State Affairs committee holds bill to allow electronic public notices after hours of debate

House State Affairs members on the motion to advance House Bill 33 voted to hold the proposal in committee after more than three hours of testimony and debate.

Sponsor and Meridian Rep. Jeff Ehlers told the committee the bill is intended to "modernize" public-notice law by allowing government entities and other notice filers to publish legally required notices electronically and to post them to a central site maintained by the state controller. He said the bill is voluntary for local governments and would include an archive and optional push-notification features that users could subscribe to.

Supporters — including county commissioners, the Association of Idaho Cities and some school-district representatives — told the committee the change would reduce what they described as substantial local costs for newspaper legal notices and provide more direct reach by electronic means. Jonathan Wheatley, deputy director of the Association of Idaho Cities,…