By Philip M. Lucey
Like a bad penny, the legislation to hide public notices from the public is back in the NC General Assembly.
Members of the House of Representatives have tabled separate bills that would allow 14 counties in Piedmont and the mountains and 12 counties in eastern North Carolina to post public notices on their websites instead of in newspapers. This has been a bad idea for the last 10 years, and it arguably a worse idea today when a public health crisis requires more transparency, not less.
Why are public notices important?
Public notices catalog government action in cases of tenders, reallocations, budget hearings, auctions, property transfers, delinquent tax notices, street name changes, and more. They draw the public’s attention to disruptive land use changes for sewage treatment plants, asphalt plants and waste incineration plants. They inform the public in advance of suggestions for high density congestion developments and plans for wider roads or new roads. Although they cost local government a small amount of money, public notices generate income by forcing overdue taxes to be collected. Indeed, the risk of their names being published in the local newspaper (and on their website) for non-payment is an incentive for timely payment of property taxes for an incalculable amount. Rather than undermining the public’s right to know, county officers and city council members should provide as much information as possible to all of their constituents, including the many who have no internet access or poor service.
What role do newspapers play?
Newspapers are a community forum. That role doesn’t change with the way you receive local news that is important to you.
– Newspapers have proven to be the lifeline of critical community news during the pandemic. Instead of killing the messengers, counties and cities should continue to publish legal notices in newspapers and help maintain this vital line of communication with the local community.
– Applicable law ensures that public notices reach the broadest possible cross-section of the community. The death of newspapers has been greatly exaggerated since the invention of the telegraph machine, radio, and television. While the Internet has reduced the circulation of news about a printed product, newspapers have been adding web-based products almost everywhere around the clock, which in many cases are reaching a larger audience than the news companies prior to the spread of websites. The traffic on county websites is infinitely small compared to newspaper websites and print runs. A recent study by the North Carolina Press Association found that newspaper websites had four to five times as much traffic as county websites.
The survey commissioned by the NCPA in December 2020 found the following:
- 6.6 million North Carolina adults read a newspaper product each month for information about their local community.
- 72% of adults read public notices in local print or digital newspapers.
- 68% believe that governments should be required to publish notices in a newspaper to serve the community.
- 86% cite local newspapers as their “most trusted” source of public announcements compared to government websites.
The survey largely supports what most people would consider an intuitive fact: the public relies on newspapers more than any other source of information, and it’s not even close.
What about access to these communications?
– According to many studies, 30% of North Carolinians either live where there is no internet service, they cannot afford it, or they don’t read online even when available (most seniors).
Readers and viewers still check newspapers for community news that no other organization offers.
Would this save money for our counties?
The fact is, legal notice advertising is a tiny fraction of the budget in any county.
It’s an important check-and-balance service that newspapers have provided local governments with for decades, and yes, they get paid for it. These notices do not subsidize the operation of small town newspapers. They keep the public informed.
If our papers did not play this role, many vulnerable taxpayers would be left in the dark about the local government meetings for which their taxpayers’ money is paid and the decisions and taxes that these meetings could lead to. After all, legal ads sometimes more than pay for themselves by either averting a costly government controversy, getting the public to see them early, or bringing in cash.
Limiting public notice to government websites is a bad idea.
Because up to a third of North Carolinians have no internet access, cannot afford it and would not visit government-run websites even if they had internet access. This bill would bury public notices on a website that few citizens visit and would effectively destroy the public’s right to know.
Attempts to retaliate against local newspapers are a bad idea. Contact your local lawmaker and district officials and ask them to keep the fox out of the hen house. Tell them to keep public notices in newspapers for the public to see.
Philip M. Lucey is the executive director of the North Carolina Press Association.