Waiting for the Election

Denver voters will start voting in a couple of days, but without a lot of excitement. The race for mayor has attracted more money than passion.

In 2003, at this point, John Hickenlooper was beginning to generate buzz as he received the Rocky Mountain News’ endorsement, saw a surge of fundraising from $600,000 to $1 million, and grabbed the Denver Post’s endorsement mid-April.

If the one poll published and the contributions reflect the current state of the race, Chris Romer makes the runoff, but below 50 percent. The second place finish will likely be close, but will depend on final candidate turnout efforts and advertising.

All the top candidates have TV ads up, and some are good, but none seem to be generating any buzz. Surprisingly, candidates are attending two and three forums a day, but the effort seems to be more exhausting than enlightening – and, it certainly hasn’t generated much controversy or major differences.

Maybe Romer’s best chance of winning this outright is pure boredom – voters may just want to get it over.

See Denver Post article:  Denver mayoral candidates together raise about $3 million through March