In an editorial “Creighton helps hide public info” the New Era joins the Intelligencer Journal editorial page (the same day) and the Sunday News (yesterday) in attacking State Representative Thomas Creighton for suggesting government notices be posted on the Internet rather than by newspaper advertisements! The New Era harrumphs “If this was simply a matter of the government saving dollars and cents, Creighton and other lawmakers would do better to sponsor a bill to eliminate all public notices.”
WATCHDOG: Creighton is one of the sponsors of a bill that would allow legal notices to be posted on web sites rather than run in newspapers, an approach that would save the state a lot of money.
The bill has already succeeded in getting newspapers throughout the state to agree to lower the rates they charge the government. Now isn’t getting better value for taxpayers expenditures what our representatives are supposed to be doing?
This is not to say that the bill is above debate and objection. Let’s post an op-ed by Creighton or another bill supporter side by side, as USA Today would do. But three editorials skewering the man? That’s piling on.
When we witness back to back to back editorials (three in two days) in the interest of Lancaster Newspapers, Inc., it is reasonable to assume that Chair Jack Buckwalter and President Harold Miller have passed the word from their fourth floor executive offices. So much for journalistic independence.
Deju vu Convention Center, all over again (as Yogi Berra would have put it). When our elected oppose the financial interests of the Lancaster Newspapers, the long knives come out. Ask Molly Henderson and Dick Shellenberger…they know.
