The Money Chase, May Update: State Treasurer

Here's the latest look at the money chase for the State Treasurer race.

Last month, GOP candidate Allen Alley hadn't reported any fundraising yet. Westlund was up to $44k. This month, Allen Alley is finally on the board with $39k - while Ben Westlund is up to $92k, a lead of $53k.

Westlund's daily pace (over 90 days) has moved up from $499/day to $801/day - and $1585/day over the last 30 days. Alley's daily pace over the last 30 days is just $865/day.

Here's the box scores and the charts:

	Alley	Westlund
last updated	4-23-2008	4-28-2008
2008 starting balance	$0	$8,584
current total	$38,936	$92,458
cash contributions	29	108
average contribution	$0	$774
daily pace (last 90)	$432	$801
daily pace (last 30)	$864	$1,584

Technical notes on the jump...

We retrieved this data from ORESTAR on May 1, 2008. Because campaigns can choose to delay their reporting up to 7 days, some recent data isn't available yet. The "daily pace" is based on the last 30 or 90 days for which we do have data. Our chart starts in January 2008. The "average contribution" is based on actual cash contributions since January 1, 2008 - while the "current total" includes in-kind contributions, sold items, interest income, and the starting balance. Also, some campaigns lump together under-$100 contributions into a single line item - so the number of contributions may be slightly understated and the average contribution slightly overstated. In order to measure campaign strength, these numbers include the initial cash-on-hand on January 1, 2008 plus all funds raised since then.

Why not look at cash-on-hand? Because it doesn't lend itself to an apples-to-apples view. The goal is to provide a snapshot view that compares the financial strength of the statewide campaigns and legislative caucuses. Does a low cash-on-hand mean that a campaign is failing to raise money? Or does it mean that they're spending money on big-ticket items like polling, direct mail, and television? We assume that campaigns spend money in whatever way they think is most strategically smart. So, looking at the total funds raised since January 1, 2008 (plus the opening balance that day) is the best snapshot of overall financial strength.

May 03, 2008 Posted in open discussion.