ZID Center Controller reported ZOB had extended stop signs for weather reasons and would not manage and work traffic in the area; leading to overwhelmed and overloaded sectors in the vicinity and reroutes that negatively impact users.

Narrative

These events have become a common occurrence this summer. ZID had significant weather in the airspace. ZNY and ZDC also had a fair share of weather. ZOB had the entire Center clear of any depicted weather with the exception of a small sliver in their far southeast corner. As soon as I came into work today; we had stop signs on traffic going into ZOB on TEB; MMU; CDW; LGA; EWR; DCA; IAD; BWI. Later this would come to include HPN; JFK. ZID worked hard to reroute all of these markets taken from ZME; ZKC; ZAU as our feeding facilities but eventually we needed help and passed on some of the stop signs (LGA; EWR; TEB) back onto these facilities because our areas were dealing with too much weather to also be having to reroute all aircraft. This would continue for the next ~6 - 7 hours of the shift where ZOB continued to extend the stop sign in one-hour increments. At approximately XA:00; I had time to investigate ZOB's log and see what they were providing ZNY/ZDC. I noticed that there was no mention of stopped routes on ANY of the DC Mets that we have been forcing into area 3. Area 3 at one point had so much additional volume; their split sector NAS monitor numbers were 30 aircraft. I had the Supervisory Traffic Management Coordinator (STMC) call ZDC and verify with their supervisors that they had not passed back a stop sign to ZOB and that they would take their traffic. ZDC said yes; they would take that traffic and they had not passed a stop sign. I called Command Center (DCC) and conferenced ZOB. I asked if they had routes to the DC Mets and they said; No; we are stopped." I then said that I just talked with ZDC and that they were not stopped. They then said that they were holding DC Mets (of which they had none because only ZID/ZAU feed them; but anyhow; sector to sector they would not take them. So for hours on end; we continued to cost the users tens of thousands of dollars in fuel/reroutes/missed connections/cancellations as who knows how many were caught up in ground stops under the claim of no routes. Meanwhile others were rerouted hundreds of miles out of their way over West Viriginia and into overwhelmed and overloaded sectors. For what? Simply put; because ZOB didn't want to work the traffic. This is most unacceptable and falls into gross negligence; causing safety issues for other controllers. It's not the Review Team's job to recommend job action but this is deserving of such. This would happen again at XC:00 as ZOB continues to extend their stop signs to ZID to both EWR/JFK. I can clearly see that ZAU has been allowed to have their traffic flow onto these routes via ZOB. But ZOB's claim is that they have no routes to ZNY (a false narrative verified from their log and on the DCC page where I can see their restrictions). Again; we continued to move entire New York markets far out of their way for a reason none other than they didn't want that volume. At this point; the weather was actually over to just east of New York. So; closing the ZOB route and forcing us to send them via ZDC is an additional safety concern because we are now stacking them on the unsafe side of the weather. No doubt; this negatively affected the user by forcing them into weather and likely caused ZDC to pay for it as well. Recommendation: ZOB Traffic Management Unit (TMU) needs additional training on traffic management. Management allowing this behavior applies their guilt equally in this matter. No STMC should have allowed such action by their Traffic Management Centers (TMCs). Lack of accountability. Lack of NAS understanding. Lack of weather patterns. Incompetence."