A few people within the West Virginia Republican party have been talking about the cash position of the state GOP. I have been hearing from people that we are in great shape and some that we are in horrible shape. Interestingly one of the people that told me just how bad things said, “You should check out the FEC reports for all the states surrounding us... like Ohio.” I did just that and was pleasantly surprised at what I found.
Since cash on hand it what people seemed to be most concerned with, that is what I compared so their question could be addressed directly. Since all off the surrounding states are much larger in population I broke it down as compared to cash per proportion for each state resident. That way we are comparing things on an equal footing.
| | Cash On
Hand * | State
Population ** | Cash per Person |
| | $165,662.00† | 4,041,769 | $0.04 |
| | $1,609.00 | 5,296,486 | $0.00√ |
| | $1,536,155.00 | 11,353,140 | $0.14 |
| | $1,570,548.00 | 12,281,054 | $0.13 |
| | $211,198.00 | 7,078,515 | $0.03 |
| | $106,946.00‡ | 1,808,344 | $0.06 |
Source of Data: * Federal Election Commission Filings, ** US Census Bureau, † 2008 data, 2009 unavailable, ‡ Data provided by WVGOP dated 6/12/2009, √ Less than one cent.
This is where we rank when compared to our neighboring states:
#1 Ohio
#2 Pennsylvania
#3 West Virginia
#4 Kentucky
#5 Virginia
#6 Maryland
Another interesting bit of information you can look at. In 2006 the WVGOP was in debt $141,485. Had we started with no debt in 2006 and raised the same amount of money and maintained the same fiscal discipline we would have $248,431.89 in the state account. On a cash per person basis that would give us $0.14, the same as Ohio. We would be tied for first place.
We must remember we are a small state and strive to be the best. Our fundraising efforts are on par with our bigger neighbors when we compare things on an equal footing, but we can always strive to do better. Let’s all give what we can to the state GOP to make it easier to win seats in the 2010 election.
