Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers on Dec. 9, 2025 signed Senate Bill 440, now known as 2025 Wisconsin Act 72, relating to the required font for published legal notices by Wisconsin newspapers.
The legislation was sponsored in the Assembly by Rep. Todd Novak (R-Dodgeville) and in the Senate by Senator Romaine Quinn (R-Birchwood).
“I am happy to report that Governor Evers signed the WNA initiated legislation to eliminate the mandatory use of the Arial font when publishing public notices on Tuesday of this week,” WNA President Jeff Patterson wrote in a message to WNA members on Friday, Dec. 12. “With this change, Wisconsin newspapers are now free to use a font of choice when publishing public notices.”
Senate Bill 440 amends Chapter 985 which is solely
devoted to the requirements for the publication of legal notices in newspapers. A legal notice is every notice required by law or by order of court to be published in a newspaper.
Chapter 985 delineates the requirements for a newspaper to publish legal notices. The Department of Administration is charged with overseeing the process that determines a newspaper’s eligibility to publish legal notices. This process is referred to as the “certification process.”
Chapter 985 requires that all newspapers publishing legal notices publish them in print, on the newspaper’s website and the statewide public notice website that aggregates ALL legal notices required to be published in newspapers in Wisconsin.
The mandated use of the Arial typeface became law in 2011 following an agreement between the WNA and the Department of Administration to streamline the newspaper certification process.
The WNA testified in favor of the changes, which were requested because some newspapers are now struggling to meet the Arial font requirement because of the layout and design platform that individual newspapers use.
“The Arial typeface in some instances is no longer available to the newspaper,” WNA Executive Director Beth Bennett said during her Nov. 5 testimony in favor of SB 440.
Bennett told senators that WNA alerted the Wisconsin Department of Administration to the problem.
“In discussing how to address the situation it was agreed by the DOA and the WNA that the newspaper industry would seek a legislative change to return the statute to pre-2011 status by requiring no set typeface for the publication of legal notices,” Bennett testified.
Every legal notice published by a Wisconsin newspaper is uploaded in real time each day or week by the publishing newspaper to WisconsinPublicNotices.org, a website maintained by the Wisconsin Newspaper Association on behalf of the newspaper industry, at no additional cost to government.
All legal notices appearing on WisconsinPublicNotices.org are searchable and available to the public at no cost.
