Politics The Race for the 43rd: By the Numbers
Our intern, Sarah Mirk, just finished crunching the contribution numbers for candidates in the closely-watched race to become the next state representative from Seattle’s 43rd District.
No surprise, Jamie Pedersen, the downtown lawyer and gay civil rights advocate, still has the same large fundraising lead that he’s held from the start of this race. Other findings: Dick Kelley, the chair of the 43rd District Democrats who has limited his contributions to $100 per person, currently has the highest number of contributors: 555. (But Pedersen, who has not limited his contributions, is right on Kelley’s heels with 529.) And in the sometimes contentious category of contributions from outside of Seattle, Bill Sherman leads with 54 percent of his contributors residing outside of this city.
(Note: The data on the total number of contributors to each candidate does not include contributions under $25.)
I think the attached graphs might need some work to match the numbers in the post. The post says Kelley has the most contributors with 555, but the graph shows him at approximately 615 and trailing Pedersen. The post says Pedersen has 555 contributors, but the graph shows it more like 655. And if slightly more than half of Bill Sherman's contributors are from outside of Seattle, that dark blue bar should be half way up the light blue bar. I know journalists and graphs don't always mix well -- perhaps this can be blamed on Excel?