WHY PUBLIC NOTICES SHOULD REMAIN IN NEWSPAPERS AND ON NEWSPAPER WEBSITES

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Public Notice Talking Points | Updated February 2011

Newspaper publication of government's notices have been the law since our country was founded. In one of its first official acts in 1789, the federal government ordered the publication in at least three public newspapers of every bill, order, resolution, and vote---because they didn't entirely trust the new government that they were forming, and they didn't want to leave notices up to government alone.

Newspapers agree that public notices should be on the internet. That's why we sponsored legislation that passed into law 7 years ago to mandate that all newspapers must put them on their website at no additional cost, in addition to placing them in their print editions. 

Giving local government the option to put their public notices where they choose means citizens will have to search longer to find them, since some may keep them in newspapers and on newspaper websites, and some may move them to government websites.  Since we believe that government has an affirmative duty to tell the public what it is doing, we have supported legislation requiring that public notices appear in several mediums, including the government's website---but government groups have always opposed this proposal.

Newspapers and newspaper websites are where the public goes to get news about their government---not government websites. The West Central Tribune Newspaper in Willmar, the Albert Lea Tribune, and the Rochester Post Bulletin each had over 1M visits to their websites in just the month of December, 2010.    Newspapers across the state have significantly higher numbers of visits to their websites compared to government websites.

The Minnesota Senate asked the public, in the state fair poll in 2009, what their primary source for acquiring government or political information was---newspapers were overwhelmingly the first choice. A government operated website would remove public notice from the mainstream of community information and would make it less likely that they would be seen.
 
Advocates for taking public notices out of newspapers claim that it will save money---but local government has never substantiated this claim. The money spent on putting public notices in papers is statistically insignificant compared to the local government's budget.  And the expense of designing, operating, properly maintaining, and updating a website are significant, if done right. These costs are now covered by newspapers.

It is counterproductive to transfer responsibilities from the private sector to the public sector, and give local government more duties when they will undoubtedly be operating with fewer employees in the future.  Additionally, newspapers are businesses that pay taxes and provide thousands of private sector jobs. We believe that private business can do a better job.

Local governments know that newspapers get the message out best. When they want to publicize issues of concern, they don't post it on their website---they go to the media.

Many citizens do not have ready access to the Internet, or prefer not to use it often. AARP, the American Association of Retired Persons, representing over 700,000 Minnesotans 50 and older, has a position opposing removal of public notices from newspapers.

Do we really want government to have sole responsibility and control over the dissemination of its own notices? Newspaper publication prevents government from deciding when and how the notice is published, and whether it is changed after it is published. Public notices in newspapers are also a critical check and balance on potential government errors.

Public bodies can give little assurance that their websites will be reliable, available, permanent or secure.  Properly maintaining a secure website is an expensive proposition. 

Current law has extensive requirements for what newspapers must do in order to disseminate notices and how it must be done. Legislation to remove newspaper publication has never contained any standards or requirements on how government must post notices. There is no real incentive for them to do the job right, and no penalty for that failure.

There are legal consequences to local governments if they fail to properly publish certain notices. Minnesota has hundreds of laws that require public notices to be published according to strict timelines and other conditions. If their website goes down, will citizens be able to challenge their actions for failure to properly meet statutory publication requirements? Will bond issues and zoning decisions be challenged? Will ordinances not take effect? Under current law, the newspaper assumes the liability when errors are made. With this legislation, the insurance trusts for local government will become liable for the errors of their members.
 
Public notices in newspapers are the permanent records of what a public body does as well as the notification of what it intends to do. There is no archival history to government websites as there is with newspapers. Years from now, any citizen could go to a newspaper and read what the government did.

The reliability of newspaper publication is so well established that courts accept the published contents as evidence in court, and require it for many court actions. In previous years, the state auditor and attorney general have expressed reservations about the loss of paper notices that courts want as independent verification.  

Web only access to public notices raises issues of citizen privacy, since government can track the use of government websites.

Newspapers only support publication of notices that are meaningful to the public and will never oppose sensible changes. In fact, most of the significant changes to public notice law over the last 30 years have been proposals of the newspaper association that have repealed over 300 outdated and obsolete public notice statutes.

The more the public knows about what elected officials do, the better off we all are. And the more open and accessible government information is, the less room there will be for speculation and rumor.