April 06, 2011 06:38 PM UTC

March Fundraising Update

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• by: Colorado Pols

This is it, folks. The last fundraising numbers we’re going to see before we see the actual, verifiable results from all that fundraising. Fortunately for some candidates and unfortunately for others, things haven’t changed too much since the last time we talked about fundraising in this space. We said then that the lines in the sand had been drawn, and indeed, fundraising numbers have more or less held steady.

Chris Romer

As you’ll recall, Romer announced that he’s raised over $1,000,000 since the start of the campaign, hauling in about $282,000 this month alone. He’s got just about $500,000 on hand. It’s a huge development that you’ve got a candidate with that kind of fundraising in this kind of race. He’s almost raised double what some of his closest competitors have, and he’s easily spent more than a lot of the other candidates have raised. Make no mistake, these numbers all help to ensure that Romer will make it through to the run-off election. If he doesn’t, that will be a game-changing campaign shocker in an otherwise milquetoast race. We know Romer’s on TV and we can assume he’s gearing up for mail. What will really make or break Romer is how hard he and his team are hitting the streets. We have our own doubts about his doorstep manner, but even if he were terrible in walk and knocks, he’s raised enough to give him a huge buffer above the others. Oh yeah, some Democrats recognize his dad for some reason or another. That can’t hurt.

Carol Boigon

Boigon had another good month, raising about $150,000 with $232,000 on hand. As our readers pointed out below, Boigon actually only raised about $50,000, investing another $100,000 of her own money in the campaign. What this says about her fundraising is that she has indeed picked all the low-hanging fruit she can, but she is at least able to self-finance. Funding your own campaign is a bad way to show you can relate to voters and gives the impression of “buying your way into public office,” but it probably won’t hurt that much in this race given the minimal coverage from the media. It worked for Jared Polis, after all,  and we think it may be able to work for Carol if she can prove she’s competitive. Unlike Romer, most analysts don’t seem to think that she’s guaranteed to make it through to the run-off. We agree. But Carol’s fundraising and ability to self finance is good enough that she can target her more direct competitors. What will be difficult for the councilwoman to figure out is how to raise money if she ends up running against Chris and only Chris: she won’t be able to capitalize on that doomed City Council vote, and a lot of her low-hanging fruit has been picked. Regardless, Carol’s got a big enough wallet to have thrown herself $200,000 so far. If she makes it to the run-off, we’re pretty sure she can loan herself even more.

Michael Hancock

Hancock has really solidified his fundraising lately, and it’s already showing. Though he raised just under $140,000 this month, he’s raised more in total than Carol Boigon and now has about $140,000 on hand. We’re surprised. We perceive Boigon as a better fundraiser than Hancock, but he’s certainly got the numbers to prove us wrong. He hasn’t had to invest incredible amounts of his personal funds into the campaign, either. We know he’s spending his money, too: his campaign produced what we think has been the best TV ad in the race thus far and we know he’s preparing himself for a massive field push before ballots start to get returned. His ill-advised vote on pay increases will flesh itself out in the coming days, but Hancock has positioned himself well financially to give it his all…so long as he has managed his burn rate better. In February Hancock spent about as much as he raised, which is a killer when you need every last dollar for TV.

James Mejia

We had almost counted Mejia out of the running last month when he pulled in a paltry $65,000. That’s not the case this month: James raised a hair under $130,000 and has $135,000 on hand. We honestly didn’t think Mejia would be able to compete with the fundraising prowess of Boigon and Hancock, but he’s proven himself a legitimate candidate. He’s in that odd spot where he can’t afford another significant TV buy in addition to a heavy field and mail campaign. Either way, Mejia should still be able to make his case as to why he should make it to the run-off, though he’s still struggling with heavy name ID problems that he doesn’t necessarily have enough money to fix.

Doug Linkhart

We’re convinced Doug Linkhart is the greatest practical jokester in the state. After all, he got himself elected to an at-large city council position but then totally faked not having any political ability when he decided to run for mayor. Good one, Doug! Seriously, though, Linkhart has only raised $145,000 in total, with just $45,000 of that coming in this month. Like Carol Boigon, Doug gave himself a $20,000 loan, which may prove that he dearly wants to be Mayor, but just isn’t capable of running a campaign of this magnitude. It’s a shame, because Linkhart could’ve portrayed himself as the progressive alternative in this race if he had the resources. He hasn’t capitalized well enough on that angle, though, and so has not been able to get on TV or do anything remarkable on the campaign trail. If anything, this might be a lesson on what happens when your advisors move on to bigger and better things: we hear his old campaign manager Lois Court is busy doing things in the State Capitol. Either way, at least he did better than last month.

Theresa Spahn

Who? That’s actually a pretty good question. Spahn raised a mere $15,000 this month and only has $110,000 on hand. That said, Spahn might be taking advantage of all that this Mayoral race has to offer. She’s stayed out of the sights of people like Chris Romer and Carol Boigon while simultaneously raising her own name ID (somewhat) and proving that she’s got at least some support in the city. We can almost guarantee that Spahn will not be Denver’s next Mayor, but she may have positioned herself for future career opportunities. She just has to make sure she doesn’t lose badly — that’s an easy way to piss off future donors.