Mitch PerryFueled by a well-attended fundraiser at Tampa insurance executive Guy King‘s palatial estate off of Bayshore Boulevard this past month, Jackie Toledo has become the first person running for city council this winter who has raised more than $100,000 ($102,832 to be precise).
The District 6 hopeful dominates the fundraising race over her two opponents, Democrat Guido Maniscalco and fellow Republican Tommy Castellano, but is not a sure thing by any stretch heading into the March 3 election (with a possible runoff March 22). She’s raised more than three times as much as Castellano, though, and more than four times as much as Maniscalco, the lone Democrat in the contest. Among her biggest contributors during the most-recent fundraising period was TECO, which chipped in $500. She also received $500 from International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 915 and $500 from Robert Clark, a 75-year-old Tampa steel magnate.
Castellano has raised $29,487, Maniscalco $25,324.98.
The next most prodigious fundraiser this campaign season is District 4 representative Harry Cohen. As of the end of January, Cohen had raised $89,491. His opponent, South Tampa businessman Kent King, had raised $51,732, including a nice $12,755 haul during the middle of January. Included in that amount was a $500 check from the Florida Conservative Leadership Fund in Tallahassee.
In the District 3 citywide race, Democratic Party incumbent Yolie Capin has taken in $69,835. Those include $500 contributions from International Association of Firefighters union Local 754, and from former TV journalist and fallen CD15 Democratic candidate Alan Cohn.
Capin’s opponent, small businessman Paul Erni, hasn’t been that successful with his fundraising efforts. He’s taken in $11,780 as of the end of January, $8,000 of that coming from a check he cut for himself that month. In the last week of January, Erni, who works for a wine and spirits wholesaler, reported just one contribution. That was $150 from Whiskey Willie’s on Hillsborough Avenue.
It’s another lopsided fundraising race in the citywide District 1 contest between incumbent Mike Suarez and Seminole Heights activist Susan Long. Suarez has raised $45,705 (a certain chunk of that paying for his new TV ad, no doubt), Long just $6,121.80 (including $1,000 she gave her campaign in January).
And in the mayor’s race, Bob Buckhorn continues to fundraise, though at a much less fevered pitch since late January, after he learned that his only opponent would be write-in candidate Jose Vazquez, who worked in the political world in his native Puerto Rico but has had a troubled time in the Bay area. Buckhorn had raised $386,729.09 at the end of January.
Vazquez had $120 in his election campaign fund. That came from himself.
