Updated 3:35 pm
A Martha’s Vineyard radio station reported a winner of the Edgartown selectman’s race, a week before the election is scheduled to happen.
Gail Gardner, who is challenging incumbent selectman Arthur Smadbeck, said she arrived at her teaching job at Edgartown School Friday morning and was approached by a colleague about her “loss” in the election.
When she said the election had not happened yet, the woman said she must have misheard the news report on MVY radio. But when Gardner was approached by a second colleague, she decided to call the station.
“I called, and they confirmed what happened,” said Gardner. They said they got an email.
In an era of fake news, this is as false as they come. The election is scheduled for Thursday, April 12.
P.J. Finn, the station’s manager, confirmed the error. “Clearly, it was a bad mistake on our part,” Finn told The Times. “We’ll do what it takes to make it right.”
Later he issued a statement, blaming the mistake on a “pre-story” written by a news copywriter. He said the false report aired three times.
“The mistake was the result of a news copywriter, writing a pre-story ahead of the election, with the intention of editing and adjusting the copy once the race results became known,” Finn wrote. “However, the incomplete and incorrect story was mistakenly sent by the copywriter to the on-air staff, who read the story.
WMVY issued an on-air retraction, and is posting that to its social media pages, he wrote. “We deeply regret the error, and have reached out to candidate Gail Gardner in hopes of offering an apology,” he wrote. “We have also spoken with Adam Darack, information officer at Edgartown Town Hall, to help clear up the confusion we created.”
WMVY has an agreement with the Vineyard Gazette to rewrite news on the newspaper’s site, but in a follow-up email, Finn wrote that the Gazette did not provide the incorrect information that was aired.
“This mistake was a result of the copywriter trying to pre-write a story,” he wrote. “The mistake is entirely WMVY’s, and should in no way reflect on the Gazette.”
Gardner, who writes the Edgartown town column for The Times, posted about the mistake on Islanders Talk, calling it “disgraceful” that someone would try to affect the election outcome by making a false report to the station.
“I think it might have an impact,” she said Friday afternoon. “Though I think more people see Islanders Talk than listen to MVY at 6 in the morning. It will be interesting to see.”
Asked why she thought someone would stoop to providing bad information to the radio station, she said,: “I must be a viable candidate, I guess, with all the stink I’ve been making the last few months.”
Later, after the radio station reached out to her, she softened that stance, saying that it appeared to be an honest mistake.
“They were super responsive and apologetic. Maybe they should have known when the election was, but everyone makes mistakes,” she wrote in a comment to The Times. “Goodness knows I’m not at my best at 6 am!! They’re a great radio station and do so much for our community. I’m glad this turned out to be a simple mistake instead of an intentional action to derail the election.”
Smadbeck did not return a message seeking comment.
Updated with statement from WMVY about what went wrong. -Ed
