…some lawmakers this year will continue to push to remove from Florida’s newspapers public notices, those often nondescript black-and-white boxes of text alerting residents what their local government is up to. They are prompts, or prods, for residents and others to get involved in the process, to attend a meeting of the zoning board, the city council, the school board. Attendance allows taxpayers to make their presence felt and their voices heard.

In Florida, the public’s on notice: Elected leaders don’t want you to know what they’re doing | Editorial

ZOMG! What evil stuff are the Legislators gonna do if they will not notify us!

Of course, that’s the last thing the more devious lawmakers in the Legislature want. They would rather shut residents out of the process, pulling the shades and turning out the lights on open government.

After all, the year of the pandemic also affirmed Florida’s brazen attempts to hide vital information from a public that is starving for it.

“Warning! There will be no information coming out of your government on what they are trying to do! Sunshine Law will die!” or at least this is what the Herald is pushing with this editorial.  But wait, after the screaming death intro, the editorial sort of touches on the issue:

Florida House Bill 35 is a repeat of last year’s legislation. It would no longer require local governments to purchase space in newspapers — and on their websites — to announce meetings, public hearings, impending votes, etc. Instead, those governments could post the information solely on their own websites.

So this is the real problem: losing mandated government subsidies to run your rag. As a taxpayer, I believe it should be a crime that my taxes go to fund a liberal political propaganda media outlet. In fact, I believe that is not quite Constitutional.

But here is the issue with the “editorial” , as I read the bill, what is does is to allow notices in government websites also and it gives permission/mandates to do so when there is no local newspaper in the county. There is no language in the bill that forbids publication in a newspaper, in fact, the old  language indicating publishing in a newspaper is still there….unfortunately.

I do love this stab at Republicans.

More that 1.2 million Florida residents do not have access to the internet, according to a report by Nielsen Scarborough in 2018. Many elderly and minority residents — whom Republicans shamelessly target when it comes to voting and other rights — can’t afford a computer and the fees they incur.

Only one little problem: The sponsor of the bill is indeed a Republican but it is co-sponsored by a Democrat.

And in a splash of pure irony, the Democrat co-sponsor is a representative from Miami-Dade County, home of the Miami Herald.

So basically I believe this is just an editorial trying to gather sympathy for a disappearing newspaper that once was important and now does not even have a physical presence nor seems to be wanted by its political masters anymore.

And as usual, trust nobody. Read the bill’s text.