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

If anything should persuade misguided lawmakers in the Florida Legislature that the internet remains an unnavigable place for too many people desperate for basic public information, it should be these interminable months of COVID-19.

From the beginning, last March, Floridians have had trouble finding information about the basics, including how to secure unemployment benefits. Now, too many seniors are on their own — or out of luck — as they try to line up appointments for the COVID vaccine via the internet.

Yet, 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.

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.

Remember, Gov. DeSantis took his sweet time revealing at which assisted-living facilities and other care centers for seniors the coronavirus had been found; the Department of Health fired data analyst Rebekah Jones for not playing along with attempts to restrict public access to certain COVID stats.

If anything shows Floridians that their state government does not want them to access public information — even that which can save lives — it has been this year of the virus. But they can fight back.

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. The problem is, residents will have to be extremely motivated to look for information that they are much more likely to encounter in their newspaper and the newspaper’s website.

So the Editorial Board will repeat what it said on this issue last year:

- 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.

- In addition to their print audience, newspapers’ web audience is typically 10 times larger than most city or county websites.

- Newspapers are required to post copies of the public notices on floridapublicnotices.com, which has more traffic than many city or county websites, is easily searchable and is available to the public for free.

- Notices posted exclusively online will only be seen by people who look for them. Currently, people find notices when they are looking for other information in a newspaper.

- Internet access is not as readily available in some rural areas or for some segments of the population, including many whose quality of life is already precarious.

- Newspapers provide a paper trail when new legal notices are published and added to the newspaper’s website. That paper trail likely will disappear if left to local governments.

The Editorial Board further stated: “Clearly, this is a years-long effort to keep Floridians out of the loop, less likely to petition their government at local government meetings or able to hold their elected leaders accountable.

“It’s another attempt, too, to gouge newspapers — which many lawmakers wrongly consider the enemy — by cutting into their revenue.”

This year, however, the companion bill in the state Senate, sponsored by Sen. Ray Rodrigues, R-Lee County, adds another befuddling element to this already-misguided legislation: Senate Bill 402 also would reduce the number of Floridians who see judicial notices by removing legal notifications from newspapers, instead posting them to a website established by the state Supreme Court.

Is that really where a resident will go and discover his home is about to be sold on the courthouse steps?

We urge Floridians to see this issue for what it is — and isn’t. In truth, it’s not about saving localities money. It’s not about newspapers’ revenue — and it shouldn’t be a partisan issue.

No, it’s about government accountability. It’s about transparency.

And right now, we can see right through these legislative efforts that would let local governments throughout the state conduct Floridians’ business in the shadows.