Our View: Legal notice policy serves the public

The Voluntown municipal web site was off-line for at least two days this week. We're not sure exactly when it went down, but by Wednesday morning it was up and operating.

We mention that because there is a renewed effort in Hartford to adopt legislation that would allow municipalities to post legal notices on municipal web pages rather than in newspapers.

As we witnessed this week, web pages are not always reliable. But in the more than 200 years of The Bulletin, we're not aware of any day when we didn't publish a newspaper.

We have repeatedly opposed legislative efforts to alter the way in which municipalities are now required to post legal notices, and we acknowledge publicly that we have a vested financial interest in maintaining the current policy. We make money from those notices.

Our opposition is not tied to the financial issue, whereas the rationale behind the proposed change is. Municipalities are constantly seeking ways to lower costs and the legislative effort is an honest and sincere effort by lawmakers to help.

But at what cost?

Legal notices contain information on public hearings and requests for bids for the purchase of goods or services. It's “public” information that could easily be overlooked or hidden on a web page. It wouldn't be difficult to post a public hearing notice on controversial proposed zoning change in such a manner that would make it hard to find or easy to overlook.

Studies have consistently shown that fewer people visit municipal web pages to learn about what their local government is doing than those who cull that information from newspaper.

Is there a price tag that can be put on an informed citizenry?

Not every municipality has a web page that is easy to navigate or updated on a frequent enough basis to adequately meet the spirit of the law requiring the posting of legal notices. And that burden could prove more costly in the long run, especially for smaller rural communities.

The measure before the Legislature, although well-intended, comes with unintended consequences that do not serve the public's best interests.

That's our opinion. We'd like to hear yours. Email us your thoughts at letters@norwichbulletin.com