More from Bharat Ayyar, who looked into the race between Republican State Senator Frank Padavan and Democratic challenger Jim Gennaro.
As of the July filing, here’s how much money they have on hand:
Padavan – $116,642.20
Gennaro – $406,965.01
It’s surprising that Gennaro is raising so much more money than Padavan, since people don’t see Padavan as being as vulnerable to a Democratic challenger as some of his Republican colleagues in the State Senate, like Serf Maltese, Caesar Trunzo, and Joe Robach. And even thought the Republican State Senate Campaign Committee has a lot more money than their Democratic counterpart, having to pour money into Padavan’s race would just be one more drain on their resources.
And not only does Padavan has less money on hand, but the district has more registered Democrats than Republicans. A lot more. According to the latest figures from the state Board of Elections, in the 11th State Senate district there are 85,860 registered Democrats to 32,669 registered Republicans.
Among the expenditures:
Padavan spent $5,801 on lawn signs and $380 on flag pins.
Padavan also paid $600 to sponsor baseball teams in the Bayside and Glen Oaks Little Leagues.
And Padavan paid $600 to Times Ledger columnist Dee Richards for photographs.
Gennaro paid Joanne Gennaro a total of $8,275.98 for her counsel, including $115 in reimbursements.
UPDATE: Bharat notes that Joanne Gennaro, the one the campaign paid more than $8,000, is the wife of the candidate. She was working as a fund-raiser for the campaign from 2006 to April of this year, until she was replaced by Jeffrey Guillot.
I spoke with Guillot, who said, "As the campaign kicked into high gear, they needed a full-time fund-raiser. And that’s me."
I asked Guillot if the candidate had any concerns about the appearance of impropriety of paying a family member with campaign money. Guillot said he couldn’t speak to Gennaro’s thoughts at the time, but said that when candidates hire a fund-raiser, it has to be someone in whom "you have the utmost trust."
UPDATE II: Guillot called to point out the Joanne is a professional fund-raiser, and, as the filings show, was pretty good, which supports the idea that she wasn’t getting paid simply because she was married to the candidate.
