Mounting a campaign is a costly undertaking for local candidates

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Updated: August 4, 2011 4:20PM

They might be local offices, but there’s nothing minor about how much is being spent to get elected a state legislator or circuit court judge in Kane County this year.

It’s gotten so high that even the candidates themselves are amazed at what their campaigns are costing.

A check of six candidates from the major parties for three local races on the ballot this November shows they will spend at least $2.7 million.

Based on numbers and projections provided by the office-seekers, the race between Republican Steve Rauschenberger and incumbent Democrat Michael Noland for the 22nd District State Senate seat will find the two men each spending $750,000 or more in this election.

For the 43rd District State Representative seat, Republican Ruth Munson and incumbent Democrat Keith Farnham will spend about $400,000 to $500,000 each.

And in the contest between Republican David Akemann and Democrat John Dalton for Kane County Judicial Circuit Court judge, each side will probably spend about $100,000 in election efforts.

Only the judges’ campaign spending seems to match the pay they’ll get if elected. According to the state court website www.state.il.us/court/general/funding.asp, circuit court judges make about $169,000 a year.

State representatives and senators, meanwhile, are paid a base annual salary of $67,836. Even so, according to the Illinois Policy Institute, that is the fifth-highest legislator salary in the country, behind California, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania.

Million-dollar race

The Courier-News asked all six Elgin area candidates to estimate their expenditures. The largest amount for the three offices, not unexpectedly, probably will be in the state senate race.

“The amount of money this race will cost astonishes and frustrates me, but to get elected, I project I will spend close to $750,000,” Rauschenberger said.

And Noland said it could be even higher.

“It’s hard to say,” Noland said in regard to the amount that would ultimately be spent on the race. “I think when it’s all said and done, this could turn out to be million-dollar race.”

Farnham said that two years ago — when he unseated Munson for the representative office — “my campaign expended $253,795.65 and received $117,150.10 for a total of $370,945.75. Ms. Munson expended $210,299.90 and received another $210,198.07 in in-kind contributions for a total of $420,497.97. In other words, she outspent me by almost $50,000.”

Farnham would not directly say how much he expects to spend this time.

“For both campaigns, fund-raising is an ongoing effort,” he said. “I am working as hard as I can to raise the funds we need to be competitive without distracting from my primary goal of meeting and talking to voters one-on-one. The truth is that, at this point, I do not know how much I will be able to spend.”

Farnham said he would be “skeptical of any candidate who is declaring how much they intend to spend on a campaign.

“For one, unless they already have that money and there is publicly available evidence they do, there is no way to verify it until it is actually spent and reported to the State Board of Elections. Furthermore, sometimes candidates have been known to offer an outlandish number in order to try to intimidate their opponent or as a way to boost their own fund-raising efforts by sending a newspaper article to potential donors as a way of ‘legitimizing’ their claims with an independent third-party source.”

Reaching voters

Munson agreed that it’s hard to say until the election is over exactly how much will be spent.

“Our campaign has raised approximately $80,000 to date for this campaign cycle (October 2009 to October 2010). We have more than 200 local contributors,” Munson said.

“We’re still raising money and will use everything we raise. But it’s hard to say at this point how much that will be.”

Munson added, “It’s unfortunate that we have to spend so much.”

While she is noted for her use of social media and other facets of the Internet to communicate with voters, Munson pointed out that not everyone is online.

“We’re all trying to find ways to reach people who vote,” she said.

Dalton also said he would not know how much his campaign will spend “until the fundraising is finished and the campaign is complete.

“However, it does appear likely that the primary and general elections combined will cost my campaign something in the neighborhood of $80,000 to 100,000,” he said.

Akemann campaign manager Carole Burris estimated the election effort would “end up in that same area” as the Dalton campaign — $100,000.

Akemann noted that expenditures on local judicial races increased dramatically two years ago when Democrat John Noverini defeated incumbent Republican Circuit Judge Patricia Piper Golden in the 16th Judicial Circuit’s 2nd Subcircuit. The two spent more than $200,000 combined on their campaigns.

Akemann said that such spending wasn’t seen 15 or 20 years ago when he first entered politics. Now, like a good portion of Kane County, he’s getting two or three cardboard campaign literature mailers just about every day for one candidate or another running for a state office.

Outside funding

Akemann said he wasn’t sure such mail is the most effective campaigning. Reasons for the increased spending could be because the races are competitive and outside groups — including the state-level Democrat and GOP groups — are throwing money into the races, he said.

That latter also clouds how much money actually is being spent, said Matt Streb, an associate professor of political science at Northern Illinois University.

Streb explained that political action committees and the parties can set up their own efforts to get someone elected, independent of the formal campaign, which adds to the bundles being spent.

That so much is being spent in Elgin didn’t surprise Streb, considering that the local races are being seen as competitive ones by the two parties.

“It’s an arms race that’s trickled down to most offices,” Streb said.

The Elgin area spending pales in comparison to a 2004 Illinois Supreme Court race that Streb studied in which Republican Lloyd Karmeier beat Democrat Gordon Maag, and the two spent a combined total approaching $10 million in money from their own campaigns, their parties and PACs.

Streb said there can be some positives in such spending, which might increase knowledge of a particular race and bring out voters. At the same time, the cost narrows the pool to those with connections for raising large amounts of money, those who are willing to do what it takes to raise money and/or those with their own deep pockets, Streb said.

“It’s not necessarily a good trend. My daughter said, ‘Think of all the good stuff that could be done with the money. It’s disheartening, but it’s the system we have,” Akemann said.

Staff writer Steven Ross Johnson contributed to this report.

Online resources for tracking campaign funding

opensecrets.org (for national offices)

followthemoney.org (has incomplete state race numbers)

elections.il.gov/CampaignDisclosure/CommitteeSearch.aspx (Illinois candidate funding)