Hartford County MD Votes Overwhelmingly to Move Public Notices Online and Out of Newspapers

HAT TIP : LEGAL NOTICE ONLINE

The Important Election Results are in: Harford County MD Votes Overwhelmingly to Move Public Notices OnLine Partially Out of Newspapers

The real action last night (in the world of legal notices) was a huge landslide victory in Harford County, Maryland. The County was tired of overpaying for public notices in print. Charter Amendment F changes the requirement of posting of public notices from two newspapers to one and includes posting the 2nd notice on an official website.

The Amendment passed by the largest margin of any of the charter amendments on the ballot.
Almost 84% of those voting, voted for the amendment. (See Below)

One would think that such a large county (over 250,000) to vote through such a referendum might be a progressive urban hotbed of technology? Far from it, mostly rural and suburban, Harford County, is solidly conservative (over 58% voted for Romney) .

The outcome is encouraging for other counties and local governments looking to save taxpayer money, not just because notices were pulled out of print but because this amendment provides the first real blueprint of saving money while keeping an independent third party involved in the posting of notices. Next year, when legal notices start moving out of print on the state level, the solution of having one web site government run and one web site run by an independent local online news organization will provide local governments and their citizens, the independence that is needed and will save close to $1 billion nationwide.

RESULTS:
QUESTION F
Number of Precincts-79 . Precincts Reporting 76
For Charter Amendment- 88,636 (83.73%) Against the Charter Amendment - 17,220 (16.27