1. Big Picture: What’s Been Raised and Spent:

Total Raised & Spent (since 1/1/25):

2. The Numbers Can Be Deceiving:

For example, it sure looks like Francisco Maldonado is lapping the competition in terms of money raised. However, as has already been noted by both Dick Howe and Gerry Nutter, $20K of his $30K came from his own pocket. Other candidates have also provided their own seed money, though none to the same extent.

3. I Know A Surefire Way to Save Any Campaign $1900:

When you have $30K to spend, I guess you can do some unusual things with it. Namely, Francisco Maldonado spent $1900 on a sky banner:

Intelligent minds can differ as to whether it would be more effective to simply light the money on fire. I guess it depends on how well you can market a money burning event.

(Yes, I recognize the irony in calling attention to it. Grow up).

4. Either: (1) Councilor Chau Gets A Terrible Deal on Venue Rental, or (2) Councilor Chau Knows How to Throw a Party

Believe it or not, $1900 for an aerial advertisement isn’t even the biggest head-scratcher I found.

Sokhary Chau raised in $13,567.05 in 2025 – which is an impressive sum. $13,567 is the 3rd most of money raised by any candidate. What caught my eye was the expenditures of $11,225.94. That’s a lot of money to spend when you have no opponent. So, where did that money go?

Turns out that 71% of it, or $9700, was paid out to Sampao Meas on 4/30/25 for an event. For context, the amount spent on this party is more than what 12 candidates have received in 2025.

In addition, Vesna Nuon paid the same vendor for an event on May 24 for considerably less money:

If you look back over the years, it’s not just this year, but pretty much every year since 2020 – when he stopped getting the Vesna rate.

For additional context, I took a quick peek at what some other candidates spend on their parties this cycle:

I’m not saying $9700 is too much to spend on a party, but the members of Motley Crue gasped when I showed them.  We talk from time to time.  Except Vince Neil.

He knows why.

5. Looking at the Data Doesn’t Really Help Me Handicap the District 3 Race

Well, maybe a little. Clearly, the money is on Juran, who raised an impressive $22,350.00 before the preliminary.  She’s almost doubling the incumbent and other challengers.

However, as noted above, the numbers can be deceiving. So I figured I’d try to take a look at whether the people donating to each candidate are actually my neighbors. This analysis is imperfect, as I don’t think district boundaries line up precisely with postal zip codes. Basically, if a donation comes from 01852 I counted it. If there was a street address, I looked it up. If there was neither street nor a zip, and if I don’t know who the person is, I counted it as out of district.

Juran

173 total donors – 70 in district and 103 from out of district.

Belanger

89 total donors – 42 in district and 47 from out of district.

Gendron 

147 total donors – 86 in district and 61 from out of district.

Finn

64 total donors – 23 in district 41 from out of district.

My expert analysis of these numbers:

It’s all going to come down to turnout.

6. The District Incumbents, Generally, Have Yet to Break a Sweat

In terms of money spent, it’s not too surprising to see incumbents keeping their powder dry until November. However, it is a little surprising to see this in D3 and D7 where the incumbents could be vulnerable.