Legal Notice HB 35 is big win for newspapers

By Tami Stevenson

On May 7, 2021, Governor Ron DeSantis signed HB 35 into law. The Legal Notices Bill, which originally sought to remove newspaper publishing requirements all together, in what they called ‘modernizing’ the way legal notices were published, has been amended. After the compromise, the bill passed with a vote of 105 Y’s to 9 N’s.

     Unwavering resistance from organizations such as the Florida Press Association finally convinced enough law-makers to withhold their vote until a compromise could be reached stating legal notices are an historical source of revenue for newspapers.

     Beginning January 1, 2022, when the bill will take effect, businesses, school districts, judicial and government agencies, etc., that need to publish legal and public notices will not see much change from the way things are now. The only real difference, it seems, will be a choice to either publish their legal and public notices online on a qualifying newspaper’s website and/or in print. The pricing is not expected to change either.

     As always, legals will still be published on the statewide legal notice website:  www.FloridaPublicNotices.com.   

     Here are the some of the changes stated from the summary analysis:

    * Gives governmental agencies the option to publish legal notices on the website of a qualified newspaper and on the Florida Press Association’s (FPA) repository website under specified conditions.

    * Authorizes a newspaper publishing legal notices online to charge for such publication up to the amount it would charge to publish the notices in its print edition.

    * Requires the FPA to seek to ensure that minority populations throughout the state have equitable access to legal notices posted on the FPA’s repository website and requires the FPA to publish a report containing specified information.

    The bill was introduced by Republican Representative Randy Fine of Brevard County and amended by Republican Senator Ray Rodrigues of Fort Myers.