Sign, Sign, Everywhere a Sign
What is it with these things?
Two hours of door-knocking in Southridge and this came up FOUR times: what the heck is with all the signs??
There are forty-five people running for office right now, without wards, so everyone is running everywhere. In this sense, the abundance of signs isn’t so surprising, although it is getting tiresome now that we’re a month into it.
The thing that stands out to me from the past week or two is the increase in campaign spending overall. I've gotten a robo-text from the Barnes campaign. I’ve just heard radio ads from two other candidates for Council. And on the streets, the little herds of sheep-sized campaign signs are increasingly getting replaced by buffalo-sized behemoths.
I don’t know what these things cost - I guessed to a couple of people they’re in the range of $150 to $300 each? No, they replied. More.
///////////
The sign war started normally, with little placards from the first batch of eager young hopefuls dotting the roadways. When Drew got going his signs were all large, but Drew’s rich and everyone knows it, so the big flashy signs were no surprise. Everyone also knows that Rose is rich, so it was expected that he would up his sign game also, and within a week or two the first large Rose signs appeared. Would that be the end of it? Obviously not.
//////////
Why am I writing about signs right now? First, it stands out that four different voters shared their roadsign distaste with me when I knocked on their doors on Saturday. They don’t like it.
Second, I’ve been wondering myself about the money trail. I know that US presidential campaigns attract bazillions in donations because the stakes are so high, but wtf? Why are people suddenly putting so much money into buying my vote here? It’s just Medicine Hat city council - is my vote really worth that much? If so, why? Robo-texts, radio spots, and giant buffalo herds with names printed on their skins. What makes this worth it?
Kris Samraj just put out a plea for another $6,000 from his supporters. If he gets it, will that go to signage, radio, social media or robocalls? Some of the candidates of course already have the $6,000 to spare, so Samraj’s adspend will just add to the noise.
I wonder if Kelly will be able to dig all the numbers up when this is over, and find out how much more money was spent on this campaign than was spent last time. Is it mandatory to report all the expenses? I’d sure be curious to know. It’s not that I’m unaware that politics can be high-stakes, I just wasn’t aware that OUR little civic election was worth the money pouring in now. It feels like something isn’t adding up, or is that just me?
Take the massive Dumanowski signs that suddenly showed up this week. Who bought those, and why? Not one other candidate has mentioned his name. I can think of no person or group that has endorsed him. And he has no political identity anymore beyond “I hate Linnsie”.
Dumanowski has no campaign, no ground war, no effort, no message, and a ton of bad baggage. As a business proposal, anyone with money to spend on this election would have abandoned him weeks ago. Yet the signs appear….
Is he spending his own money? That would be odd, since, as I said, his only political identity is “Hate Clark”. Is he really spending thousands of his own money to drag that baggage across the finish line? Or is someone else footing the bill for Dumanowski’s signs, because “Hate Clark” is exactly the message they want to spread?
Look, Linnsie Clark is fine. She’s going to be a great mayor. She is, I am certain, the Mayor that the majority of Council candidates want to serve under. I am equally certain that no one running for Council wants to serve alongside Robert Dumanowski. (Please, correct me if I’m wrong). Which leaves this puzzle: if no one wants Dumanowski to win, but someone is adding money to his campaign, why?
/////////
To all the candidates, I just want to express sympathy. There doesn’t appear to be a solution to the current situation. There’s still a week to go, and our visual space along the roadside has become a battlezone. Most of you do not have the fundraising machines to ramp up to buffalo-mode, nor do we really want you to. But how much of the vote can be swayed in the last week by the surge in big new signs? How well have you already locked in your voters? How many of them will you lose if you don’t release your own behemoths onto the roadsides? Is it even worthwhile - or are you risking angering voters by adding more signs to an already irritating landscape?
So many questions without clear answers. I feel for you. Good luck with your campaigns.