Local governments are required to post legal notices where the public is most likely to see them. Traditionally, that has been in general-circulation newspapers. It still is.
But the state legislature is threatening to rescind requirements for these important notifications to appear in print.
Senate Bill 343, whose primary sponsor is Republican Sen. Trudy Wade of Greensboro, would allow cities and counties to place notices about public hearings, zoning changes, elections, delinquent taxpayers and other matters on their own websites. The measure “helps save local tax dollars,” Wade claims.
Another component of the bill would let local governments go into the legal notices business themselves by posting notices from attorneys and charging them a fee. Half of that revenue would support salary supplements for teachers.
What’s wrong with this? Plenty, starting with visibility.
Newspapers enjoy broader readership than do local government websites. Even in the age of the internet, many people remain print readers only. They will never see a notice about a neighborhood rezoning proposal if it’s only posted on the city website. But for online readers, newspapers have a robust internet presence as well. Notices that appear in a newspaper’s print and online editions stand a much better chance of being seen than those that are only found on a city or county website.
Newspapers already have made concessions on this issue in response to legislative suggestions in the past, posting notices at discounted rates. Is this still a bad deal for local governments and taxpayers? That’s an unproven claim. While proponents like Wade say this bill will save money, there’s no evidence to substantiate that assertion. If the only location for legal notices would be city or county websites, most of those cities and counties likely would need to make substantial improvements to their sites at significant cost.
This may be why the House is working on a revised version of the bill, which would create a “pilot program” in four counties to test the idea that local governments can provide sufficient notice themselves. The counties would be Guilford, Durham, Forsyth and Buncombe — notably leaving out Wake and Mecklenburg. This practice run, if approved, likely will result in less-informed citizens.
It’s no secret that newspapers face economic challenges as more readers shift from print to online consumption. Losing legal notices would cost advertising revenue. So, in a way, this is a scheme to marginally shift employment from the private sector to the public sector. It’s also a tax plan if local governments wring fees from lawyers for posting their notices. It’s clever to channel some of that money to teachers, but it probably would generate less than expected. Lawyers won’t find it cost-effective to advertise on government websites that few people use.
The most pernicious part of this scheme is its potential for keeping the public in the dark. If government officials really don’t want people to know something, the last thing they’d do is tell the newspapers. If they can closet a notice on their own thinly trafficked website, they’ll succeed in keeping most folks in the dark.
The legislature should not let that happen.
— The Greensboro News & Record