DISGUSTING: Race for 39th District Senate seat smashes spending mark

[demodonkey]

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_605310.html

TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, January 1, 2009

Republican Kim Ward and Democrat Tony Bompiani spent $2.3 million in their fall campaigns for the 39th District Senate seat, shattering the record-setting $1.7 million spent in the 2004 campaign for the seat. Ward, a former Westmoreland County commissioner, spent more than $1.4 million during her whirlwind, three-month campaign to win the seat formerly held by Republican Robert Regola. According to campaign expense reports filed with the state election bureau, Ward of Hempfield outspent her opponent by more than $500,000.

SNIP

Ward won the seat Nov. 4 with 60,740 votes, to 51,571 for Bompiani.
Regola of Hempfield won the Senate seat in 2004 from then two-term incumbent Sen. Allen Kukovich, a Manor Democrat, in a campaign that set the previous record spending.The $2.3 million figure stunned veteran political analyst G. Terry Madonna, director of the Franklin & Marshall College Center for Politics and Public Affairs.

SNIP

Most of Ward's campaign cash -- more than $1 million -- came from in-kind contributions in the form of campaign mailers and television commercials from the Pennsylvania Republican and Pennsylvania Senate Republican campaign committees. Ward received $15,000 from the campaign committee of Indiana County Sen. Don White and $1,000 from former Fayette County Commissioner Joe Hardy. Ward, who worked on campaigns for presidential candidates John McCain and George W. Bush and for former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, ran the 2003 commissioner campaign for Hardy, the founder of 84 Lumber.

SNIP

Madonna said spiraling amounts spent on campaigns "really limit who is able to run."

[demodonkey]

1. Remember, this is Scaife's newspaper, that was instrumental in defeating Allen Kukovich and...

...ratcheting up the spending in 2004. Now it is almost $1.5 million dollars to win that 39th District State Senate seat, and that is just obscene. (On edit: Ward spend over $23 for every single person who voted for her!)

WE NEED CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM, along with voter-verified paper ballots, audits, and many other improvements in our Pennsylvania elections!