Scott Ott: Long Shot Almost Comes In
March 13th, 2010 | by BGuzzardi |
Against all odds, against popular incumbent, with nearly no money against an incumbent’s campaign cash of about quarter million dollars. A very long shot almost comes in. Ideas nearly overcome incumbent’s natural advantage as well as campaign cash of about $727,000 against virtually nothing for challenger Scott Ott. Scott Ott’s campaign was to expose the fact that during Executive Cunningham’s term, the incumbent over spent revenues every year depleting substantial surplus reserves. In addition, Scott Ott presented a positive plan to address the budget issues facing Lehigh County: how to deliver basic services without straining The Forgotten Taxpayer.
“The final tally had me and incumbent County Executive Don Cunningham separated by only 870 votes out of 41,228 cast. His margin of victory came entirely from urban precincts where Democrats outnumber Republicans by three or four to one. Among the 30,000 or so voters who live outside of Allentown, I received about 2,500 more votes than he did.
FYI 300,000 people live in Lehigh County with 224,000 registered voters ( which seems like a high percentage registered to population ). In November 2008, 152,473 votes were cast for Presidential candidates in Lehigh County. Lehigh County’s Budget is approximately $412,000,000 in 2010 Montgomery County, with population of 700,000 has a budget of $403,000,000