By By JONATHAN CLAYBORNE
Staff Writer
Jerry Evans and Bertie Arnhols are the only Beaufort County commissioner candidates to raise more than $1,000 so far this election cycle, campaign reports show.
The reports, filed before the primary election, reflect candidate fundraising and spending through the next-to-last week of April.
Arnhols, an unaffiliated candidate, is circulating a petition as part of an effort to be placed on the ballot for the Nov. 2 general election.
Until she gets all of the necessary signatures, Arnhols won’t be an official candidate.
Arnhols has raised $2,648.50 so far this year, the reports reveal. Of that amount, $2,298.50 has come out of her own pocket, the reports read.
Arnhols has spent $1,923.70 on her campaign, which to date has involved renting facilities for town-hall meetings and related expenditures.
To raise awareness of her town-hall sessions, she spent $497.20 on ads in the Washington Daily News.
“I would certainly have liked to have better attendance at the town-hall meetings,” Arnhols told the Daily News on Monday.
Yet, she said that, because of the ads and the meetings, more people have recognized her name on the petition trail.
“People can make a connection between someone’s petition and that person because they saw the ads,” Arnhols commented.
Arnhols’ push has brought her very close to her petition goal.
According to the Beaufort County Board of Elections, Arnhols needs 1,252 verified signatures to be placed on the November ballot.
As of Monday, she had 1,117 verified signatures, just 135 short of her target.
Arnhols must collect the remaining 135 signatures by a deadline of noon June 25.
Money devoted to the precampaign initiative wasn’t the only reason for a rise in signatures, Arnhols said, adding that warm weather has brought out more people and more opportunities to get signatures.
As previously reported, Evans, a Democrat, has listed total receipts of $2,800.
None of the other seven commissioner candidates who participated in last week’s primary raised enough money to cross a $1,000 reporting threshold, related Kellie Harris Hopkins, Beaufort County’s elections director.
Hopkins said she anticipates that the commissioner fundraising amounts will rise now that the two major parties have selected their nominees.
The parties, along with unaffiliated voters who took part in the primary, have nominated three Democrats and three Republicans to run for three available seats on the Beaufort County Board of Commissioners.
If her petition is successful, Arnhols will become the seventh candidate in the race.
Some county-level candidates have said they expect to have difficulty raising money this year because of the lagging economic recovery.
Outside the commissioner contest, the most significant local fundraising has been in the developing contest for Beaufort County sheriff.
There was no primary in that race.
Incumbent Sheriff Alan Jordan, a Democrat, has reported $20,970 in total receipts for his campaign committee.
Of that total, $1,745 came in the form of aggregated, individual contributions of $50 or less, while $18,125 came from individuals giving more than $50.
Jordan received $1,000 from the campaign committee of state Rep. Arthur Williams, D-Beaufort.
Jordan listed numerous $100 contributions, including $100 from Evans, one of the three remaining Democratic commissioner hopefuls.
Jordan also got $100 each from Tom Payne, chairman of the Beaufort County Board of Elections, and Alice Mills Sadler, chairwoman of the Beaufort County Democratic Party.
Jordan also received $250 from Tom Richter, mayor of Washington Park.
Jordan’s report showed $3,195.87 in total expenditures for the cycle so far. He had $18,893.67 cash on hand as of April 28.
The largest single expense in his most recent report was $921, a required filing fee.
Donald Dixon, Jordan’s Republican opponent, did less well in fundraising.
He showed $3,175.46 in total receipts and $2,938.84 in operating expenditures.
Dixon had $236.62 cash on hand at the close of the period.
He spent $302.23 on a campaign Web site and $269.38 on business cards.