About four out of five likely candidates in the 2008 state legislative elections say they intend to participate in the Citizens' Election Program, according to a new survey conducted for the State Elections Enforcement Commission (SEEC). The telephone survey, implemented by the UCONN Center for Survey Research and Analysis, indicates that 86% of incumbents and 76% of unsuccessful 2006 candidates who plan to run again say they will definitely participate or are inclined to participate in Connecticut's public campaign financing program. More than three-quarters believe that too much campaign time is spent raising money.
Some likely candidates say they might not participate (9%), definitely won't (3%), or don't know (6%). Please speak to potential candidates in your area to ask them for a commitment to participating in the Citizens' Election Program.
Tomorrow, January 3rd, the SEEC will unveil and demonstrate a new Electronic Campaign Reporting Information System (eCRIS) for candidates, PACs and party committees. I hope that public reports from the new system will be easier to view and interpret than the old electronic "reports," which were painfully difficult to access and interpret and impossible to export. This event will take place at the Legislative Office Building at 11 am (event flier). It will be broadcast on the CT Network and may later appear in their online video archive.
Almost all current state legislators (95%) say they'll run for office again in 2008. Less than half of candidates (39%) who were unsuccessful in 2006 will also run again.
Among those who said they would definitely not participate in the clean elections program (3%) or those who were unsure (6%), half disagreed with the idea of public campaign financing. The Program's spending limits are not seen as a problem - very few (9%) wanted to spend more money than these limits.
Of interest to political race-trackers:
Three current Representatives plan to seek office in the Senate, two say they will run for a non-General Assembly office, and one is undecided.
One Senator is interested in seeking an office outside the General Assembly.
Of course, those who are interested in running for other offices are not identified. One could be Senator Cappiello. Given that the Congressional races are the only other game in town in 2008, I'm not sure what the other non-General Assembly offices would be (early municipal or statewide campaign committees?).
About four out of five likely candidates in the 2008 state legislative elections say they intend to participate in the Citizens' Election Program, according to a 
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