March 09, 2011 09:55 PM UTC

February Fundraising Update

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• by: Colorado Pols

We just spent some time looking over the recently released February fundraising numbers for Denver’s top mayoral candidates. Not too much has changed from last month, though the financial lines in the sand for this race have definitely been drawn.

Chris Romer: Romer is still sitting pretty as this race’s monetary leader. Of course, money isn’t everything, but it’s certainly a good early indicator of the direction a campaign is going to take. Romer raised $252,710.00 in February, most of which came from pretty substantial donations. That’s what you get with $1000 dollar a plate fundraisers with Josh Penry, though.

Romer spent a cool $102,162.60 in February, but he’s got $565,354.63 on hand, so what’s a hundred thousand here and there? If Romer’s ground game can match his fundraising prowess, he’s got this race locked down. That remains to be seen, however.

Carol Boigon: Though she’s by no means spending Chris Romer quantities of money, Boigon isn’t doing too shabby. She raised $92,311.00 and spent nearly all of that, $87.391.31. That leaves her with $306,211.51 on hand, which will keep her competitive over the next few months. If Boigon can keep fundraising at this level, she should be able to compete with Romer financially long enough to make a difference in her field campaign. Of course, if worse comes to worse she may be able to loan herself another $100,000.

James Mejia: Mejia was the first to jump in the Mayoral race, but that might mean he’s already picked all the low hanging fruit he can. Mejia only raised about $65,000 in February. That leaves him with about $175,000 on hand. Mejia just isn’t pulling in the money he needs to be able to compete in ad buys with the other candidates. He’s got a decent amount on hand, but it’s certainly not enough to get him on television with a decent buy. We have a hard time seeing how Mejia is going to be able to raise his name ID enough to be one of the top two candidates in April.

Michael Hancock: Pretty standard month for Hancock. Though he’s been a big spender in the campaign thus far, he’s fortunate enough to be able to raise enough to facilitate spending as much as he does. Hancock raised just under $110,000 in February, leaving him with just under $125,000 on hand. He’s already bought a good chunk of TV time, but he can’t be burning through his cash like this without putting most of it under his mattress for TV.

Doug Linkhart: Is Doug even running for Mayor anymore? Theoretically, Linkhart’s got the same name ID as Carol Boigon, but he’s being trounced in terms of fundraising. Linkhart raised only about $19,000 in February, leaving him with about $50,000 on hand. We’re not sure why Linkhart is pulling in such low numbers, but unless he can pull in at least $250,000 in March, he’s not going to be able to sustain his campaign with the kind of TV presence he’ll require. It’s still a little too early to completely ignore Linkhart, but the fat lady is definitely warming up.

Theresa Spahn: We mentioned a month ago that the only way Spahn could win this race was with a big TV ad buy. According to February’s numbers, it doesn’t look like that’s happening any time soon. Sphan raised about $23,000 and is left with $49,619 on hand. In a race where the frontrunner has raised 10 times more than you, Spahn simply doesn’t have the name ID to be competitive. She gets a small trophy for raising more in February than Linkhart, though.

The big winner in February was clearly Chris Romer. The other winners? Well, Mark Zuckerberg and Andrew Romanoff. Nearly every candidate has spent a few hundred on Facebook advertising for their campaign, and both Boigon and Hancock spent around two grand on Romanoff’s lists. Of course, the value of those lists decrease as more and more candidates get their hands on them, but still, the 2010 Senate primary is having its impact on the Mayoral race.