True or False: Councils must give notice of public hearings for their budgets before adopting them.
Answer: True.
The public hearings that city and town councils must conduct for their budgets, required by state law, have special public notice requirements. Municipalities must give public notice of the hearing in a newspaper of general circulation in the municipality at least 15 days before the hearing.
The published public hearing notice must
- be at least two newspaper columns wide;
- have a bold headline and include the governing entity’s name;
- include the time, date and location of the public hearing;
- state the revenue, expenditures and millage for the current fiscal year’s operating budget and for the proposed budget; and
- provide the millage rate that is required to generate the revenue total in the proposed budget.
State law also requires the use of an ordinance to adopt the budget. All ordinances must have at least two readings, with a minimum of six days between each reading.
The Municipal Elected Officials Institute of Government offers online courses. In-person classes will resume when COVID-19 activity drops to safe levels. To register, participants should go to the Municipal Association’s website at www.masc.sc and log in with their user identification number and password.