The Overland Park City Council on Monday unanimously approved a resolution that names the Johnson County Post’s print edition as an official city newspaper.
The move clears the way for Overland Park to begin publishing legal notices in the Post, which has the biggest community news audience in Johnson County, reaching approximately 200,000 users each month.
“That’s a big step in better communicating with our residents,” Mayor Curt Skoog said to the council after the 12-0 vote.
What are legal notices?
State statute requires that local governments alert the public about a number of potential actions — from the rezoning of a plot of land to the opening of a bid period for capital improvement projects to the announcement of a proposition that will be put before voters — by publishing a notice in a local printed newspaper. Before the qualification of the Post’s print edition in April, only one other weekly publication, The Legal Record, was authorized to carry legal notices in the county.
Additionally, attorneys and private citizens must sometimes publish legal notices. Some of the actions that Kansas law currently requires the publication of a legal notice for include:
- Legally changing your name after a marriage
- Settling an estate after the death of a loved one
- Filing a petition for divorce in some circumstances
- Announcing the auction date of certain property
Why is the Johnson County Post publishing legal notices?
Post Publisher Jay Senter said the Post worked toward eligibility for legal notice publications for two main reasons.
“For one, we believe that public notices should be easily accessible and that they should reach the largest number of people possible,” he said. “There’s a reason state law requires these notices to be published in local newspapers — it’s in the public’s interest to know what local governments are doing. The Post reaches hundreds of thousands of Johnson Countians each month. There’s no better way to get a message to the Johnson County public than the Post, making us the best option to meet both the letter and the spirit of the public notifications statute.”
Legal notices published in the Post’s print edition are also made freely available and accessible at all times on the Post’s website. You can read the legal notices published in the Johnson County Post here.
Additionally, Senter said, publishing legal notices will allow the company to generate more revenue as it looks to add staff to its newsroom.
“The Post is the only news organization that employs local reporters dedicated to covering Johnson County week in and week out,” he said. “We’ve got six people in our newsroom, which is great. That’s the biggest news operation dedicated to Johnson County in a dozen years. But if we’re going to fully cover this big, vibrant county with a population of 600,000, we need to grow our staff.”
The Johnson County Post can carry legal notices for attorneys and residents
The city of Leawood last month became the first local government to adopt the Post as an official publication. Several other Johnson County municipalities are expected to follow suit in the coming months.
In addition to the county, cities and school districts, the Post is now also eligible to carry legal notices for local attorneys and residents.
Since our print edition became eligible to carry notices, we’ve seen more and more attorneys and Johnson County residents using our service because of its affordability, transparency and ease of use.
This week’s edition of the Post’s print edition carried a dozen legal notices, including one from the city of Leawood alerting residents of the proposed assessment roll in the Park Place Development District. You can find a PDF version of the June 2 edition of the Johnson County Post print edition here.
To place a legal notice in the Post, just click here to start an order. You’ll see a proof of your notice and get a price quote before you finalize the publication date.
