Firefighter groups, land investors are big donors to Stanislaus County candidates
In an election year overshadowed by the coronavirus pandemic, campaign disclosures show a moderate amount of spending by candidates for Stanislaus County offices.
Firefighter unions and land development interests are the largest donors targeting the campaigns for two contested seats on the county Board of Supervisors.
According to campaign disclosures thus far, none of the candidates for the District 1 and District 5 supervisorial seats have come close to the six-figure mark in terms of spending.
Channce Condit and his cousin, Matthew “Buck” Condit, who are running in district 5 and 1, respectively, have both received large contributions from unions representing firefighters.
Buck Condit took in $2,500 from the Stanislaus Consolidated Fire Firefighters Union Local 3399, as well as $3,000 from the California Professional Firefighters PAC and $2,500 from Modesto Fire Fighters Association.
Channce accepted $1,000 each from the Ceres Firefighters PAC and Modesto Firefighters Association.
Cal FIRE Local 2881 reported $10,000 in radio advertisements supporting Channce and Buck Condit. The Oct. 2 expenditure brought the total amount spent by Cal FIRE Local 2881 to $17,500.
Buck Condit, a fire captain for Stanislaus Consolidated, has said he will retire from the fire district if elected to the Board of Supervisors.
The Peace Officers Research Association, representing law enforcement officers, has also spread money around to candidates. It gave $2,500 each to the District 5 contestants, Tom Hallinan and Channce Condit, who are vying to represent Ceres, Patterson and Newman, and it donated $2,500 to Modesto Councilman Bill Zoslocki, who’s pitted against Buck Condit in District 1 in the Riverbank-Oakdale area.
Besides the two contested races, county Supervisor Vito Chiesa is unopposed on the Nov. 3 ballot.
Land investment firms have also donated funds to the political hopefuls.
Channce Condit collected two checks totaling $5,000 from Lyons’ Investment Management LLC and a $3,000 contribution from Land Development Consulting Group. Other large donations for Condit included $2,500 from former state Sen. Anthony Cannella and $1,000 each from former congressman Gary Condit, Del Don Farms, Monster Ice Cream, Prabhjot Singh, Tri-Cal Inc., Catherine Nutcher and Manjit Dhillon.
Condit has reported donating $1,800 to his own campaign.
Hallinan received $1,500 from the California Real Estate PAC. The Ceres city attorney has committed $11,000 of his own money to his campaign, according to disclosure reports.
Zoslocki received $4,500 from the California Real Estate PAC and $2,500 from Mapes Ranch Investments. Other donors included L.F. Brichetto Farming ($1,500), International Brotherhood Electrical Workers ($1,500) and Ty Lin International ($1,000).
Buck Condit loaned $9,000 to his campaign and also received $2,500 from Recology Inc. and $1,000 each from Adrian Condit, L.F. Brichetto Farming, Surjit Malhi and Prabhjot Singh.
This story was originally published October 27, 2020 at 8:39 AM.
