San Luis Obispo County’s three supervisor contests are flush with cash for the home stretch of the June 7 primary election. A surge in late donations brought $210,621 to the nine candidates during the last month and pushed their fundraising totals to more than $1.3 million.
South County rivals Lynn Compton and Jimmy Paulding, competing for the 4th District supervisor seat, have drawn the most donations of the candidates.
In total, that race has drawn more than $830,000, and between April 24 and May 21, each candidate received about $50,000 in new donations, according to campaign finance filings. Paulding holds the overall monetary edge on Compton, and has $110,507 on hand to still spend compared to Compton’s $94,818.
The next most expensive county race is in the 3rd District, between Dawn Ortiz-Legg and Stacy Korsgaden. Ortiz-Legg has outraised Korsgaden and still has $117,195 in cash on hand, versus Korsgaden’s $26,886. Ortiz-Legg received $32,256 in new donations between April 24 and May 21; Korsgaden drew $24,595.
In the North County 2nd District race, Bruce Gibson has propelled ahead of challengers Bruce Jones, Geoff Auslen, and John Whitworth in fundraising. In the past month, he raised $39,765 compared to Auslen’s $8,524, Whitworth’s $2,784, and Jones’ $2,350. Gibson has nearly as much cash on hand, $43,703, as his opponents combined.
The well-funded supervisor campaigns are in part a product of a 2020 Board of Supervisors’ decision to raise local campaign contribution limits to $25,000 per donor, according to Michael Latner, a political science professor at Cal Poly. The state’s cap is $4,900 per donor.
“Our county supervisors have been egregious in their greed for making the county a sort of slush fund by raising the contribution limits,” Latner said. “I think we’re seeing the consequences of that.”
While most donations have totaled less than $4,900, there are exceptions: Paulding, Ortiz-Legg, and Gibson each received $14,100 from the Democrats of SLO County. Compton received a $10,750 donation from the Santa Ynez Band of Mission Indians and a $7,000 donation from the Lincoln Club of SLO.
According to campaign filings, the candidates are spending large chunks of their money on mailers as well as ads on radio, television, print, and social media.
“We’re getting a lot more TV ads than we ever seen before,” Latner said. “That’s where most of that money’s going.”
With less than a week before the June 7 election, SLO County is seeing signs of low early voter turnout. As of May 31, only 15 percent of registered voters had returned a mail-in ballot, according to politicaldata.com. Δ
This article appears in Jun 2-12, 2022.
