Our Community Newspaper Role

The Dayton City Council last Monday night voted unanimously to award its yearly contract to publish legal public notices in the "legal" newspaper that offered the best rate, which was the Times.

Our team is grateful and honored to fulfill this role. The Times has a long history of publishing legal notices for Walla Walla County and its agencies. Last summer, Columbia County Superior Court Judge William Acey designated the Times a legal newspaper of record for Columbia County as well, prompting the city and the Columbia County to put out requests for bids from newspapers with that designation.

The Times was (and is) immediately eligible to publish legal notices from private attorneys, such as notices to creditors and notices of trustee's sales. It offers the same competitive rate to publish those mandatory announcements.

To be eligible as a legal newspaper, the Times had to meet certain requirements. It had to be published weekly, be of general circulation in the county and have a presence locally.

Since the Times changed ownership in late 2009, the newspaper has expanded its news coverage of Columbia County and increased its circulation in the Dayton area while maintaining its strong coverage of the city of Waitsburg. It opened an office across the street from the courthouse in Dayton. It created a presence on the web with a website and Facebook page, which now has more than 1,000 followers.

The Times intends to do even more as the premier news source in the Touchet River Valley. This week, Reporter Morgan Smith has come on board full-time and will be dedicated to covering news in and about Dayton and Columbia County.

Managing Editor Jillian Beaudry will focus more exclusively on Waitsburg and Walla Walla County, while Publisher Imbert Matthee will contribute news and stories at large. Larry Davidson, who has years of experience in the legal field, was hired last week to become the Times' advertising and legal notices manager.

Our Times Family, rounded out by Office Manager Tawnya Richards, knows it has to continue to work hard to maintain the trust and respect of the communities it serves. We will do everything our abilities and resources allow to fulfill this important role. Additional changes will be announced soon for the next phase of the Times' expansion.

According to Columbia County Commissioner Chuck Reeves, community pride was one of the reasons he and Commissioner Dick Jones decided to initially award a substantially higher bid to publish legal notices submitted to the county by the Dayton Chronicle earlier this spring. Commissioner Dwight Robanske abstained from voting on the matter.

The Times has asked the commissioners to review its bidding process, which they have agreed to do at an upcoming meeting on June 6. We are grateful for that decision because we have concerns about the initial bid award.

The Times' bid was the only one that responded directly to the county's request for proposals with a one-year column-inch rate almost a dollar below the other bid, which stipulated a three-year contract.

We estimate that Columbia County tax payers would pay thousands of dollars per year less for a legal notices contract with the Times.

Local elected officials have some leeway when considering bids like these. The city of Dayton, for instance, asked for circulation figures from bidders and found that they are comparable for Columbia County. But such a request was not included in the county's study as a way of gauging the potential readership legal notices might get in each newspaper.

We wholeheartedly agree with Commissioner Reeves that Columbia County takes pride in its identity and newspaper history as discussed at the earlier commission meeting.

The Times, independent, locally owned and locally operated, shortened its name in the 1950s to serve readers beyond Waitsburg. It has long been an important news source for Walla Walla and Columbia counties, while other publications here have come and gone.

Now celebrating 135 years of continuous weekly publication, the Times is poised to offer even more informational services to readers in the two counties.

We believe that in an environment of fair and free competition, this history and its savings to taxpayers ought to make the Times' bid to publish legal notices for Columbia County the most compelling before the county commission and we look forward to its review in early June.