Election ’09: What’s in the Candidates’ Campaign War Chests?

By • Apr 24th, 2009 • Category: Blog, News, Politics

We’d been combing through state Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC) reports all week when we noticed this morning that Politicker’s Matt Friedman beat us to the punch on the fundraising race. Friedman focused on the mayoral campaigns, though, so we thought we’d cite his story and add some other interesting nuggets from the latest filings.

“Healy’s campaign has raised a total of almost $3.1 million and has spent just shy of $2.3 million for his reelection,” Friedman reports. The next-closest mayoral candidate is Lou Manzo, whose ELEC report has not been filed. Manzo, however, tells Friedman that he’s raised “about $300,000 as of the filing deadline, and has spent somewhere between $270,000 and $280,000.”

Everyone else trails even further behind. The entire Harvey Smith team has raised $67,295 and spent $41,415.

Phil Webb tells Friedman he’s raised about $10,000 and spent most of it, while Dan Levin says he’s raised somewhere around $7,000, as has his council team.

But what about the other candidates?

As expected, Healy’s council team is well-funded, having raised more than the other four mayoral candidates combined. In their joint committee, the team — made up of At-Large candidates Peter Brennan, Mariano Vega and Willie Flood, along with Ward A candidate Michael Sottolano, Ward B candidate Phil Kenny, Ward C candidate Nidia Rivera Lopez, Ward D candidate Bill Gaughan, Ward E candidate Guy Catrillo and Ward F candidate Viola Richardson — raised $542,180 and spent $320,269.

Several of those candidates have their own fundraising committees as well. Richardson in particular has quite a war chest. She began the filing period with more than $50,000, then raised $8,725 and spent $7,359, leaving her with more than $52,000 in the bank. Kenny also started out with some cash — $21,749 — before raising $2,650 and spending nearly $6,000. He’s left with $18,539 going forward. Lastly, Catrillo raised $4,300 (including a $1,600 loan from himself to the campaign) and spent $1117.

Of the other council candidates, Ward E Councilman Steven Fulop, who considered a mayoral run this year before mounting an independent reelection bid, has by far the most campaign money. He began the filing period with $206,812, raised an additional $44,789, spent $33,425, and is left with a nice sum of $215,368.

Ward D candidate James Carroll, who is running with Manzo, came into the filing period with $11,065. He raised $3,000 and spent $10,174, leaving close to $4,000 in his committee’s fund.

The Voices for a Better Jersey City slate — At-Large candidate Abdul Malik and Ward C candidate Asim Usman and Ward E candidate Azam Riaz — filed together as a committee. They raised $7,495 and spent $5,177.

In Greenville, independent Ward A candidate Andre Richardson raised $8,730 and spent only $2,561, leaving him with more than $6000.

Independent Ward F candidate LaVern Webb-Washington is the only candidate to file an ELEC report who is currently underwater. She’s raised $10,620, including a $3,000 donation from her own bank account, and spent more than $11,000, ending the most recent filing period $457 in the hole.

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is the founding editor of the Jersey City Independent; he now works for a public-policy nonprofit in Trenton.
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  • Shorty

    This article would be far more interesting if you drilled down more deeply into the sources of campaign funding for each of the Mayoral and Ward candidates. For example, why does Fulop’s elec reports read more like a who’s who of real estate developers? This is where pay-to-play really has an impact. I think Lou Manzo and Dan Levin are right to say that such contributions should be prohibited.

  • Jon Whiten

    Of course it would be more interesting if we could do that, but we just don’t have the resources to ID and tag each contributor for each of these ELEC filings that gets released in the run-up to May 12 — that’s more of a post-election project, and one you should probably expect from us down the road.

  • Steve Hyman

    First mistake is thinking. What do you do while you are awake? Why do you care about this stuff? Do you know the source of most of Loser’s , money comes from himself and his brother. While Loser was protesting the Flintkote tax abatement, one of his aids told me, in 2004, that he was promised that he was promised not have the same problem when he was ready to develop his property While Levin has not raised enough money to fly first class to Australia and back. Money is the name of the game and if you really cared you would ask how Healy was able to attract so much $$$$. It appears that according to the article Healy has spent ten times more money than Fulop raised. Now you tell me who is doing a better job for JC and why Healy was able to collect that much money. It is not for his singing or hard work. As a part time Council man, Fulop puts in more time working than the Mayor does in a full time job. GO HEALY, HE MIGHT NOT BE THE BEST BUT HE IS BETTER THAN THE REST!!

  • ELECtellsall

    There is no way this could be the *real* Steve Hyman.