Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach recently issued a legal opinion declaring that some cities may publish notices on their own websites despite a state law requiring them to be published in local newspapers.
“Home-rule provisions of the Kansas Constitution … allows cities to exempt themselves from nonuniform acts of the Legislature,” Kobach wrote. “We conclude that a second-class city may exempt itself by charter ordinance. And, once having done so may then choose to publish official city business on its own webpage.”
Municipalities with populations between 2,000 and 15,000 people are considered “cities of the second class” in Kansas.
AG supports newspaper notice in Wyoming lawsuit
Two municipalities in Wyoming passed nearly identical ordinances in 2021 exempting themselves from state statutes mandating the publication of various notices in their local paper of record. A lawsuit subsequently filed by that paper — Lee Enterprise’s Casper Star-Tribune — seeks to compel the cities of Mills and Bar Nunn to publish those notices within its pages.
The Star-Tribune is the official newspaper of Natrona County. Mills and Bar Nunn are small but growing communities within the county.
Last month, the state of Wyoming weighed in on the side of the Star-Tribune. The attorney general’s office filed a brief in the case, arguing the state’s public notice laws are valid and must be followed by both local governments.
After its bill passes, Guilford County loses interest in notifying citizens
Two nearly identical public notice bills have been introduced in North Carolina. Both bills would allow multiple counties, and the municipalities within those counties, to adopt ordinances authorizing them to move their notices from newspapers to the county website. H35 would apply to 11 counties and HB51 would impact 13 others.
Their Republican sponsors (one co-sponsor is a Democrat) structured the bills so oddly to avoid the almost-certain veto of Democratic Governor Roy Cooper. In North Carolina, the governor can’t veto legislation filed as a “local bill”, and local bills are limited to 14 counties.
Voters in Connecticut town eliminate newspaper notice on second try
Don’t like the outcome of a referendum? No problem. Just put the same issue back on the ballot in the next election, only this time leave out the part that voters objected to the first time.
That’s what the Board of Selectmen did last month in the town of Winchester, Connecticut, after voters rejected a 2018 ballot initiative that would have moved the town’s public notices from local newspapers to its website.
North Carolina County Requests Own Local Notice Bill
Rockingham County’s Board of Commissioners last month approved a referendum asking the state legislature to allow all government units in Rockingham to publish public notices on the county’s official website rather than in local newspapers.
The resolution specifically referenced the General Assembly’s passage two weeks earlier of Sen. Trudy Wade’s (R-Guilford) Senate Bill 181, which authorized neighboring Guilford County to move all public notices in the county from newspapers to its official website. Wade’s bill was almost identical to House Bill 205, an earlier measure she backed that passed the legislature this summer but was swiftly vetoed by Governor Roy Cooper (D). However, unlike HB 205, Wade’s latest effort to eliminate newspaper notice was drafted as a veto-proof “local” bill.
N.C. Public Notice Legislation Resurrected as Local Bill
North Carolina State Sen. Trudy Wade’s battle to eliminate public notice in newspapers is set to move to a new front this week. According to the News & Record, the state legislature is expected to consider a local version of her public notice bill when it reconvenes on Wednesday.
Wade’s previous public notice bills have been state legislation. Even her measure that was vetoed in July by Gov. Roy Cooper — which had been amended minutes before it passed to focus solely on Guilford County — was a North Carolina bill. Like that bill, her latest effort would affect only Guilford County, but it has been written as a piece of local legislation. Local legislation can’t be vetoed by the governor.
N.C. Governor’s Public Notice Veto Still Stands
This story was updated on Sept. 5.
North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of a bad public notice bill is safe for now.
The state’s legislature adjourned for the year on Aug. 31 without ever having voted whether to overturn the governor’s veto of HB 205, Sen. Trudy Wade’s (R-Guilford) apparent effort to punish the newspapers in her district.
Public Notice from a Bureaucrat’s Perspective
The Anne Arundel (Maryland) County Council is considering legislation proposed by its Department of Public Works that would allow public notice for right-of-way purchases, road abandonment, and petitions to extend water and sewer services, to be published on its website. The bill would also eliminate the current requirement that department officials post a sign on the affected property or publish two notices in a local newspaper.
This is a minor local issue that normally wouldn’t merit the attention of a national audience.
But a statement made by the county’s public works director to the Capital Gazette caught our attention. It perfectly encapsulates the bureaucratic perspective on public notice.