Star Editorial
One has to wonder whether there was an ulterior motive in the County’s legal notice bidding process this year. Certainly the award of the bid to the Ravalli Republic was not made for fiscal considerations or in the interest of the public’s right to know.
Last year the Bitterroot Star was awarded the bid for printing the county’s legal notices. The Star’s circulation was higher and its bid lower than the only other bidder, the Ravalli Republic, and the commissioners rightly used those facts as their rationale for awarding the bid.
This year the Star was once again the low bidder with the highest circulation, circulation that is now more than double that of the only other bidder, the Ravalli Republic. However, the commissioners chose to award the bid to the Republic.
According to the published specifications in the Call for Printing Bids provided by the county (which was published in the Bitterroot Star Legal Notices section) the relevant criteria is:
“• Per folio rate (1-100 words) for the first and each additional insertion
• Information that specifically addresses compliance with Section 7-5-2411 MCA and 7-1-12121 MCA.”
This is the publication and circulation information that is provided by sworn statement to the Clerk and Recorder each year, and includes the net circulation figures, “net” being the number of newspapers that are distributed and not returned. (By the way, 7-5-2411 MCA was renumbered by the state in 2009 to 18-7-411 MCA, and 7-1-12121 MCA doesn’t exist, but presumably the county actually meant 7-1-2121. But everyone makes mistakes, right?) These statutes also establish who is eligible to bid, what information the notices must contain, and how proof of publication is provided.
Why is this information required by law to be included in the bid? We think it’s because this information is exactly what the commissioners need in order to make an informed decision.
In the discussion at the bid opening, the commissioners expressed doubt about the Bitterroot Star’s weekly net circulation of 6876 copies, suggesting that because the Star is free it’s not being read. They even went so far as to subtract all the circulation on the newsstands (we have over 120 stands) from their calculations, and used only the sum of the mail and home delivery (which alone is 3395, still more than the Ravalli Republic’s total of 2999) in their discussion. They were suggesting that because the Star is free on the stands it’s not being read. But we know differently, and we think they do too. Most people who pick up a newspaper from the stand plan on reading it. The newspapers left in the stands are recovered and recycled and do not count as part of our net circulation.
The truth is, more people than ever are reading the Star, and it’s not just those who get it in the mail or at their homes. At a number of stands around the valley, we can hardly keep the papers in stock. The Star is wildly popular, perhaps because, in these times, people appreciate receiving their news without the expense of a subscription or the inconvenience of having to pay at the stand. Furthermore, the clustered areas of Hamilton, Corvallis and Stevensville have free home delivery. If people in these areas don’t want to receive the paper, they can call to have their free paper discontinued. How often do you think that happens?
The commissioners also mentioned that one member of the public didn’t want to wait for the Bitterroot Star to publish on Wednesday and published a legal notice at their own expense in the Ravalli Republic. And, that the Bitterroot Star had missed the first insertion of a legal notice because an email order wasn’t seen. All email orders for legal notices receive a confirmation email from the Star. Shouldn’t we have received an immediate call from the county when the order wasn’t confirmed? This was certainly the Bitterroot Star’s error, but it can be argued that the county had some responsibility too. However, is that truly a “performance issue” of great significance, as the commissioners suggested? One omission out of more than 80 insertions placed as of the end of November (and that by just the commissioners’ office alone). Is this a good time to mention the county’s “omission” of the correct numbers of the Montana codes published in the Call for Printing Bids referenced above?
This year, the county also issued a call for bids for display advertising. And again, the Bitterroot Star’s bid was significantly lower than that of the Ravalli Republic, the only other bidder, but you guessed it, the Ravalli Republic was awarded that bid too. Not only did the commissioners give the same flimsy reasons for their decision, they added another one. In this case, they said that they would have to award the display bid to the successful legal notice bidder, the reason being that they didn’t want to be using two papers as the official paper of record for the county. But nowhere in the call for display advertising bids did it say that.
We think all of the above makes this year’s bidding process a total sham. And we have to wonder if this could be retaliation for the recent successful lawsuit the Bitterroot Star brought against the commissioners for not following the laws regarding the public’s right to know and participate in their own government. If that’s so, we should all be thinking about replacing these elected officials who keep making poor decisions that cost the taxpayers, rather than good decisions that save money.