Threatening to remove public notices of meetings and other legal notices from newspapers can be a tactic to intimidate a press that has become critical of government. But lawmakers failed to bite on a proposal in the state senate committee on Tuesday.
A bill that would have allowed local and state government entities in Tennessee to stop publishing public notices of upcoming meetings and other items in local newspapers failed in committee when no lawmakers would make a motion to bring it for discussion.
State Sen. Todd Gardenhire, R-Chattanooga, proposed the bill, S.B. 1909. But when State Sen. Ken Yager, R-Kingston, the chairman of the Senate State and Local Government Committee, called for a motion on the bill, none was made.
“Fails for lack of a motion,” Yager said.
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State Sen. Ken Yager, R-Kingston, and chairman of the Senate State & Local Government Committee.
