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STAFF REPORT <br />TO: Mayor Keis and Members of City Council <br />FROM: Heidi Heller, City Clerk <br />DATE: January 13, 2020 <br />RE: 2020 Designation of a Legal Newspaper <br />ACTION TO BE CONSIDERED: <br />Motion to designate a legal newspaper for 2020. <br />BACKGROUND: <br />The City received notice that Lillie Suburban Newspapers would no longer be publishing legal <br />notices after October 2, 2019. On October 9, 2019, the Pioneer Press was designated as the City’s <br />legal newspaper for the remainder of 2019, with the intent that it would be discussed again in <br />January. <br />There are no other community newspapers specific to Little Canada, so the three same options are <br />available for the Council to consider: Pioneer Press, Star Tribune and Press Publications. All three <br />newspapers are available both online and in print versions, with the legal publications available <br />online for anyone to view for free. <br />Both the Pioneer Press and Star Tribune are published daily and legal publications can be published <br />any day of the week. Due to the Star Tribune being focused more on the west metro, staff did not <br />solicit a bid from them for 2020. Their 2019 rate was not competitive compared to what the other <br />two papers had offered. The Pioneer Press did not increase their rate for 2020, and staff has been <br />extremely satisfied with their service for legal notices over the last few months. <br />Staff has again been contacted by the editor of the Press Publications, which publishes the weekly <br />Vadnais Press and every other week Shoreview Press, among city-specific editions. This newspaper <br />is free to each city edition’s residents or is available to anyone as a paid subscription. They do not <br />publish a Little Canada edition, although their Vadnais edition does reach slightly into Little Canada <br />in the northwest corner. They had initially offered a low rate of $5.75/column inch in 2019 since <br />their delivery area for the free print copies does not reach most of Little Canada residents, but their <br />2020 proposal rate is now much higher. <br />State Statute requires publication in a newspaper for all public hearings. The preferred newspaper for <br />a city’s publications is one that is located in that city and delivers to that city’s residents, otherwise it <br />essentially is up to the Council’s discretion which newspaper to use as long as all of the Council <br />members agree. All of these options are a “qualified newspaper” per state statute.