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Realtors and developers spent the most cash on two pro-VRE candidates in Spotsylvania County, who won re-election Date published: 1/17/2010
By DAN TELVOCK Developers and real estate agents pumped more than $24,000 into the war chests of two Spotsylvania County supervisors who won re-election in November. Most of the donations came in the final two months of the campaigns by Supervisors Gary Skinner and Benjamin Pitts. The late donations boosted the two independent candidates' campaign coffers by about $10,000 more than their Republican opponents, D.J. McGuire and Chris Yakabouski respectively. Fitz Johnson, president of Johnson Realty Advisors, gave $500 to both Skinner and Pitts. He said the support from developers and real estate agents was largely because both Pitts and Skinner supported the county's becoming a member of the Virginia Railway Express commuter rail service. Johnson's company is a broker for more than 1,000 acres near where a VRE train station is planned at Crossroads Business Park. "VRE was the driving reason, and I supported both of those candidates in the past monetarily," he said. From Sept. 1 to Nov. 26, Skinner received about $12,000 from those two sectors. Pitts received about $12,750 during the same time period. This election also marked the first time that the Realtors Political Action Committee took a stance on Spotsylvania politics, giving Skinner and Pitts $1,500 each. Realtors in the region have long supported VRE. John Broadway, spokesman for the PAC, said there are 29 local associations in Virginia and the PAC manages the accounts for 26 of them, including the Fredericksburg Area Association of Realtors. He said the Fredericksburg branch requested the funds for Pitts and Skinner. The local association also helped fund a study of gas prices at the pumps in the region to show that localities that are VRE members did not have higher average gas prices than Spotsylvania, which was not a member. The Silver Cos. donated more than $5,000 to both Pitts and Skinner, by far the most of any developer or real estate agent or group. The development firm used entities such as Carter West LLC and Gardner Station LLC as the contributors. Jud Honaker, president of commercial development for the Silver Cos., said the company chose to support pro-VRE candidates. But another reason he said the company supported Pitts and Skinner was that they seemed to get along well with the other five supervisors. Honaker said he did not want to see the Spotsylvania board become contentious, as the Stafford board has been in recent years. "That tension on that board, I don't think it was good for [Stafford County]," Honaker said. Dan Telvock: 540/374-5438
Mr. Telrock started his article well, but finished inadequately. Fist, we need all available facts, not just a select few. What were the total donations to each candidate, including the losers. How do they break out? What do the candidates have to say about donations? What do political analysts have to say?
In summary, the article was a tease, but seriously short on full factual information and had zero analysis or perspective.
What percent of the total contributions do the enumerated contributions represent? If it is a high % of the total their votes are predictable.
Proportionally, I'd say $250 per donor. That would prevent
undue influence of large donors to any single candidate. It
would also open the field for other candidates who don't
want to "owe" anyone for their donations. Everyone knows
deep pocket developers control local elections & ultimately
policy because they expect favors for their donations. Why
else would they give that kind of $?
Naw - here's what is needed. Within 24hrs of ANY
DONATION, it APPEARS on the VPAP website and notifies
those who are registered to RSS on that website.
Then we'll all KNOW - What developers are donating to
whose campaigns BEFORE the election and we can then
vote accordingly.
The problem here is that this kind of info does not come to
light in time for most voters to realize it.
Spotsylvania BTW can foster this process by requiring
candidates to EFILE campaign donation rather than paper-
file them.
Anyone with a brain knew the developers, realtors, the selective agenda FLS reporters and the current "members" of the VRE (misery loves company logic) were doing all in their power to shove the County right through the election. Good on them for their cunning plan. I think it's sad just how many voters bought it! That's the sobering part.
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