Commission Impossible

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October 31, 2006

The Numbers Game

With 8 days until the election there's still no indication of who's winning the City Council contest. Mary Flynn seems to have a solid crew of letter writers, and has done an admirable job of raising funds. But the pounding she took in the ER endorsement editorial was one for the record books. Otherwise the Sorensen, Herbert, and Dailey slate have caught up to the progressives (Gruendl, Flynn, and Nickell) in fundraising, and with the exeption of Flynn have probably surpassed them. The three PACs (Chamber, Hooker Oak Alliance, North State Business) supporting Bertagna, Sorensen, Herbert, and Dailey have activated a previously silent business community, and drawn together addtional threads of discontent. The Esplanande League and Chico Conservation Voters have been pushing the "developer slate" concept in their mailers, and the Chico Beat showed that they aren't "dicking around" when they interview candidates. The Butte Republicans have even begun populating their 72 hour push. They've even taken the unique step of endorsing City Council candidates due to the deceptive mailer sent out by progressives implying Scott Gruendl was a republican favorite. It looks like nobody is sitting out this election, and both sides are geared up for the last week. To make the contest even more "razor's edge" the gap between democrat and republican registered voters has dropped to about 1000. The increase in registered Republicans is probably due to annexations in the last few years. Minor parties probably break evenly across the party lines (Greens = minor party conservatives). Registered Democrats 15,325 (previously 15,148) Registered Republicans 14,324 (previously 13,396) Decline to State 8,163 (previously 8,162) 1/3 of Chico voters are permanent-absentee-voters, so it is possible that 30% of the people that will vote have already done so. The election will depend on two things. Get out the vote efforts by the political parties, and the direction the "decline to states" take in this referendum. I won't be foolish enough to suggest winners. But I will say that none of the 6 candidates are out of the race, and I don't believe either incumbent is safe.

Posted by Lon at October 31, 2006 08:48 AM

Comments

Posted by: Dave Brobst at November 2, 2006 01:25 PM