“Each day you are leading by example. Whether you realize it or not or whether it’s positive or negative, you are influencing those around you.” — Rob Liano

We had the story ready to go for Tuesday’s paper, but we didn’t have a comment from Gordon Snow.

We had a copy of the email Snow, an Alpena Public Schools trustee seeking reelection to the school board, sent from his personal email account to the school email accounts of APS principals, telling the principals to ask everyone on their staffs whether they’d like to get yard signs supporting Snow or contribute funds to his campaign.

We had a statement from a Michigan Press Association attorney who reviewed the email calling the missive “problematic” and saying it might violate the Michigan Campaign Finance Act’s prohibition of using public resources for campaigns because Snow had communicated with each of the principals through their school email accounts.

We had multiple phone calls and emails in to the Secretary of State’s Office seeking comment, though they hadn’t returned our calls.

But we didn’t have Snow on the record, and we’d only reached out to him earlier Tuesday. I, News staff writer Steve Schulwitz, and News Managing Editor Torianna Marasco decided we hadn’t given Snow enough time to respond, and it wouldn’t be fair to run the story without giving him more time.

We decided to hold the story until Wednesday.

But, by Tuesday, there was never any question whether we would run the story.

When we received a copy of Snow’s email, it raised questions immediately. We knew the Campaign Finance Act prohibited the use of public resources for campaigns, and it appeared Snow’s email at least brushed up against that prohibition by asking principals, using their work emails, to poll their staffs to see who wanted to support Snow.

At the very least, it seemed unusual for a sitting school board trustee (the school board has hire/fire powers over the school district superintendent, making the school board the boss of every other school employee’s boss) to ask school employees to essentially act on behalf of his campaign.

So we reached out to the Michigan Press Association’s attorney, an expert in campaign law, who called the emails “problematic” and said Snow’s missive may have violated the Campaign Finance Act.

With that confirmation, we knew we had to report it.

When any public official — from any political party, or, like school board candidates, from no political party — does something questionable, taxpayers and voters have a right to know so they can judge the public official’s actions for themselves.

That’s why newspapers exist, to arm readers with the information they need to make informed decisions about how they want to interact with their community, including whether or to what degree they want to support candidates for elected office.

To Snow’s supporters, the email may have been a big nothingburger. Snow’s opponents probably see it as a disqualifying act. Voters just learning about Snow may side somewhere in between.

That’s for our readers to decide.

Our job is to provide the information so they can make that determination for themselves.

We eventually got a hold of Snow and talked to APS Superintendent Dave Rabbideau, by whom Snow said he ran his plan to email the principals.

Snow, a former APS teacher and principal, said he didn’t think he violated the law and never meant to do anything wrong, that he just wanted to reach out to people with whom he’d long worked to see if they wanted to support him.

Rabbideau said the district had talked to an attorney for the Michigan Association of School Boards, who told the district that, while Snow may have exhibited poor judgement with the message to principals, it likely didn’t violate the law.

We also reached APS board President Anna Meinhardt, who told Schulwitz the board intended to clarify its policy about proper campaign procedures.

We included all of that in the story — the Michigan Press Association attorney’s concerns over Snow’s actions, Snow’s explanation, Rabbideau’s information about what the school board association had to say, and Meinhardt’s vow to work on policy.

A political group representing Snow’s opponents called for Snow’s resignation, and we included that in the story, too.

Armed with all of that information, our readers could decide for themselves whether they believed Snow did anything wrong or how wrong his actions were and their level of support for him going forward.

If we’d done nothing with the story, we would have robbed our readers of the chance to make that determination, and that would have been a dereliction of our duty to our readers.

Justin A. Hinkley can be reached at 989-354-3112 or jhinkley@thealpenanews.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinHinkley.