July pre-election campaign statements are in! I'm still digesting the information, but here's a glance at the numbers. The hyper
Ward 1
Anne Bannister - Donations: $6,675; In-kind donations: $365; Expenditures: $2,969.55; Campaign Finance FilingWard 3Jason Frenzel - Donations: $11,217; In-kind donations: $400; Expenditures: $4,886.12; Campaign Finance Filing
Total donations: $17,892; Total expenditures: $7,855.67
Zach Ackerman - Donations: $12,698; In-kind donations: $0; Expenditures: $9,046.50; Campaign Finance FilingWard 4Steve Kunselman - Donations: $6,119; In-kind donations: $0; Expenditures: $4,303.50; Campaign Finance Filing
Total donations: $18,817; Total expenditures: $4,303.50
Jack Eaton - Donations: $5,805; In-kind donations: $197; Expenditures: $3,891.65; Campaign Finance FilingWard 5Jaime Magiera - Donations: $4,280; In-kind donations: $0; Expenditures: $1,043; Campaign Finance Filing
Total donations: $10,085; Total expenditures: $4,935.38
David Silkworth - Donations: $9,949; In-kind donations: $1,248.07; Expenditures: $3,730.37; Campaign Finance FilingAssorted observations: while the campaign to represent the Fighting Fifth has received the most donations, the candidates in the race to represent Ward 3 have outspent those running for the Ward 5 seat by almost $4,000. Ward 4 appears to be the least expensive ward to run in. The combined expenditures in that race were just more than a third of those for the most expensive race. In total across wards, there have been $69,253 in donations and $37,751 in expenditures. I don't have the data on hand at the moment, but it would be interesting to track the change in donation volume and expenditure over time. I imagine there is general upward trend.Chip Smith - Donations: $11,510; In-kind donations: $1,329.65; Expenditures: $6926.94; Campaign Finance Filing
Total donations: $21,459; Total expenditures: $10,657
If I had more time, I think a really interesting next step would be to enter all the donations into a more user friendly format and do a more in-depth analysis. Specifically, I'd like to do a clustering analysis across candidates to analyze the networks of donors who are donating to multiple candidates. Also, I'd love to do something like the Chronicle did in 2014 where they looked at the geographic distribution of donations in each race.
In closing gentle readers, I encourage you to look at the campaign finance filings for each candidate. It's an important part of being an informed voter. It's really wonderful that the County Clerk puts this information online in such a timely manner.
Yes, the format of the filings (pdfs of scans of handwritten docs) is not very friendly for quick summarizing. I've now downloaded and read them, however, and have a few notes. First, with certain exceptions, not very many blockbuster donations, lots of small ones. (Defined as $300 or less, but many under $100.) Also, both Maguiera and Silkworth loaned their campaigns money, most others merely made a donation to their campaigns, not huge. There were definite overlaps for Eaton, Kunselman, Silkworth and Bannister and for Ackerman, Smith and Frenzel. Maguiera was somewhat of a standout (less overlap). In each case, there were unique donations as well.
ReplyDeleteAckerman, Frenzel and Smith ran in a very tight cluster. They all had the same campaign manager (Alex Yerkey), who was paid by each. The other candidates did not have a paid campaign manager. They also held a joint fundraiser. Ackerman, Frenzel and Smith each received $1000 from Jeff Hauptman of the Oxford Companies (largest property manager in Ann Arbor). They also each received donations from Chuck Warpehoski, Leah Gunn, and Christopher Taylor (via his mayoral campaign account). Smith and Frenzel received $1000 from Harry Cohen (Black Pearl owner) but not, apparently, Ackerman.
Eaton, Bannister, and Silkworth all donated to each other's campaigns and to Kunselman's. They all received $500 from Peter Heydon but there were no other consistent large donations.
I was charmed that Chip Smith returned a check from Dan Ketelaar (developer) with the notation, "avoid conflict of interest".
I always love looking for the patterns in the donations.
DeleteBen, I feel like we should have a council meet up!!!!!
ReplyDeleteI'm down.
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