Thursday, March 13, 2008
Al Diamon
Where's the Public Notice?
Maine newspapers appear to be trying to defeat a bill they oppose by ignoring it to death.
The state House of Representatives began debate on March 5 on Buckfield state Rep. Teresea Hayes’ measure, “An Act To Generate Savings by Changing Public Notice Requirements” (L.D. 1878), which seeks to phase out the practice of printing most notices of governmental public hearings and rule making in newspapers. Instead, Hayes wants to put those announcements on a special Web site and toll-free telephone line, a move she originally estimated would save as much as $450,000 over two years. Since her bill was introduced in 2007, it’s been amended twice, most recently on March 12, to keep more notices in print, and the projected savings have been reduced, first to $200,000 and now to a yet-to-be-specified lower figure. The weakened bill has now passed its first two readings in the House and been sent to the state Senate.
While all this – plus a lot of behind-the-scenes political maneuvering – has been going on at the State House, the issue has vanished from the news pages of the state’s dailies and weeklies. Since the measure emerged from committee late last month, it has generated exactly zero stories. Even stranger is the silence of the editorialists, who, until recently, had devoted considerable space – and venom – to attacking the proposed law.
Newspapers oppose Hayes’ legislation not, they say, because it would cost them money (which it would), but because, in the words of a Maine Press Association ad attacking the bill, “Maine citizens must be fully informed to make wise decisions about government action.”
If the state’s papers actually believe that, shouldn’t they be informing us about what’s happening with the public-notice bill right now?
Oh, never mind. I found that information online.
— Filed March 13, 2008
Al Diamon can be e-mailed at aldiamon@herniahill.net.
Posted on Thursday, March 13, 2008 in Permalink
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