To the Editor:
On Monday evening’s Milford Borough Council agenda is an item concerning potential Council support for Pennsylvania Senate Bill 194. I urge you to read the analysis from the head of the Pennsylvania News Media Association, which raises important points.
If governmental agencies can meet the important and required public notice obligation by posting legal notices solely on their own websites without requiring they be published in public media (print or online), it will mean less transparency and a heightened risk of manipulation by public officials who really aren’t interested in accountability and public scrutiny.
As or more important, it will also be a death knell for hundreds of local media outlets in Pennsylvania who rely on legal notices to be commercially viable. It is not unusual for local weeklies in Pennsylvania to derive a third to half of their revenue from legal notices.
Local media has dramatically shrunk in recent years, to the detriment of the American democracy as well as to the local communities they serve.
We should be finding ways to support and strengthen local media, not to kill it off.
I urge the Milford Borough Council to send a letter to Sen. Lisa Baker expressing their strong opposition to this bill.
Sean Strub
Former Mayor of Milford