The Upper Pottsgrove Journal’s Facebook account—with thousands of pageviews each week—has been suspended after Board of Commissioners President Al Leach filed a copyright complaint targeting one of the Journal’s profile images with Facebook.
Commissioner Leach was fully aware that filing such a complaint would trigger an immediate takedown by Facebook (Meta) under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which grants platforms “safe harbor” protections when they act swiftly on copyright claims. The image in question is a version of the Upper Pottsgrove Township seal—used by some other organization(s) in the past without issue.
On February 19, shortly after the Journal published a critical article about him (see February 17 article https://upperpottsgrovejournal.com/upper-pottsgrove-new-board-misreading-financial-reports/), Commissioner Leach contacted the Journal demanding it discontinue use of the image. The Journal responded with straightforward and reasonable questions:
- Did the Board of Commissioners formally authorize this request, or was he acting independently?
- What township statute or legal authority controls the use of the image in question?
In essence, the Journal requested a legal basis for the demand. None was provided. Even an informal opinion from the township solicitor would have sufficed. Instead, no justification or any response followed. The Journal considered the matter settled.
At the same time, another sitting commissioner on the very same board—over which Leach presides—had used the identical seal on a social media account unrelated to township operations, without objection or consequence. The selective enforcement is telling.
The Journal has consistently scrutinized decisions made by the current Board, including recent reporting raising concerns that officials may have circumvented the intent of Pennsylvania’s Sunshine Act.
“This has all the hallmarks of a deliberate effort to silence a news outlet for publishing information certain officials would rather keep out of public view,” said a member of the Journal’s board. “If copyright claims can be weaponized to suppress criticism, it represents a direct threat to free expression and government accountability.”
The Journal has begun consulting legal counsel and is actively exploring all available options in response to what it characterizes as a blatant abuse of a process intended to suppress independent reporting.
The Journal is working to get the correct information to Facebook as well. The Journal’s website is fully operational. More to follow.