NEWS FILE PHOTO Brooks-Medicine Hat UCP candidate Michaela Glasgo hugs re-elected Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA Drew Barnes on election night in April. Glasgo and Barnes both far outspent their rivals on their way to election wins.
cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant
Rookie candidate Michaela Glasgo raised more money than veteran campaigner Drew Barnes, according to campaign finance documents made public this month.
Combined, the two United Conservative Party candidates in southeast Alberta handily out-fundraised and outspent their combined rivals en route to winning seats.
In fact, the biggest challenge to the local dominance of conservative party financing came from independent candidate Todd Beasley, who billed himself as an “independent conservative,” after he was left out of the UCP nomination process.
He wound up well back in voting however, and in a deep deficit after the April 16 election.
The disclosure documents also paint a picture of the behind-the-scenes strategy. As for electioneering, the New Democrats spent the most money attempting to unseat Barnes, who won a third term as MLA and is seen as the standard bearer of the UCP in the region.
The campaign of NDP candidate Peter Mueller spent a total of $25,000 in the race to win Cypress-Medicine Hat, compared to $63,000 by Barnes’ re-election campaign. The two-term MLA secured about two-thirds of the votes in the urban-rural riding comprising most of Medicine Hat and parts of Cypress County.
That was funded by nearly $45,000 in donations and a transfer of $40,000 from the party and constituency association.
Campaign financing was more competitive in Brooks-Medicine Hat riding, where three campaigns spent above $10,000.
The UCP’s Glasgo cruised to victory in the recently redrawn riding, and raised $52,500 from individual donors for the 2019 campaign, her first. She also benefited from party transfers of $13,400.
In comparison, the entire campaign of second-place finisher Lynn MacWilliam, of the Alberta New Democrats, cost $16,130 to operate. That was largely funded by the Bassano resident and an $11,000 transfer from the party, which centralizes campaign donations and doesn’t list donations to specific campaigns.
The Alberta Party’s Jim Black also raised $10,750.
Glasgo wound up spending almost $58,000 during the six-week election period on office expense, advertising, staff and events. Her returns show a $9,000 surplus in the end.
She captured 61 per cent of the vote on election night, more than tripling the votes cast for MacWilliam (18 per cent) and also soundly beating Beasley (12 per cent).
In his bid to win, Beasley raised $22,800 and spent $34,100, leaving an $11,300 deficit.
In Cypress-Medicine Hat, Alberta Party candidate Collette Smithers spent $1,500 of a campaign budget that totalled $6,900, and transferred the remainder back to the party.
Desert Blume resident Terry Blacquier’s $3,800-campaign for the Alberta Advantage party was largely self-funded.
Similarly, Alberta Independence candidate Collin Pacholek, in Brooks-Medicine Hat, raised $200 from outside sources for a $1,700 largely informational campaign.
Both men said their goal was to inform voters of their fledgling parties’ positions.
Alberta Liberal candidates in the two ridings, Walsh resident Anwar Kamaran and Brooks resident Jamah Farah, spent a combined $2,000, mostly on candidate registration fees.
