Hopeful tops $100,000 in funding

One Newport Beach City Council candidate broke the $100,000 mark, and money has been pouring into the campaign against the controversial growth-control initiative Measure X, reports filed Thursday show.

Michael Henn, one of four candidates for the District 1 council seat, reported raising nearly $104,000 this year, and the No on Measure X campaign banked more than $200,000 in three weeks.

The campaign finance reports, due Thursday to the Newport Beach city clerk, cover donations and spending between Oct. 1 and Oct. 21, and they include totals raised and spent this calendar year.

In council campaigns, Henn raised the most of any candidate this year or in any previous Newport election. According to his report, he raised $103,852 and spent $51,383 so far in 2006, and he has $53,186 left in cash on hand.

Henn said he’s not sure whether he’ll need to spend the remainder of his money. He plans to send more mailers, and he’s had to get more yard signs to replace those that have disappeared, so he’s playing it by ear.

“I am making no assumptions whatsoever about where I stand in terms of winning or losing,” he said.

Henn’s three opponents are the reason he worked so hard at fundraising, he said. As it is, he raised more money than all of them put together.

“I’m in a unique position,” he said. “If I was [uncontested District 3 incumbent] Don Webb, I sure as heck wouldn’t be doing this.”

The other candidates in District 1 raised far less than Henn but two of the three spent slightly more. Jack Wu raised $39,860 and spent $53,590; Marcia Dossey raised $40,103 and spent $52,080; and Brenda Martin raised $4,874 and spent $4,997.

In second place for the most money raised was District 4 Councilwoman Leslie Daigle, who reported collecting $90,134 and spending $65,482.

Incumbent Councilmen Ed Selich in District 5 and Keith Curry in District 7 raised several times more than their respective challengers, Robert Schoonmaker and Dolores Otting. In District 6, challenger Nancy Gardner out-raised Councilman Dick Nichols.

Aside from Schoonmaker, who didn’t need to file a report because he agreed to raise and spend less than $1,000 on the race, the lowest totals came from Nichols, whose $7,258 was the least raised, and Webb, who spent the least with a mere $1,313.

Business and property rights supporters were lining up to toss money into the No on Measure X coffers. The campaign’s report showed a total of $255,598 raised, with about $215,000 of it raised in the first three weeks of October.

If Measure X is successful, it would require public votes on any development that adds more than 100 homes, 40,000 square feet of building space or 100 peak hour car trips in the city, so it’s not surprising that businesses and developers have chipped in to fight it. Going to the ballot can be a costly and uncertain process, and Newport Beach voters rejected the two projects that went to the ballot under existing rules.

Among contributors to No on Measure X were the Koll Co., which gave $49,999 — the Koll Co. lost a vote on a proposed office tower; and a $10,000 donation from Mariners Mile Gateway LLC, the developer of a project that might require a vote under Measure X.

The No on Measure X campaign reported spending $191,428 this year and has $112,393 cash on hand. Jeff Flint, the No on X campaign’s consultant, could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The pro-Measure X campaign is being financed by the Greenlight residents group, which wrote the measure. It’s unknown how much money the group has raised or spent to date because its report was not filed by the Thursday deadline.

Greenlight spokesman Phil Arst acknowledged the report would be filed late — likely early next week.

The group did report late expenditures this week of $9,401 for mailers and $6,259 for advertising.