Fort Worth mayor hits $1M in campaign funds as candidates prep for May 3 election

Days before the May 3 election, sitting Fort Worth City Council members have continued to outpace their challengers in fundraising, with Mayor Mattie Parker maintaining more than $1 million in campaign cash as of April 25.

From March 25 to April 23, Parker raked in $563,827.11 in donations, bringing her war chest to about $1.04 million.

The position of mayor is the most contested of the 11 Fort Worth City Council seats on the ballot, with incumbent Parker facing seven challengers as she seeks her third term. Josh Lucas, a community ministries coordinator at Broadway Baptist Church whose campaign has focused on criminal justice reform, has raised the most money of the seven challengers, securing a reported $1,550 over the same time frame.

Candidates are required to self-disclose donors by filing campaign finance reports with the city secretary’s office during routine intervals before local elections. Fort Worth City Council candidates had a deadline of April 3 to file reports for the three-month period of Jan. 1 to March 24. They were expected to file updated disclosures on April 25, eight days before the election.

Amid the influx of donations, Parker spent $136,833.30 on promoting her campaign, adding to the roughly $85,000 she spent during the first three months of the year.

Parker received $100,000 from Gary Blake, the CEO and founder of Creative Solutions in Healthcare, a private health care company primarily focused on elderly. She also received six checks of $20,000 from names including billionaire investor John Goff, AI innovator James Brooks and Tracy Sellers, the wife of John Sellers, who founded Double Eagle Energy Holdings II LLC with Cody Campbell, who also donated $20,000.

Parker’s support also came from political action committees, or PACs. Those donations included $20,000 from the Accountable Government Fund, predominantly backed by members of the Bass family, including billionaire Ed Bass; $20,000 from the Fort Worth Firefighters Committee for Responsible Government; $10,000 from the Ryan Texas PAC; and $10,000 from the For the Children PAC.

For the Children PAC is backed by Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, who has waded into Texas politics this spring with donations to San Antonio City Council candidates through another PAC supporting charter schools. In addition to supporting Fort Worth City Council incumbents, For the Children has also contributed to Fort Worth ISD school board members and the Tarrant County NAACP chapter, according to Transparency USA.

Incumbents outpace challengers in bids for reelection

Of the 34 City Council candidates trailing behind Parker, District 3 council member Michael Crain raised the most in donations, securing $53,405.92 in the monthlong finance period and bringing his campaign balance up to $700,360.03. Crain has spent more than $20,000 over the past month on his reelection bid as he faces off against Jason Ballmann, a strategist for Texas Instruments who previously served on Marfa City Council. Ballmann raised $8,011.75 over the same time frame and reported spending $7,153.67. He maintains a little more than $2,100 in campaign funds.

District 7 incumbent Macy Hill has raised $56,040, adding to her stockpile of $233,761.36. The council member is running unopposed but reported spending $28,611.03 to promote her campaign.

District 2 incumbent Carlos Flores raised $51,190, the fourth highest amount of all candidates, bringing his stockpile up to $122,758.82. He reported spending $47,965.07 in his race for reelection against challenger Joe Ponce Jr., a mechanic in the Northside neighborhood who reported raising no funds and spending $108.25.

District 9 incumbent Elizabeth Beck has raised $48,942 and reported having $48,894.63 left in campaign cash on hand. Beck is facing two challengers as she seeks her third term: State Farm Insurance agent Jenny Stewart, who reported raising $3,752, and construction worker Michael Raulerson, who did not have a campaign finance report available on the city’s website as of noon April 29.

Campaign spending heats up for 2 empty council seats

City Council is slated to see two new faces join the dais post-election, as District 5’s Gyna Bivens and District 6’s Jared Williams are not seeking reelection.

Six candidates are vying for the District 5 seat, which encompasses parts of east Fort Worth including the historic Stop Six neighborhood. The candidates reported a cumulative $83,859 in campaign donations over the most recent reporting period, with Deborah Peoples raising more than half of that amount.

Peoples, a retired AT&T executive and former chair of the Tarrant County Democratic Party, reported receiving $47,075.54 — about $9,000 less than the roughly $55,000 she secured during the first three months of the year. She is followed by Michael Moore, a lifelong Stop Six resident and pastor at New Bethel Complete in Christ Church in south Fort Worth, who reported $29,300 in cash donations.

Of the District 5 candidates, Moore has spent the most on promoting his campaign, disclosing $38,677.01 in expenditures over the most recent reporting period. Mary Kelleher, an outgoing Tarrant Regional Water District board member seeking the council seat, spent the second-most, expending $36,667.51 on her campaign with nearly $6,500 cash raised over the last month. Peoples came in third, spending $30,282.88 on her campaign.

The race for District 6, which covers much of southwest Fort Worth, has attracted four candidates, two of whom were nearly tied for funds raised in the last reporting period. In the April 25 reports, Daryl Davis II and Mia Hall, both current members of the Crowley ISD school board, documented raising $4,295 and $3,530, respectively.

Hall’s campaign has significantly outspent Davis’, reporting spending nearly $40,000 to Davis’ almost $15,000 since January. Most of their funds have gone to printing and advertising expenses.

Marshall Hobbs, a Como resident and political science professor, raised the most money over April, reportedly receiving $6,325 — $6,000 of which is from Ron Sturgeon, a millionaire real estate investor and owner of the DFW Elite Toy Museum. Hobbs reported spending $2,566, mostly on printing.

Election Day is May 3. Tarrant County voters can cast their ballots at any polling place in the county, and polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. The Fort Worth Report’s Tarrant County Voter Guide, featuring candidate surveys from council, school board and other candidates, is available here.

Cecilia Lenzen and Drew Shaw are government accountability reporters for the Fort Worth Report. Contact them at cecilia.lenzen@fortworthreport.org and drew.shaw@fortworthreport.org. 

At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.

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