominally exists for certain purposes but does not act as a functioning unit of civil government. Such townships usually exist on paper as a

legal fiction A legal fiction is a fact assumed or created by courts, which is then used in order to help reach a decision or to apply a legal rule. The concept is used almost exclusively in common law jurisdictions, particularly in England and Wales. Deve ...

due to

municipal annexation Municipal annexation is the legal process by which a city or other municipality acquires land as its jurisdictional territory (as opposed to simply owning the land the way individuals do). In the United States and Canada, it refers to the incorpor ...

Formation

Almost all territory within Ohio is at least nominally part of a

township A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, ...

. Whenever a township falls entirely within a single municipality, or is coextensive with a single municipality, the township government is automatically abolished and consolidated with the municipal government under . This condition can be met in multiple ways: * A municipality may annex territory until it becomes coextensive with the township. For example, the City of

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line w ...

was originally located in Cincinnati Township in Hamilton County; the city annexed the township's remaining unincorporated territory in 1834. * A township may be incorporated wholesale as a municipality. For example, in 1955, the residents of Van Buren Township in Montgomery County voted to incorporate as the Village of

Kettering Kettering is a market and industrial town in North Northamptonshire, England. It is located north of London and north-east of Northampton, west of the River Ise, a tributary of the River Nene. The name means "the place (or territory) ...

. * A municipality may withdraw from its surrounding township, creating a township coextensive with the municipality that only exists on paper for the purpose of satisfying the requirement that the entire county lies within a township. Under other provisions of state law, a township can exist nominally in rump form without a government if the remaining unincorporated portion of a township does not meet the requirements for incorporation or annexation. In limited cases, territory may fall in no township when either: * a township successfully petitions under to create a new township exclusive of that part included in municipalities; or * a township merges into a municipality under through .

Withdrawal

In a legal procedure known as withdrawal, a municipality may request that the board of county commissioners modify the overlapping township's boundaries to exclude the municipality, and erect a new township coextensive with the municipality. The township effectively never exists because its government is immediately abolished. This

is common among the state's largest cities and popular among cities and villages in southwestern Ohio, where township government is seen as redundant to municipal government and a cause of higher taxation. A city or village that overlaps with multiple townships only needs to create a single paper township to withdraw from each township. Because Ohio law does not forbid townships from being located in multiple counties, a municipality in multiple counties may petition multiple county boards of commissioners to create a single paper township shared among all the counties, or petition to create separate paper townships in each county. For example, both

Butler A butler is a person who works in a house serving and is a domestic worker in a large household. In great houses, the household is sometimes divided into departments with the butler in charge of the dining room, wine cellar, and pantries, pantry ...

and

Hamilton Hamilton may refer to: People * Hamilton (name), a common British surname and occasional given name, usually of Scottish origin, including a list of persons with the surname ** The Duke of Hamilton, the premier peer of Scotland ** Lord Hamilto ...

counties share a nominal Heritage Township that corresponds with the City of Fairfield; on the other hand,

, Clermont, and Warren counties each have a separate, nominal Loveland Township that corresponds to part of the City of Loveland. When the municipality annexes additional land, township boundaries must be explicitly adjusted to reflect the change; otherwise, the annexation remains in the original township as well as the municipality. Under 1953 case law, a paper township may not be considered an adjoining township for the purpose of dissolving a township. A paper township does not have to share the municipality's name. For example: *

Louisville Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border. ...

's Constitution Township is named after the city's nickname. * Fairfield's Heritage Township was created by the county commissioners of Butler and Hamilton counties because Butler County already had a Fairfield Township – the one from which Fairfield withdrew. * Canal Fulton's Milan Township is named after one of two villages that Canal Fulton annexed in the 1850s.

Unpopulated townships

A township can consist of unincorporated territory but lack a government because it has no resident population. On January 23, 1981, Wayne Township in Montgomery County was re-incorporated as the city of

Huber Heights Huber Heights is a suburb of Dayton in Montgomery and Miami counties in the U.S. state of Ohio. Its origins trace back to the now- defunct Wayne Township, which was settled in the early-mid 1800s. Wayne Township was incorporated as the City of H ...

. However, a small portion of Wayne Township east of the Mad River was part of

Wright-Patterson Air Force Base Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (WPAFB) is a United States Air Force base and census-designated place just east of Dayton, Ohio, in Greene and Montgomery counties. It includes both Wright and Patterson Fields, which were originally Wilbur Wr ...

. Under , territory on military installations can not be incorporated without the approval of the

Secretary of Defense A defence minister or minister of defence is a cabinet official position in charge of a ministry of defense, which regulates the armed forces in sovereign states. The role of a defence minister varies considerably from country to country; in so ...

. Thus, that portion of Wayne Township still nominally exists, but has no local government. It is currently the only unpopulated township in Ohio. Decades earlier in 1943, Millcreek Township in Hamilton County became defunct, leaving no local government, after annexations by Cincinnati and withdrawals by other villages reduced the township to only a cemetery without even a resident property owner eligible to vote for annexation.

Prevalence

As of the 2010 Census, 15 townships in Ohio had no government because a city or village had become coextensive with it, and one because it had no population. A total of 258 municipal corporations (179 cities and 79 villages) have fully or partially withdrawn from functioning townships to create paper townships. Of those partially withdrawn, 24 are cities and three are villages.

Economic implications

Municipalities can dramatically reduce a real township's territory and tax base by withdrawing from the township and subsequently annexing additional territory. Columbia Township in Hamilton County and Lemon Township in Butler County were once large and populous but gradually shrank to small, discontiguous neighborhoods as surrounding cities and villages withdrew and continued to annex township land. To remain viable, a township may merge with another township or municipality either through a

referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a Representative democr ...

or with the consent of the relevant boards of trustees or councils. Since 2002, a municipality must reimburse a township for lost tax revenue when land is transferred to a paper township after annexation. Previously, the reimbursement had to take place upon annexation, even if the land remained within the original township.

Political implications

Paper townships are a relatively obscure phenomenon that can create major surprises in election administration. In 1890, a defunct, largely forgotten Storrs Township in Hamilton County upended the Ohio Democratic Party's

gerrymandering In representative democracies, gerrymandering (, originally ) is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries with the intent to create undue advantage for a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. The m ...

scheme, potentially affecting the balance of power in the

United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...

, when a state redistricting act was inadvertently worded in a way that failed to place the township's residents in any congressional district. A joint congressional resolution was introduced to temporarily revert the districts to their former boundaries.

Formation

Withdrawal

Unpopulated townships

Prevalence

Economic implications

Political implications

See also

References

Further reading