Business and politics

City-council candidates, and the interest groups who want their candidates elected, are spending lavishly on campaigns again this year.

In District 2, which covers the city’s northern neighborhoods such as north Sacramento and Del Paso Heights, candidate Allen Warren is the money leader by far, raising more than $83,000 since March and $113,000 this year. But a big chunk of that is $50,000 Warren loaned to his own campaign. (Though he’s not had enough to cover property taxes on buildings he owns in the district; see “North by northeast,” SN&R Feature Story, May 10.)

After himself, Warren’s biggest donor is the Sacramento Metro Chamber of Commerce, which gave him $5,050. Over the course of the entire campaign, Warren has raised $152,000.

Rob Kerth is second in the District 2 money race, with $48,420 raised in the last quarter and $109,000 raised so far. Kerth had the most money on hand; this should help if he winds up in a run off, which seems likely. Kerth’s biggest patrons include the Sacramento Area Fire Fighters Local 522 ($5,050) and the Sacramento Central Labor Council ($5,000).

It’s even more competitive in the Land Park/downtown/Midtown District 4 race, where Phyllis Newton raised $34,000 in the last quarter, including the maximum possible ($5,050) donations from Sacramento Area Fire Fighters and the California Apartment Association. Starting last fall, Newton has raised more than $150,000, including a $50,000 loan to herself.

Her opponent Steve Hansen has raised $130,000 over the campaign. The last quarter brought $32,000, including $3,000 from the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, and $1,500 each from the Rainbow PAC and the Northern Alliance of Law Enforcement, and $1,000 from councilman Jay Schenirer’s campaign fund.

Joe Yee raised a respectable $33,000 in the last quarter, with large donations from Councilman Darrell Fong’s campaign fund ($1,500), and the Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 447 union ($1,500).

Terry Schanz’s campaign picked up speed, raising almost $30,000 in the last quarter. Big infusions came from the Central Labor Council PAC ($5,000) and Sacramento City Teachers Association PAC ($4,000).

But the biggest money story this campaign cycle is independent-expenditure committees, which can get around the usual campaign limits. Well, one independent-expenditure committee in particular, called the Better Sacramento PAC, which spent nearly $30,000 on behalf of Newton.

Better Sacramento PAC has also spent $30,000 in support of Betty Williams in her race against incumbent Bonnie Pannell, along with another $15,000 on attack mail against Pannell.

SN&R earlier pointed out that the Williams mailers wildly exaggerated unemployment numbers in the district. The Sacramento Bee last week also took the Williams campaign to task for using misleading crime statistics.

These attack pieces are funded primarily by a handful of businessmen who have poured money into the PAC, including developer Mark Friedman, Armour Steel’s Michael Ayers, and MARRS building developer Michael Heller’s company Heller Pacific.

The Better Sacramento PAC’s lawyer is Tom Hiltachk—who was Meg Whitman’s campaign lawyer, the lawyer for Kevin Johnson’s “strong mayor” effort and for Proposition 23, the effort by out-of-state oil companies to undo California’s climate-change laws. (Cosmo Garvin)