catiamonkey,
we're talking A320 here...as far as A320 operations go, overweight landing is not an emergency procedure in the JAR world at least. I don't know/care about FAA.
And guess what, Airbus put the overweight landing is the 'Abnormal proc' QRH section.
The manufacturer says you're ok to exceptionally do overweight landing AND aircraft will even be dispatchable with no further action on next flight if you touch with a V/S<6ft/sec.
I've never heard pilots declaring emergency/distress just because they were about to carry out an overweight landing...