Plus: An announcent of another candidate event
The Standard-Examiner finally gets around to reporting on the second round of election 2007 campaign financial disclosures this morning, with this Scott Schwebke story in this morning's newspaper.
As we also learned from Kristen Moulton on Saturday, Boss Godfrey has raked in $183, 540 as of October 26, the filing date for the second reporting period. This sum of course exceeds the campaign war chests of ALL other candidates combined, and is more than triple the amount raised so far by his challenger, Susie Van Hooser.
It's startling, we think, that Godfrey's expenditure for his professional campaign manager, $54,324, itself surpasses the $52, 420 that Ms. Van Hooser has raised for her entire campaign. The sheer magnificence of Godfrey's campaign fund should not surprise anyone however. There are many friends of Matt who've received special favors over the past years; and now that the election has rolled around, it's time for big-time payback.
Lest we leap to the conclusion that Godfrey's campaign is indulging in fund-raising overkill, or that the size of Godfrey's campaign warchest is overly grotesque, Boss Godfrey assures us that there's nothing unseemly about raising and spending such an obscene wad of cash. Godfrey recognises that he's accumulated a lot of "bad karma" during his 8-year reign of terror, and he's hoping all that dough will set things right:
Godfrey said Monday he has had to raise a lot of campaign funds to refute attacks from critics while promoting his platform.We think Boss Godfrey may have a point; and we wonder if any amount could ever be sufficient to offset the ill-will that Godfrey has accumulated over the past eight years. We'll find out soon enough, won't we.
“Having been in office for eight years, I’ve received a tremendous amount of criticism, so I need to defend myself against the critics while also talking about what I plan to do in the next four years,” he said.
On another topic, WSU professor Bryan Dorsey contributes an excellent Op-ed piece on this morning's Std-Ex editorial page, making some comparisons between competing transit systems, and delivering a soft sales pitch for street cars as the logical choice for Emerald City public transit. Professor Dorsey also asks the question: "So why is Ogden waiting to get in line for federal funding for transit oriented development?"
"Good question, Professor Dorsey" we say. "That's something many of us have been wondering."
Announcement: On another note, we've received notice from Dirk Youngberg, of the Ogden firefighters' union, concerning another candidate forum scheduled for later this week. For those lumpencitizens who'd like another live look at our city council candidate slate, please take note that a council candidates forum has been set for 7:00 p.m. on November 2d. This could be your last chance, by the way, to see these wild and crazy guys gathered together as a group.
That's it for the WCF-relevant news this morning. Let's hear it from our gentle readers.
Election update 10/30/07 4:42 p.m.m MT: We've just now spoken with State representive Neil Hansen, who garnered 20% of the vote in last month's Emerald City mayoral primary race. Representative Hansen will be holding a press conference on Thursday at the Weber County Building.....NE corner of 24th and Washington Blvd at 1 PM in Ogden -- In front of the "ski statue" whatever the heck that is.
Something tells us Hansen's announcment will decide the mayoral race, once and for all.
Right now, we think Neil Hansen is without a doubt the most important man in Ogden. We'll be sitting on the edges of our seats until Thursday's Hansen press conference.
Stay tuned. The political situation in Ogden gets more interesting by the moment
