JEFFERSON COUNTY

In Jeffco, school board candidate fundraising appears to be a tale of the haves and have nots. 

Two of the three incumbents on the school district’s board of education have out-raised their opponents by margins of at least 15 to 1. The third incumbent, board chair Ron Mitchell, raised almost $33,000 through last Friday, and he doesn’t have an opponent.

The campaign finance data comes from TRACER, the Secretary of State’s database. Campaign finance reports for all candidates were due by 5 p.m. Tuesday. Unlike statewide races or General Assembly candidates, there are no limits on the amount of money someone can give to a school board candidate.

In the contested races, incumbent Susan Harmon reported more than $45,000 in contributions; her opponent, Matt Van Gieson, a charter school parent, raised $2,300. Incumbent Brad Rupert took in just under $49,000; his opponent, Erica Shields, raised $3,200.

The big donors to the three incumbents were teachers’ unions, including the Colorado Education Association and the Jefferson County Education Association. Rupert received more than $24,000 from the unions; Harmon got more than $20,000. The two unions put just under $8,000 into Mitchell’s campaign account.

DOUGLAS COUNTY

It’s not so lopsided in Douglas County, home to one of the most-watched school board race in the country.

On the Elevate Douglas County slate, which is made up of four conservative education reformers, the top fundraiser was Grant Nelson, who took in more than $34,000. Former state board of education member Debora Scheffel and fellow Elevate candidates Randy Mills and Ryan Abresch all received more than $21,000 each.

Candidates backed by teacher and parent groups, took in a little less cash but made up the difference in in-kind donations. Christina Ciancio-Schor, who is running against Mills, raised $16,000 plus more than $10,000 in non-monetary donations; Anthony Graziano, who is running against Abresch, received just over $15,000 in cash and another $10,000 in non-cash contributions; Krista Holtzmann, who is running against Scheffel, received just under $22,000 in cash and another $10,000 in in-kind donations. Candidate Kevin Leung, a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the district over its voucher program and who is running against Nelson, raised just over $13,000 and also loaned his campaign another $3,000. He also took in  $3,000 in non-monetary donations.

So where did the money come from? The Elevate slate got donations of $6,250 each from former Daniels & Associates president John Saeman, who is also active in philanthropy for the Catholic Church. The church has sent out fliers and letters to Douglas County voters, encouraging them to vote next month to “protect and expand school choice,” along with a statement that says the state constitution is a “barrier to voucher programs, like the one at stake in Douglas County.”

The four Elevate candidates also got $5,000 each from Ed McVaney, the founder of software company JD Edwards. McVaney is no stranger to school board races; he pumped in $5,000 each to three conservative education reformers who ran for the DougCo board in 2009. Since 2009, McVaney has contributed more than $95,000 to school board races around the state, with conservative education reformers running for the Douglas County school board the biggest recipients with $50,000 in donations.

DENVER PUBLIC SCHOOLS

In the Denver Public Schools, the first campaign finance reports show a decidedly lopsided advantage for the three incumbents. 

Former Lt. Gov. Barbara O’Brien, an at-large incumbent, was the biggest fundraiser of any major school board district candidate in the state. She took in more than $101,000 in the reporting period that ended last week. Her biggest donors reads like a “Who’s Who” of Republican politics: University of Colorado President Bruce Benson, a former GOP gubernatorial candidate, gave $10,000; Dan Ritchie, former chancellor of the University of Denver, gave $5,000, as did billionaire Phil Anschutz (Anschutz also owns Colorado Politics). Oakwood Homes CEO Pat Hamill, who is unaffiliated, gave O’Brien $7,500.

Her opponent, Robert Speth, took in $25,000, including $3,000 in in-kind donations. He received $1,500 from the state teacher’s union but he has also put in more than $2,500 of his own funds.

In district 2, southwest Denver, newcomer Angela Cobian also holds a substantial fundraising advantage over fellow newcomer Xochitl Gaytan. Cobian took in almost $99,000 in cash and in-kind donations; Gaytan trails with $25,000 in cash and non-monetary donations.

Cobian has taken contributions from Benson and Ritchie ($5,000 each) and Hamill ($2,500), as well as a $10,000 contribution from Silicon Valley venture capitalist Arthur Rock of San Francisco and $1,000 from a dark money group, Leadership for Educational Equity of Washington, D.C.; Rock is on their board of directors.  The Leadership foundation, a successor to Teach for America, took in $18 million in 2015 and paid out just under $8 million in grants, according to an IRS filing. Its donors are not disclosed.

Cobian also got $1,000 from the Colorado Education Association.

Gaytan, known as “Sochi,” has taken in $12,000 from the CEA and the Denver Classroom Teachers Association, and another $1,000 from AFL-CIO, plus about $1,800 of her own funds.

District 3 includes covers northeastern Denver, including Park Hill and south to George Washington High School. The candidates are incumbent Mike Johnson, who took in $82,000 in cash and another $4,000 from a personal loan. His opponent, Carrie Olson, received more than $18,000 along with $1,000 in in-kind donations.

Olson’s largest contribution was $5,000 from the Denver Classroom Teachers Association and $1,000 from the Niren Christian Foundation, a non-profit. The Secretary of State’s business database says that foundation, which is based in Castle Rock, let its business registration lapse more than two years ago and it has been delinquent in its filings ever since. Its most recent IRS filing, in 2015, showed the foundation took in about $12,000 and paid out $2,000 in grants. The political contribution to Olson is its first in Colorado, according to TRACER.

Johnson’s biggest donor is David Younggren, the president and CEO of the Piton Foundation and Gary Community Investments, which was started by Sam Gary of Gary Energy. Younggren has put $5,000 into Johnson’s campaign; Sam Gary also has contributed $5,000. Ritchie has put in $2,000; Hamill has contributed $2,500.

Two other donors whose names are popping up on campaign contributions: Marco Abarca, CEO of Ready Foods and a leader in Latinos for Education Reform. Abarca and his wife, Catherine, have contributed nearly $9,000 to O’Brien, Cobian, Johnson and Rachele Espiritu, an incumbent in DPS district 4, which includes the Montbello and Stapleton neighborhoods. Scott Reiman, an investor and president of the Reiman Foundation, also contributed $5,000 each to O’Brien, Cobian and Espiritu.

Espiritu reported $73,000 in cash contributions. She is in a three-way race with Jennifer Bacon and Tay Anderson, a recent DPS graduate. Bacon received almost $62,000 in cash and in-kind contributions; Anderson took in just under $17,000 in cash.

Among Espiritu’s contributions: $4,000 from Democrats for Education Reform, a pro-charter non-profit backed by New York-based Education Reform Now. Ritchie contributed $5,000; James Crowe, CEO of Crowe Building Products, kicked in $5,000; Anschutz donated $2,000 and Gary gave $2,500.

Bacon’s biggest donations came from the Denver Classroom Teachers Association, a total of $10,000. She also got $5,000 check from San Francisco venture capitalist Rock, and $2,500 from Leadership for Educational Equity.

Anderson’s contributions have been entirely from individual donors; his biggest contribution to date is from former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, at $1,300.

The next update on campaign fundraising comes out on November 3, four days before the election.