OPINION
Last week, I had the opportunity to have an unexpected but frank conversation with a woman who came into my office looking for the July 11 newspaper in which a legal notice about a proposed concrete batch plant recently ran.
She just came in asking when it ran initially.
As we spoke about the information she had so far about the proposal, I walked her through understanding how to read the notice and to use it to its full extent.
She walked away seeming to feel more informed and grateful for the conversation.
I was grateful for it, too. It allowed me to tell her and to remind myself that at the end of the day, those legal notices are one of the biggest benefits we provide to our readers.
There's a reason the Texas Press Association, of which we are a member newspaper and I'm a new board member as of July 1, fights every year to retain legal notices in newspapers throughout the state.
That's because we provide a thirdparty but consistent place for those notices to run.
Having those notices means the community is aware of the issues that affect them.
Without a legal notice such as the one that ran on July 11 about the proposed batch plant, people outside of the area where they have to be notifi ed about the application have to depend on secondhand information and the possibility of learning about such proposed changes. With the legal notice about the application to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, our newspaper's readers can look into the application themselves and they can spread the word to fellow residents.
Being informed means you have an opportunity to act and to affect your environment.
Legal notices give you details about decisions or situations that you could otherwise miss.
For that situation, that opportunity includes attending the public hearing at 6 p.m. Aug. 25 at the City of Aubrey Community Center at 226 Countryside Drive.
Legal notices, while they provide revenue for newspapers, truly hold more value for our readers.
Check out our legals every week, and if you ever need some help deciphering them, come by our office.
It would be my pleasure to chat about how to understand these important tools that are available to us.
Abigail Allen is the Editor & Publisher of the Post-Signal. She can be reached at [email protected].
