Local Fundraising

Running an election campaign is very strenuous and time consuming. In many ways it is a balancing act. One must deal with maintaining public visibility, appealing to the voters, developing a platform, kissing disgusting babies, and meeting as many people as possible. However, one of the most important and difficult parts of the job is raising money. Money is necessary for all parts of the campaign, and without it, a campaign can grind to a halt. In this paper I will attempt to explain how a candidate gets the money to campaign.

The first thing to do, whenever one runs for any office, is to check all local laws pertaining to elections and contributions. In any county, there often are obscure laws that affect a myriad of subjects, elections being among them. These laws usually state who can give money to whom and how much can be given by any one person or organization. Violating these laws may result in an automatic forfeiture.

Another important step is to make sure that you, yourself, contribute to your own campaign. It does not have to be much, as many candidates do not come from wealthy backgrounds, but enough to show that you are serious about winning the election. After all, if you are not confident enough to contribute your own money, how can you expect others to contribute for you?

The third step that many hopeful candidates use is to approach their friends and family for money. While some may be hesitant to do this, one expert, who curiously did not leave his name (Basic Fundraising, n.d.), says that this is important. Your friends and family should be asked, firstly, for the reason outlined in the preceding paragraph, and secondly because this is where a candidate gets much of his or her initial seed money.

A viral approach, according to Garecht, should be used when asking associates for money (n.d.e). Ask your family and friends to ask all their family and friends, who should, in turn, ask all of their family and friends. Of course, not everyone will contribute, but by playing the percentages, a candidate can expect to receive thousands of dollars, even if he or she is not from a particularly affluent social circle. If a person is unwilling to contribute monetarily, ask if he would like to volunteer either his time or services, or even there lawn for use as signage.

The next stop one should make before running is the political action committees (PAC's). The PAC's are organizations whose purpose is to raise money for a specific cause or ideal (Garecht, n.d.f). They then will give this money to those candidates in their area who will best represent their cause. For instance, should one be a Republican candidate, one would seek out the PAC's that are anti-abortion, anti-homosexuality, pro-military, pro-church, and whatever other causes Republicans favor. Then one must give presentations to the PACs explaining why one is likely to win and why one is likely to further their goals. If all goes well, and one impresses them with one's dedication, then the PAC's are likely to cut the candidate a big, fat check to the order of several thousand dollars.

The last thing you should do before announcing your candidacy is talk to other elected officials, past and present, who are of a similar political bend; first, to get their advice, and second, to wheedle them into giving you their donor lists. These lists contain the names, phone numbers, and addresses of everyone who contributed to that particular candidate's campaign.

Now a candidate is prepared to begin campaigning. First, he or she announces his or her candidacy. Ideally, this happens in a big forum in a televised amphitheater, with lots of balloons, confetti, and straw hats with a nice little banner going around the hat that has the candidate's name, and the year in which they are running on it, or possibly a catchy slogan.

Shortly after announcing his or her candidacy, a candidate should hold his first major fundraising event (Garecht, n.d.c). This is important; it gives a campaign its first major injection of funds, sets the tone for the entire campaign, and it lets a campaign know where it stands. If a campaign receives relatively little money, then it knows it has to work much harder to compete. If a campaign receives a great amount of money, it knows it is on the right track.

Here is the time when a candidate sends his first fundraising letter. A good fundraising letter consists of four parts (Basic Fundraising, n.d.). First is the text. Letters that have a personal tone have the highest rate of return, so don't be too officious. Keep paragraph lengths short, be specific about for what you need the money, ask for an exact amount, and specify a due date and why that date is important. Lastly, always include a "P.S."; people will always read the "P.S", so be sure to put in something you wany them to especially remember (Basic Fundraising", n.d.).

The second part of the fundraising letter is the reply card. This is the slip of paper that the donor fills out and returns. It should have space for the name, address, phone number, and dollar amount the donor is sending. Also, include all "disclaimers about the candidate's committee and corporate contributions" (Basic Fundraising, n.d.), whatever that means.

Thirdly, the reply envelope plays a part. It is usually a good idea to have the envelope include pre-paid return postage. People hate looking for and buying stamps; save them the trouble and they will be more inclined to reply. Also, be sure to have the return envelope addressed to the person who is actually asking for the money. If, for instance, a friend of yours sends letters to his contacts on your behalf, the potential donors will be more likely to reply if they know that the envelope will end up in the hands of someone they know.

Fourth is the envelope itself. It is worth it to spend the money on quality envelopes. The envelope should look professional and important. If the envelope looks like it came from some cheap sweepstakes, then no one is going to bother to open it; it will be thrown away with all the other junk mail.

Now we arrive at the bread and butter of any campaign: fundraising events. This is where the candidate throws various dinner parties, box socials, lawn socials, coffee klatches, luncheons, banquets, soirees, barbecues, carnivals, spring mixers, and other social-type events, in order to acquire campaign contributions. The candidate's organization will usually invite a slew of guests with money to spend, provide them with a meal, make a small speech, and then ask for donations. Either the candidate will host the event himself, or have a friend or a friend-of-a-friend do it for him, and make