By Scott Dolan
Portland Press Herald
PORTLAND, Maine — The reaction from Gov. Paul LePage’s office last month was swift.
Within eight minutes after the Department of Corrections announced in a news release on Aug. 21 that it had posted an ALS Ice Bucket Challenge video on its Facebook page, one of LePage’s top staff members sent a terse email to department spokesman Scott Fish.
“Call me,” Peter Steele, LePage’s director of communications, wrote to Fish.
The Facebook video was quickly deleted. And within 24 hours of Steele’s email, Joseph Fitzpatrick, the Department of Corrections’ acting commissioner, issued a directive to all employees “not to participate” in the popular charity challenge during work hours or on state property.
The Department of Corrections on Thursday released copies of those emails, Fitzpatrick’s directive and a copy of the video as it appeared before being deleted from Facebook in response to a request by the Portland Press Herald under the state’s Freedom of Access Act.
The quickly targeted Facebook video was one of millions like it since the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge was introduced this summer and the concept went viral on social media as a fun, if chilly, way to get friends, family members and coworkers to donate money for disease research. But behind that urgency and the authoritative responses, both Steele and Fitzpatrick said Thursday that no one did anything wrong, either by posting the video or participating in the ceremonious drenching. No one’s job was ever endangered, they said.
“When I got Scott (Fish)’s email, I inquired whether the video was shot on state property during work hours. Since it was not clear to viewers when the video was shot or what DOC’s policy was, I suggested he take down video,” Steele said Thursday.
The employees in the video, including Deputy Corrections Commissioner Jody Breton, went outside the Maine State Prison after work hours, officials have since confirmed. They stood in two rows, the ones in back hoisting oversized buckets of icy water. The video cuts out just as they overturn the buckets over the heads of those in the front row.
“They didn’t want taxpayers to think they were taking time off from work to do that,” Fitzpatrick said by phone Thursday. “I understand the governor’s staff’s position, especially if they were in uniform.”
ALS is an acronym for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control voluntary muscle movement. ALS is also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Since July 29, the ALS Association has received $115 million in donations raised from the Ice Bucket Challenge, with everyone from children in swimsuits to attorneys from some of Portland’s largest law firms taking part.
“The governor is not opposed to ALS ice bucket challenges,” Steele said in an email Thursday. “The governor encourages state employees – and citizens of Maine – to donate or volunteer to the charities of their choice. However, state employees covered under the ‘no solicitation’ policy should conduct these activities on their private time, not on state property during work hours. Otherwise, it may appear to be a state-sanctioned event.”
Steele said LePage never saw the video and had nothing to do with its removal. The governor has issued no orders to state employees about the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, he said.