What's Left of Maplewood (MN)

We can't draw, so we are left with verbal cartoons about Maplewood city politics.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Crunching Numbers

Part of developing a campaign strategy involves studying results and seeing the strengths and weaknesses of your opponents. In that light, I've looked very closely at the results of the September primary.

Below is a table comparing the Rebecca Cave's results in this 2007 primary with the results of 2005. (Click on the image below to see a readable image of the spreadsheet.)

By looking at the results on a precinct-by-precinct basis, we can see where Cave has gained or lost support since she first ran two years ago, and how her campaign strategy has played in the field.

A few observations stand out to me.
  • Although she is an incumbent, Cave's percentage of the primary vote declined by 9 points between 2007 and 2005.
  • Turnout was up in every precinct in the city. However, only in 4 precincts (1, 2, 15, 16) did Cave's votes increase more than turnout for that precinct. In 12 of 16 precincts, Cave got a smaller percentage of the vote this year.
  • In fact, in 7 of 16 precincts, Cave received fewer raw votes in 2007 than 2005, despite the higher turnout.
  • Cave received fewer raw votes in 3 of the 5 precincts where she did best in 2005; her percentage performance declined in 4 of the 5.
  • The worst change for Cave was in her home precinct, Precinct 10, where she lost almost half of her voters – 37 votes in 2007 versus 72 in 2005, and a decline in vote share from 74% to 33%.
  • Cave's best performance was in Precinct 16, where she and her allies on the council have worked very hard to win over residents with the South Leg moratorium, with some success.
  • The three precincts where Cave did best are home to her allies: P2 (Mayor Longrie), P15 (allied candidate Rokke), and P16 (Councilmember Hjelle).
In the big picture, what I find most striking is that the people who were won over by the biggest promises in the last election cycle (the Gladstone area, where the scaremongering and misinformation campaigns were focused two years ago) are the ones who expressed the most dissatisfaction at the ballot box after actually seeing Cave and her majority in office.

14 Comments:

  • At 2:58 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Another way to get a true flavor of what happened in the primary is this - There were 1,315 more poele voting in this primanry vs the 2005 primary. Out of those 1,315 voters ( each person being able to cast two votes each) only 145 voted for Rebecca. That is only 11% So 89% voted for soemone other than Rebecca. For an incumbant that is a scary number.

    So Rebecca's best hope is that there is a low voter turnout as I am pretty sure people who voted for her last time also voted for her this time.

    I would expect that there is a good chance that 8 out of every 10 new voters will vote for Will and John.

    For an sitting council person to do this losy means that the people are very upset with them. I think last time she and her allies were able to fool a lot of people.

    As the saying goes - You can fool some of the people all of the time, all of the poeple some of the time BUT you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

    Rebecca's, Diana's and Eric work of "attempting to knowingly mislead poeple is finally catching up with them.

     
  • At 4:05 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    You know what else is interesting about this race? Rebecca Cave's pre-general election financial report is not online. What do you suppose she's hiding?

     
  • At 4:10 PM, Blogger Frostbrand said…

    I noticed that in her primary finance filing she listed no donors of $100 or more. Either no one person was willing to give her that much money, or she didn't bother to read the instructions. I'll be interested to see if she itemizes any donors this time.

     
  • At 6:21 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Somebody needs to file a complaint with the campaign finance board or whoever enforces these rules. Cave should not get a pass, especially since her last report looks like it was late too.

    Someone must want to quote Will Farrell (as Alex Trebek) and ask "are you retarded or Icelandic?"

     
  • At 11:15 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I know George Cave reads this, and I am too lazy to get a blogger account (and post on Rossbach's blog). So I will ask George {aka :)} a question on maplewoodmn.

    George, where's yur wife's campaign finance report? Where is your astroturf (Maplewood Firefrauders Assn) PAC's report?

     
  • At 12:09 PM, Blogger Frostbrand said…

    I just checked and Cave's finance report is now online, so it's not as late as it was before the primary, at least.

     
  • At 1:44 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Interesting how quick it got up once I groused about it here at maplewoodmn. Good work George, you got your wife to submit here paperwork. Now lets get the Maplewood Firefrauders Assn. to get theirs in.

     
  • At 1:47 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I just looked at her filing, how come everyone else's campaign forms had a date/time stamp on their forms, but Rebecca's don't have the stamp? (Am I missing it somewhere?)

    Ooooh, something is afoot at City Hall!

     
  • At 1:53 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    ...And if you're wondering how I know ":)" on rossbach's blog is George Cave, I offer a quote from ";)"

    "The unions endorse you as do my wife, funny thing though don't we have union printers in Maplewood, Minnesota?"

    Notice the "as do my wife"? And his English needs some work, he says that his wife endorses Rossbach. C'mon George, English isn't your second language. Unless George is actually "Jorge". Hey George, are you an illegal alien?

     
  • At 7:17 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I see that Rebecca has listed some contributions over the $100 level. I noticed that she lists BONITZ twice for $250. Here I always thougth that a candidate can only accept $300 max from one entity or person. Seems she is over the limit. Does anyone want to place bets that she never does the right thing and pay the overage back? Also I see an expense for office space. She has an office setup somwhere or is it one in her house and this is the way she is raising money to pay her fine.
    But it would not surprise me she would try to bend the rules. Her ethics are just terrible. Convicted of knowingly misleading poeple. Doing campaigning on City property, backing false statements to force people off of commissions, hiring the mayor's husband friend as our city manager, backing a manager that has cost the City thousands of dollars in settlements and increased our insurance premium for years to come. Says she supportws Parks and then supports the gutting ot the Parks Department and placing the City Clerk and public Works Director in charge, supporting staf cuts that forces poeploe at teh community center to work 14, 15 and more days in a row. Supports deep cuts in the community center so that when people are injured they have to ask volunteers to come in and help them do their duties. If this is the way they are making the Community center run in the Black it is terrible and abusive. mmm sounds very much like her husband and her fellow convicted campaign violator Eric. They bully and abuse people to get their agendas.

     
  • At 7:24 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Hey I looked at Rocky's finance report and he lists no contributions. He must have over looked it - I wonder how much he rasied? Then maybe he is having problem getting money. I noticed that Rebecca was not able to rasie very much. Seems they have problems really motivating people to support them. Could it be that come the election all of the people that say are supporting them will turn out to be just a dream that they had?

     
  • At 7:28 PM, Blogger Frostbrand said…

    In Rebecca's defense (yes, I know that sounds odd), I am pretty sure the Bonitz entries are two different people, a married couple. I've met them and they're very nice folks. The $300 limit is per person or organization, so if a married couple support the same candidate they can certainly each make the maximum donation if they like (or any other amount).

    I would assume that "Office" means miscellaneous office supplies and expenses, which would be legitimate. (Paper and toner and the like; they are printing a lot of campaign material in-house, from what I've seen of letters and flyers.) In any case, she has spent more than she has raised, so she is probably dipping into the family savings -- it's not like she's funneling contributions off for some kind of personal use.

     
  • At 7:57 PM, Blogger Frostbrand said…

    Again, it feels a little weird to speak up for an opponent, but I believe Rocky has indicated that he intended to self-finance his race, which is certainly a legitimate choice for him and his family.

    Fundraising takes considerable time and energy, and those are both in short supply in the heat of the race -- if you didn't decide to run and start fundraising early, it's pretty hard to get the ball rolling late in the game, especially if you're not an incumbent. That's why I focused on some intensive fundraising early, in June, so that I wouldn't be distracted worrying about it later.

     
  • At 9:39 PM, Blogger drawnLeftward said…

    Matthew 20:
    1 For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard.
    2 And when he had agreed with the labourers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard.
    3 And he went out about the third hour, and saw others standing idle in the marketplace,
    4 And said unto them; Go ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went their way.
    5 Again he went out about the sixth and ninth hour, and did likewise.
    6 And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle?
    7 They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard; and whatsoever is right, that shall ye receive.
    8 So when even was come, the lord of the vineyard saith unto his steward, Call the labourers, and give them their hire, beginning from the last unto the first.
    9 And when they came that were hired about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny.
    10 But when the first came, they supposed that they should have received more; and they likewise received every man a penny.
    11 And when they had received it, they murmured against the goodman of the house,
    12 Saying, These last have wrought but one hour, and thou hast made them equal unto us, which have borne the burden and heat of the day.
    13 But he answered one of them, and said, Friend, I do thee no wrong: didst not thou agree with me for a penny?
    14 Take that thine is, and go thy way: I will give unto this last, even as unto thee.
    15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? Is thine eye evil, because I am good?
    16 So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen.

     

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