Campaign fund contributions for March 5 election candidates: IID races
IMPERIAL COUNTY – Two races for Imperial Irrigation District directors occurred during the March 5 Primary Election in Imperial County, but as reported previously in the newspaper, one candidate ran opposed.
While the votes for the District Division 4 seat were closed between the second-most vote-getter, Lewis Pacheco (27.03% of the vote), and third-most vote-getter Joong Kim (22.17% of the vote), this article will focus on the campaign contributions for the two candidates who will have a run off in the upcoming November 5 Election, Pacheco and incumbent IID Director Javier Gonzalez.
Starting with the candidate who garnered the most votes in the March 5 primaries, Gonzalez (32.83% of votes), received about $9,200 in in-kind campaign contributions between January 1 and February 14, 2024, according to documents provided to the Imperial Valley Press by the County of Imperial Registrar of Voters.
Of Gonzalez’s campaign contributors, most were local farmers or farming companies, those of which span Holtville, Brawley and Calipatria, according to the documents. One person from Carlsbad contributed $100 to Gonzalez’s campaign, and one local veteran from Brawley also contributed $100 to Gonzalez.
The largest and perhaps the most interesting donation during this time period to Gonzalez’s campaign came from Hell’s Kitchen Geothermal, at $4,000, according to the documents.
IID District Division 4 challenger Lewis Pacheco raised about $1,220 in inkind campaign contributions during almost that same time period, with the documents attained only showing contributions from mid-January to early February 2024. This total does not include a $1,200 donation Pacheco made for his own campaign, which would bring the total to $2,420 in-kind.
According to the documents, most of Pacheco’s campaign contributions came from family members, with two also coming from local business owners.
It should be noted that candidates had a longer time period to collect campaign contributions, but no documents for donations for the 2023 IID District Division 4 race were received by IVP.
IID DIVISION 2 RACE – JB Hamby
In contract to the Division 4 race, the IID District Division 2 campaign fund documents attained by IVP for incumbent
IID Director JB Hamby only show campaign contributions from last year, from early October to late December 2023.
According to the documents attained by IVP, $15,950 in-kind donations were attained by unopposed IID District Division 2 incumbent JB Hamby.
The largest donations came from Imperial-based company “Insight Group LLC,” at $10,000, with the second largest donation of $5,000 coming from San Diego-based “OTG Group.” Hamby also garnered a small donation from U.S. House of Representatives Staff Director Miles Lichtman, listed as a resident of Washington, D.C.
The largest single campaign expense noted for Hamby was for “web help” from Brawley-based company “SandiaTec. Inc.,” at $34,250.36, according to the documents.