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Stumpin' for a Living: Latest Mayoral Cash Reports
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2417 Reads
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The latest campaign cash numbers are in, and the Mayor's race looks like the floor at two neighboring frats on the Sunday morning after competing rush-week keggers:
Mayor Jim Hahn and Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa have blown more than $6.2 million combined on mailers, yard signs, TV production, airtime and other attention-getting devices, and they have pitiful little left with which to get a death grip on one another.
Unless one of them suddenly finds a wealthy angel, the final mortal combat will be waged with less than a combined $1 million: Villaraigosa has just over $586,000 cash on hand, while Hahn is left with less than $379,000. Make no mistake - airtime has been bought, spots shot, mailer attacks printed and stacked ...
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And if their performance in the general election last month is any indication, they're both sitting on several strategies - Hahn pulled out some late cheap shots against "Sacramento politicians" to wield against Villaraigosa and Bob Hertzberg when things looked darkest, and Villaraigosa responded with slightly snarkier fare than the wholesome image ads that still remain linked on his web site.
The real fun is sorting through the $531,288 the unions pitched in for Hahn to date in the form of radio ads, phone bank work, direct-mail printing and a $124,080 "consulting, literature/postage" donation given to the mayor by Local 112 of the United Firefighters of Los Angeles. Compare that with Villaraigosa's $55,283 - the bulk of it from the Engineers and Architects Association - and you get a better sense of the artillery used so far on the mass-media battlefield.
Here are the latest numbers: <tr bgcolor="#000000">| April 2 | | Candidate | Contributions | Expenses | Cash on Hand | Personal Exp's | Matching Funds | | James K. Hahn | $3,455,159 | $3,746,972 | $378,637 | $0.00 | $879,870 | | Antonio Villaraigosa | $2,785,798 | $2,911,373 | $586,150 | $0.00 | $827,000 |
... compared with the last big report:
<tr bgcolor="#000000">| Feb. 19 | | Candidate | Contributions | Expenses | Cash on Hand | Personal Exp's | Matching Funds | | Richard Alarcon | $549,287 | $727,110 | $78,688 | $0.00 | $153,532 | | James K. Hahn | $2,930,369 | $2,417,467 | $1,077,149 | $0.00 | $563,720.00 | | Bob Hertzberg | $1,845,797 | $1,739,010 | $779,445 | $3,328 | $667,000 | | Walter Moore | $108,038 | $14,613 | $94,194 | $100,000 | $0.00 | | Bernard Parks | $770,822 | $713,378 | $337,447 | $50,000 | $266,584 | | Antonio Villaraigosa | $1,760,921 | $1,329,341 | $1,098,183 | $0.00 | $667,000 |
Meanwhile, Hahn's apparently too paranoid to release his daily schedule, which we can only assume contains an inordinate number of trips to local halls of the few remaining city unions that haven't endorsed him or given money.
Villaraigosa, who's already shown his disdain for the district he promised not to leave, spent a considerable amount of time last year stumping for presidential hopeful John Kerry - and for himself, the Times reported.
Hahn apparently spent a good time of *his* half-spent first term campaigning, too: The Hahn calendars obtained by The Times — which include detailed schedules for 44 days from February through August 2003 — are marked "confidential" with the caution: "Not for distribution."
They show a mayor who also was taking time out from his official duties as early as June 2003 for fundraisers, scheduling 10 campaign-related events over the 44 days. More and more I'm wishing the city had seen fit to put forth at least one solid non-politician to go up against Hahn. One can only hope that if Villaraigosa wins, he'll stick around for a few years before traipsing off to some congressional race.
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| Posted by: mack_reed on Thursday, April 07, 2005 - 11:37 PM
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