Election Day: The Dead, Dead Tree Ballot Proposal
And now for something super local on this Election Day.
As you may have heard, the Ann Arbor News closed down during the summer. That has left a bit of a problem under the city charter, which requires the publication of public ordinances in a “newspaper of general circulation.” The only one left is the Washtenaw Legal News–not exactly the best read rag in town. So the city has two ballot proposals which offer alternatives to publication in a dead tree newspaper.
Here’s coverage of the ballot proposal AnnArbor.Com–the much watched online outlet that has replaced the Ann Arbor News.
Ann Arbor voters will be asked Tuesday to approve two ballot proposals that will ease city charter restrictions and allow city staff to publish ordinances and notices on the city’s Web site instead of in a newspaper.With the closing of The Ann Arbor News, city officials are seeking alternative methods of providing the public with important information, said City Clerk Jacqueline Beaudry.
Currently, the city charter requires changes to city code or notices of proposed zoning amendments be published in a “newspaper of general circulation” in Ann Arbor. The Washtenaw Legal News is the only publication that fits that description right now.
Proposal A would allow city staff to publish approved ordinances within 10 days after enactment either in a newspaper of general circulation, by posting to the city’s Web site or by any other means or method determined appropriate by the City Council. In cases of ordinances longer than 500 words, a summary may be published and copies of the full text would be available at city hall.
Proposal B will allow the city to publish notices of proposed zoning ordinances and amendments in newspapers of general circulation or any other media otherwise permitted by law.
The Michigan Press Association has spent more than $46,000 on a campaign urging Ann Arbor residents to defeat the two proposals. It claims their passage would impact the public’s right to know how local government operates.
As they note, the Michigan Press Association has been spending what–because it seems to have been spent largely in robo-calls–feels like a big chunk of change to defend dead tree opposition to the ballot proposal. Washtenaw County has a very big and very contentious millage to replace school funding stripped by our broke state on the ballot today, which is the big story (“It takes a Millage”). But from all the robo-calls the MPA has been doing–using really hysterical language about secret changes to the city’s laws–you’d think it was the Dead Tree Ballot Proposal that had everyone worried.
Anyway, I shared this with you partly to raise the sensitive issues that arise when the dead tree press goes under.
But also to remind you to vote!
One thing that we have achieved in our county is that notices for some meetings of wider importance are actually sent out to email lists in addition to being posted online and in the local newspaper. The circulation list got much longer on zoning type meetings when some of us complained that it seemed the original lists were almost exclusively developers.
Hmm, having a public email list would be an interesting way to show who’s following these issues.
Yeah, I think now they’ve gone to blind cc’s for everyone, but I liked it when we could see who was on the list.
Congratulations on having your work cited on Olbermann’s show again.
Here in Ohio, the big money issue is #3, allowing casinos to operate in the state. I’m betting that hundreds of MILLIONS will be spent by both sides at the final tally.
I still haven’t decided how I’m going to vote. It would bring in more money, though I doubt the $500M a year in taxes that the supporters are flogging. OTOH, ever since I was old enough to vote it seems like Ohio has been saying “NO” to casinos but the backers simply won’t go away.
The robocalls from both sides during football Sunday were simply infuriating. But at least I don’t have Caribou Barbie phoning me like those poor folks in Virginia.
Money is money for a state in hard times like Ohio. If they came up with a plan that banned everyone who backed any of the casino votes from having anything to do with operating or owning an Ohio casino, I’d support it. I’m vengeful and vindictive by nature and people who won’t go away after I’ve told them half a dozen times annoy me.
If you don’t vote, you can’t bitch.
Boxturtle (If you can’t bitch, you can’t post at FDL. Everybody vote!)
an since I voted twice, I get to bitch twice as much, right ???
(duckin an runnin)
Two or three points:
1. Irony. For the historically minded, one remembers that back in the early days of the Republic, a time usually cited vis-a-vis press issues for or against Fox’s position as house organ of the Rethuglican minority, the financial fortunes of newspapers were tied to the success or failure of their parties in elections, because the income from legal notices and advertisements would make or break the papers’ books. The people elected, once in power, would adjust the list of newspapers to keep those which had supported them, and drop those which had opposed them. Now, the failure of newspapers to adapt to changing tech and changing business has resulted in there being no outlet because the “legals” don’t pay enough to support the papers.
2. Net Neutrality. Taking that historical example to the future imagine a world in which, say, Comcast (which is headed by arch-Rethugs and, inter alia, played cheers over the boos Palin got when she came to drop the puck at the Comcast-broadcast Flyers game in the Comcast-run Spectrum last year during the campaign, giving her both free propaganda and free media in kind….) controls the cables which carry the internets. And imagne that Comcast, or one of its business partners, has a real estate projct on the books which requires legal advertisements, along the lines of a zoning variance or something opposed by the locals. It would be in their interest to screw up the notification process and, to amplify it, squelch the web-based organizing through “adjusting traffic”, etc.
3. All the problems with someone in government keeping a list of email addresses keyed to the real people who live in their jurisdiction. At some point, rather quickly, the local police (having been disturbed by someone dissenting from the local PTB and their agenda) will access that list and start reading emails. This, in addition to the already-extant readings going on by federal and state authorities. Do we really want to go down that road?
4. All the problems with electronic recordation of anything. We rail on this every couple years when the Diebold systems start counting negatively on Democrats’ votes and ading to Rethugs’ (to keep it balanced). How am I going to go to the microfilms down at the public library a dozen years after the fact to find proof that notice of a variance application was given by publication when the local zoning guy decides to shut you down (unless, impliedly, you pay him an on-going nominal service charge) because there was no variance?
That really happened in a case I handled back about 1995: the zoning guy decided (urged by neighbors angling to take his property for a song) that my client’s use of a property was not compliant with zoning. MY guy had a variance for that use. The zoning board had notoriously crappy records (this facilitated their money-making chicanery with their devloper buddies) and the only record I could find that, indeed, the variance had been given was a signature (of the zoning board head from a dozen years earlier) on a plan. But to prove that notice had been given, I had to go to the microfilms of the local paper and read hundreds of pages of legal notices until I found the one that showed the notice had been given.
How you gonna do that with electrons as the notice?
Being the paper of record is important to a lot of little newspapers. If this catches on, I suspect lots of them will go under.
Your last point is the biggie and not just for legal notices. There is a lot of news in the newspaper that just won’t exist down the road. In some ways, it will be easier to re-create your identify, because all the government records will be closed for privacy purposes.
Dunno about that. AnnArbor.com, which replaced the Dead Tree, has all that. My neighbors even put a happy birthday wish to another neighbor in there last week.
I actually read MORE of that kind of news now, since it’s an RSS feed that gives me everything.
Congratulations on the kudos from John Dean. He didn’t mention your name but we know who it is. I’m gonna hafta fire off an email to John to correct that omission.
No election in my little burg today. Keeping a close eye on the mayoral and city council races in St Petersburg, FL though. Could be a sea change comin’, if we’re lucky.
It is humorous and ironic that the opo would spend their money on robo calls rather than in the dead tree media. Do they believe that the dead tree media is inadequate to get the message out.
I subscribed to the Detroit Free Press for more than 40 years, even though I lived in both Grand Rapids and Flint some of those years. I wonder if there’s a big enough circulation of the Freep and the News in Ann Arbor to have notices published there count? (I’ve been gone from there too long, but I’m not sure I remember local notices in those papers, tho…)
Remember the Freep is going away from dead tree, too.
In July, AnnArbor.com, which has a dead tree component, will count as a general newspaper. There’s a rule that it has to exist for at least a year, which ought to be the real proposal, to get rid of that distinction.
I hereby deny and repute this vicious rumor
I am NOT going away from dead trees
I jes spent two weeks cuttin, choppin, an stackin a dead tree, in a very tedious and worshipful way, with the firm intention of giving it a proper
burialburninI got a 900 pound stump that I intend to convert into a pagan idol
an I make some pretty cool chess sets outta dead wood
I spend so much time with dead wood that I could be a fookin forest gnome or sometin
I never walked away from a piece of dead wood in my life
jes wanted to be clear bout that
I killed half the rain forest jes cuz I like dead wood that much …
(wink)
an don’t call call me “the freep” too
(duckin & runnin)
I’m not seeing a successful business model for ANY daily newspaper. I subscribed to the Dayton Daily News for the better part of 25 years, but I left it about 5 years ago for the net and I’ve never felt a desire to go back. The information is sometimes three days old by the time the paper prints it and the detailed expose’s of local issues were getting fewer and fewer. They also dumbed it down to a point just above “See Spot Run”.
Prediction: A national newspaper for legal notices will be formed to cover the entire nation. Nobody will read it, except lawyers looking for information long after the fact. But it’ll make money from the notice fees.
Boxturtle (Even the big papers are going to crap at warp 2)
Based on your description of the Dayton Daily News being dumbed down, I checked the google to see who the owners are. Turns out to be Cox.
My first WAG would have been Gannett since I’ve been convinced for years that they purposefully dumbed down their local dailies in order to make USA Today look like a fine journalistic endeavor.
The dumbing down is happening everywhere. The DDN is written at the 5th grade level, because that’s the average readers ability. Rumor is they’re talking about simplifing it again.
There is only ONE daily newspaper in the nation that’s written above the 10th grade anymore and I think only two at that level. Can you name them?
Boxturtle (WSJ is 12th grade. NYT and WaPo are 10th grade)
As a former resident of A2, I appreciate your coverage of this issue.
Also:
I think you meant “are” rather than “is”?
Bob in AZ
I suspect it’s supposed to be “The city HAS two ballot proposals.”
Smart lady. You get a prize. Dakine gets a Good Try, tho.
Let’s hear a big Hurrah for the folks going to Berman’s office today. That’s Citizen Action alright. Will be interesting to see what happens.
And, hey Marcy, yep, nice shout outs from KO and Dean, John Dean. Your light is shining.
“city has”
Coffee hadn’t digested yet.
Thanks.
the only problem that I have with dead tree news outlets going down is that there is a huge digital divide out there. 50% or more of homes in Appalachia do not have access to computers and the web.
As some dead paper outlets turn to dust. The result “wood’ create a vacuum for those without access to the web.
ot
congresman Bairds response to H Resolution 867. Invite Goldstone to talk with Congress about the UN Report
Israel and Gaza Deserve Better Than HR 867
Free Gaza will attempt to read the report today at Bermans office
http://codepinkalert.org/article.php?id=5149
At 10 am on Tuesday, November 3, 2009, members of the coalition for the Free Gaza March will occupy the office (Rayburn 2221) of Congressman Howard Berman, chair of the House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs, and read publicly the 575-page Goldstone Report. They will continue to occupy the office until they get a response from Cong. Berman on their request that Congress delay the vote until Judge Goldstein has had a chance to testify at a Congressional hearing.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/11/03
True, though A2, at least, is getting pretty good local broadband, meaning that that’s not true per se in the city limits. There’s a digital literacy divide though.
We have no election today in Fargo, so out there where you do have elections, I’m counting on you to vote. Dylan Ratigan riffed this morning about the importance of people staying engaged and keeping our Congresspeople aware we’re watching them and their votes. [my paraphrase]
Marcy’s post reminds us that every election counts.
We can’t leave democracy to the tea partiers and anarchists.
hey marcy, (or anyone who might know)
I have not seen a post or comment from looseheadprop in far too long, is all ok?
Grrrr…..I have now received a total of six issue three (Casino issue)calls since 9am. four in favor, two against. Guess which ones were robocalls and which ones came from local church phone banks.
Boxturtle (Was that one too easy?)
A couple of OT items worth kibbitzing about:
From the BLT – Former OLC Chief OK With Criminal Inquiry
And from Judicial Watch: Judicial Watch Obtains New CIA Documents on Terrorist Interrogations
EW/All look what Amy Goodman focused on today
Appeals Court Rules in Maher Arar Case: Innocent Victims of Extraordinary Rendition Cannot Sue in US Courts
Arar-web
On Monday, a federal court of appeals dismissed Canadian citizen Maher Arar’s case against US officials for their role in sending him to Syria to be tortured. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that victims of extraordinary rendition cannot sue Washington for torture suffered overseas, because Congress has not authorized such lawsuits. In 2002, Syrian-born Maher Arar was held in New York on his way back to Canada from a family vacation in Tunisia. A subsequent Canadian public inquiry has shown Arar was held on erroneous advice from Canadian officials who accused him of ties to Islamic militants. US authorities then flew Arar to Syria, where he was imprisoned and tortured for a year. Canadian authorities exonerated Arar in 2007, apologized for their role in his torture, and awarded him a multi-million-dollar settlement. [includes rush transcript]
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/3/appeals_court_rules_in_maher_arar
Can a lawyer explain to me why Arar can’t sue *individuals* for what he suffered and leave it to the defendants to claim that it was part of their official business, etc? Or is the right to sue for *personal* wrongs limited to American plaintiffs and/or events that occurred in American territory?
opps, wrong thread
I thought is was the wrong thread, but I was mistaken
so technically, I’m still perfect
(bows)
here in my neck of paradise, we got a neighborhood shopper news that gets better readership than the local paper of record
everybody checks the “Penny Saver” for something; coupons, the local grocer’s ad, personal ads, lost and found
the Penny Saver has everything the local dead tree rag has, except for all the repuglitarded propaganda and BULLSHIT
and the Penny Saver is delivered thru the mail, FREE to every house and business that has an address
so there’s yer answer right there
cut out the propaganda outlets and hire the shopper news
Anyone the slightest bit concerned that info published via the web can be changed at any time? As opposed to a printed newspaper, where the words never change?
now that you mention it, YES
yes I am