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Show Little Chats on Public Notice TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE On the last day of December in a major mid-west city, three municipal officials filed their annual an-nual reports. One was for the city recreation department, another for the municipal light plant, and the third was for the traffic engineer's office. Tfte municipal charter required such reports, but one of those in question was two years late and the others were a year late. Because Be-cause they were so long overdue, city council had ordered them filed no later than December 15. As it turned out they were late even for that date. There was no hint of irregularity irregu-larity otherwise in the departments depart-ments concerned. But councilmen were irritated over the laxity of public officials in getting so far behind with their reports. Official reports have something important in common with public pub-lic notices. Both are intended for the information of and protection protec-tion to the public. Compliance with the laws requiring both public notices and reports on the operation of public activities is important. Laxity in performance on the part of officials required to make periodic reports is to be condemned. con-demned. So is apathy on the part of the public in not insisting upon up-on holding public officials up to the mark or in disregarding trie contents of public notices. Either can help to weaken the democratic demo-cratic processes which are basic to the American way of life. |