Despite qualms about possible unfair competition with the private sector and a loss of transparency, the Volusia County Council has agreed to explore the idea of setting up a special website for public notices and legal advertisements.

Before the Florida Legislature changed the law, such notices were required to appear in newspapers.

“My gut says I’m not comfortable with it. I want to save some money. I’m just not sure that we will. I think all this is going to come back and we’ll get a second bite of the apple. Right now, we don’t know how much we’ll save,” County Chair Jeff Brower said Nov. 21, as he and his colleagues debated the proposal.

Council Member David Santiago was gung-ho.

“It’s time to modernize,” he argued. “I’ve got nothing against papers, but it’s time to modernize, and I realize it doesn’t apply to everyone, but we’re shifting toward electronic features, computers, tablets, or phones, and the Legislature has given us that ability to do it now. It’s going to be a cost-savings to taxpayers.”

Will those savings — unknown as of now — offset possible public skepticism about government’s role in deciding what the public should know and where they should find the information?

“It is a fundamental principle and basic right of American society that details of government activities reach all parts of the community so that they can make an informed decision,” Daytona Beach News-Journal General Manager Jane Katona told the County Council.

The option for county governments to create their own public-advertising spots in cyberspace comes from House Bill 7049, enacted by the Florida Legislature in 2022. The measure went into effect Jan. 1.

“Under the new law, a local government may only publish on the County website so long as publishing on the website costs less than publishing in a newspaper,” reads a memorandum written by Senior Assistant County Attorney Paolo Soria and given to the County Council.

In addition to publishing its own legally required notices on its own website, the
County Council is exploring the idea of selling the service to cities and other governmental entities.

Soria’s memo continues: “Additionally, if the County chooses to allow for website publication, other municipal governments and county constitutional officers may also publish on the County website, so long as the cost to publish on the County website is less than the cost of publishing in a newspaper.”

The county spends about $110,000 on legal ads yearly, Soria said, and by having and using its own special website for such ads, it may reduce that expense by approximately $70,000.

Savings? Real or imaginary?

Savings may be iffy, as the full costs of operating a county public-ad website are not certain. For example, would the county use existing personnel or hire another staffer to keep the website in-house? Or would the county follow the legal staff’s recommendation to contract with an outside vendor or service provider?

The $70,000 savings does not take into account “the cost of a third-party service provider,” Soria’s memo noted.

Having an outside vendor operate the website, he said, may cost about $2,000 each month.

Moreover, newspaper publication of some legal ads may be required by federal or state laws.

“The total cost or savings is currently unknown as there may be some required legal advertisements that may not be published on the county website due to a statutory restriction,” the memo noted. “There is an additional unknown cost to the County, as persons who wish to receive notice are entitled to receive the notices published on the County website by e-mail or by first class mail under the new law.”

The state law also requires the website to have its material readily available for those looking for past publication.

“All advertisements and public notices published on a website in this chapter must be in a searchable form and indicate the date on which the advertisement or public notice was first published on the website,” Section 5, Paragraph 2 of House Bill 7049 reads.

By having its own public-notice website, the county may have another way to make money, cash that could pay for the website.

“There’s unknown amounts of potential revenue if you choose to charge state and local governments. Once again, that limitation set by statute says it must be less expensive to publish on the county web site than it is to publish in a newspaper of general circulation,” Soria said.

Media in the vortex

Caught in the middle of the budding controversy are the newspapers, whose owners,
editors and other supporters voice misgivings about government being in charge of
disseminating its own advertisements.

“We believe the public will be the ultimate loser, if you decide to move your government notices to your own website,” Florida Press Association President Jim Fogler told the council. “First off, the county website will result in a direct conflict of interest by county officials. The county and its vendors will be directly overseeing the timing, the placement and the content of the public notices on its own county activities. That’s a bad idea.”

Fogler referred to the controversial fuel farm envisioned near Ormond Beach, which came to the public’s attention after a news writer saw a legal notice about the fuel farm published in the Hometown News.

“If a scheduled public notice is not published or contains incorrect information — I can’t even imagine if the fuel farm did not even appear on your website, that would have been a disaster. We believe the newspaper is more likely to catch that mistake,” Fogler said.

Barb Shepherd, founder and publisher of The Beacon, voiced doubts about the idea of saving tax dollars.

She said the county’s calculation “ignores the value, as others have mentioned, of the functionality and service those newspapers provide, and ignores the true cost of replacing that with taxpayer funding. There will be ongoing labor costs for the web platform, the content, maintaining, updating, fixing things … coordinating with the website providers, providing customer service, and so on, especially if you start your own little small business of selling the county’s website service to other government entities.”

Shepherd noted, too, the possibility of supplanting the private sector and putting some people out of work.

“As a newspaper publisher,” she said, “I’m no stranger to the idea of cutting expenses. I understand and I respect the County Council’s commitment to doing the best possible and most efficient job with the taxpayers’ money. What I don’t understand is why the county would undercut its own homegrown businesses by using taxpayer dollars to create a new bureaucracy to do a job that local private enterprise is already doing well.”

Debate on the dais

Having a special website for legal and official notices appealed to Council Member Jake Johansson, a retired naval officer and former city manager of Port Orange.

“I brought this up as a thought about more efficient and effective government,” he said. “I’m not opposed to newspapers continuing to do this. I’m trying to save government some money.”

Johansson dismissed thoughts about possible bureaucratic interference in getting required or vital information out to the general public.

“We have an obligation to give this information to the newspapers to print. So, I guess if we’re trying to hide something, we could be doing that now,” he said.

“I think we’re becoming more transparent, or at least that is the intent of why I want to do this,” Johansson added.

Johansson acknowledged the possible pain of unemployment if the county establishes a public-notice website, after newspaper representatives said the loss of business could lead to job losses.

“I don’t want people that live within this county to lose their jobs so we can save some money without knowing that in advance. You guys bring up a great point today that I didn’t consider,” Johansson said.

Council Member Matt Reinhart likewise voiced mixed feelings.

“I am that tangible guy. I like the newspaper,” he told his colleagues and the audience. “I do get your point about conflict of interest. I do get your point about government replacing private business. I do get the point about government competing with private [business]. … I understand their point.”

The conflicting concerns weighed on Council Member Troy Kent.

“Times are changing,” Kent said, “and change is not always easy. I’m aware of that. I don’t know where I am on this. … I’m not 100 percent sold, either way.”

“My biggest hurdle, the biggest pain in my gut,” Brower said, “is that I see this as government replacing private business for a service that they’re already providing and then we’re going to compete.”

On the flip side, he added, “it’s not the council’s job to keep newspapers in business. I don’t think that is the argument that they are making.”

Brower suggested a possible dual-information system.

“I honestly think we need to do both — that we need to put it on the county’s webpage for more transparency and in the newspapers, but that’s not going to save us any money. That will cost us more money.”

That may be the answer, Santiago said, noting, “maybe have both running at the same time. I’m open to that.”

When the time came to decide whether to move forward with a new website to keep the public in the know, or to drop the idea, the council voted 5-0 to ask for more information about procuring an outside service provider.

The council also authorized its attorneys to draft an ordinance to create such a website. County officials may also determine a fee structure for other governments or agencies that wish to advertise on the proposed county website. Vice Chair Danny Robins and Council Member Don Dempsey were absent.

Is this trip necessary?

Before the council set its course of action, Fogler told the council the status quo already provides a wide array of information about other governments and their notices — at no charge.

“Did you know the Florida Press Association currently hosts a free aggregated website called Floridapublicnotices.com? We’ve had it in place since 2012, and we’ve updated it and modernized it in 2022. So if government notices go on your county website, it will no longer be available for citizens on our FPA site,” he said.

“The bill says there must be cost savings for governments to move to web-only. But how can a local government know that before it proceeds,” Fogler added.

Volusia County, he said, should perhaps “consider doing both. Run in your local newspaper and on the government website.”

Shepherd also suggested the county look at a possible partnership.

“If you are determined to go online only, I would urge you to use an already-existing newspaper website — even The Beacon — and support your local businesses, instead of creating more county government to replace them,” she said.

How soon information on the costs and real impacts of a new public-advertising website owned by the county will be available is not known. Nor is it clear if the County Council, once informed, will proceed to establish such a website.

Stay tuned.