The official financial contributions disclosure for the three candidates for Oviedo mayor tell three very different stories.
The candidates — Brady Duke, incumbent Megan Sladek and Judith Dolores Smith— are required to report their campaign contributions and expenses to the Seminole County Supervisor of Elections. The reports are required to be sent monthly “until the weeks preceding the election, at which point, reports are more frequent,” according to the Supervisor of Elections website.
Contributions are broken down by monetary and in-kind, which can include any non-monetary donations, such as goods and services.
“You’re going to use those resources to increase your name recognition,” said Aubrey Jewett, associate professor and assistant director at the University of Central Florida’s School of Politics, Security, and International Affairs. “Because turnout is so important in these local elections, if you have 300 or 400 people that have given you money, well, almost certainly, that’s 300 or 400 people that are going to vote for you.”
In addition to running a campaign, the money is often spent on building name recognition, creating and sending mailers, social media advertising, consulting services and campaign promotional materials.
Brady Duke
Duke, an Oviedo resident who made an unsuccessful bid for the congressional seat that Cory Mills won in 2022, is a former Navy SEAL sniper, according to his website. According to state records, he owns Vital Solutions Consulting, which his website says trains law enforcement and SWAT teams. He and his wife, Julie, run Intervene Ministries Inc, which offers “inner healing coaching for Christians.”
To date, Duke has raised $34,555 in his campaign for Oviedo mayor, with $0 of in-kind contributions. The majority of the total — $32,255 — was raised between July 1 and Sept. 30. The average contribution size to his campaign is $397.
Of the 87 total donations to the Duke campaign, half are from outside of Oviedo. Not including protected voters — voters who request and qualify to keep their home addresses and phone numbers confidential, such as law enforcement personnel, judges, officials who work on child abuse or exploitation cases, prosecutors and public defenders and others — 13 are from out of state, 22 others are from outside of Seminole County and 9 others are in Seminole County but outside of Oviedo. Nineteen of the 24 contributions of $1,000 are also from outside of Oviedo, with six coming from outside of Florida. The Brady Duke for Congress and Texans for Morgan Luttrell principal campaign committees donated $1,000 each, as well.
Jewett said that because Duke likely has some national name recognition from his previous congressional run, he is able to raise funds from outside of Oviedo.
“Presumably, he already had a database of contributors to his congressional race … even outside of Seminole County,” Jewett said.
Duke said that his strategy is to “raise money from my friends and family.”
“Everybody who’s supporting me are people that I have relationships with,” he said. “Friends, family, acquaintances who believe in me and my leadership ability. So even though [some] aren’t going to be directly impacted by me, if I win this race for mayor, they believe in who I am and what I stand for.”
Duke’s large sum of contributions are needed to overcome any possible name-recognition issues he may face as a challenger to the incumbent, Jewett said.
The Duke campaign’s total expenditures and distributions total $29,463.59, much of it to get his name and platform out in front of voters. His two largest single expenditures — $5,933.49 and $2,878.30 — have been related to advertising and marketing. He has spent $7,500 total on campaign consulting, as well. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t pounding the pavement.
“A local race really can be won by meeting as many people as possible,” Duke said. “I really do enjoy connecting with people and talking to people, hearing their concerns, debating different ideas with people.”
The strategy seems to be working, Jewett said.
“Clearly, it’s successful in the sense of raising money,” Jewett said. “If you’re a candidate, generally speaking, you take money from wherever you can get it, with the thought that, hey, we’ve got to have money to run a successful campaign and to get our message out.”
Megan Sladek
Sladek, an Oviedo native, is the current Oviedo mayor, a position she has held since 2019 after serving on City Council. She holds a law degree from the University of Florida, is the owner of Wolfshead Real Estate LLC and executive director of the Oviedo Preservation Project.
Sladek has been raising money since Feb. 2022. Over that period, she has raised a total of $18,334 in monetary contributions, with an additional $1,482.24 of in-kind contributions. Most of the in-kind contributions — $993 — came from herself in Feb. 2022 for various items, such as postage, stationary, domain name and campaign signs.
Her expenditures and distributions have totaled $8,497.69, with most going to printing, postage and promotional material.
Sladek’s campaign has received 414 monetary contributions, for an average donation of $44.29.
“It’s not an efficient way to do it, but I think when you have a lot of people who are putting normal-sized amounts in, it lets you really appreciate what a very big difference a person can make at the city level,” she said.
Only one of the non-protected 414 contributions have come from out of state — a $5 donation from South Carolina — while 13 are from outside Seminole County and 42 others were outside of Oviedo.
“The goal is just keep it as local as possible so nobody has any question about where my loyalty lies, because when you have PAC [political action committee] money or union money, it’s really hard to trace who ultimately gave that, and to whom you may owe allegiance,” Sladek said.
Sladek said the small, recurring donations have helped her maintain key campaign components, such as her email newsletter. Additionally, she said it shows loyalty vs. large one-time donations.
“You’re not giving $5 a month if you’re backing someone else,” she said. “I do think it’s possible that you, in the spur of the moment, at a rally and you think, ‘Oh, this person just gave a really good speech, I think I’m going to give 100 bucks.’ Then you start looking at it more, and you think, ‘I haven’t heard from this person since that rally …’
“And maybe the 100 bucks is a sunk cost and I’ll just go [to another candidate],” she said.
The largest-sized contributions she has received are five different donations of $500.
“In the local mayor’s race, one way to raise money and increase your visibility as a candidate is to go to your own community and seek funds,” Jewett said. “Traditionally that not only is a source of money to run your campaign, but it was a way to showcase your strength in the community.
“If you get a lot of people that were willing to donate even a small amount of money, then that was a signal that you were a pretty strong candidate,” he said.
Jewett said that incumbents in local races have a significant advantage, because they have built-in name recognition, making it easier to raise money locally.
“Because people know that [incumbents] usually win, they want to be associated with the winner,” he said. “Now, of course, some people are just giving money because they like you or they know you or they’re your friends, especially in local races like these. But there are other people who are giving strategically.”
Judith Dolores Smith
Smith, who served one term as Oviedo City Council Group I member from 2019-2021, losing her re-election campaign in 2021, is a third-generation Oviedo resident and a self-published author who has owned multiple businesses in the past. She has also worked in social and mental health services, and is board president of the Historic Oviedo Colored Schools Museum.
Similarly to Duke, Smith began raising money for her campaign for Oviedo mayor in June. She is nearly all self-funded.
“The reasoning is that people are having a hard time,” she said. “I find it extremely difficult to ask people for money for something that is important to me. I hope it’s important to them, because the leader of their city is important … but at the same time, I don’t feel that it’s something that they need to pay for.”
She made the lone monetary contribution to her campaign, $300 in June. Of the $7,210.03 in in-kind contributions, all but $2.35 has come from Smith herself. Her largest in-kind contribution was $4,501.61 for advertising on Sept. 29.
Despite the concerted effort to not ask residents for money to fund her campaign, Jewett said that could lead to an uphill battle.
“It’s certainly going to make her job a lot tougher, because … she’s got a lot less money than the other two candidates, so it’s going to be harder for her to get her message out,” he said. “I wouldn’t say it’s hopeless or anything like that, but even for local races today, money is an important resource.
“You don’t always have to be the candidate with the most money, but you do have to have enough money to get your message out to be successful,” he said.
She has reported no expenditures or distributions to date.
“I decided to run based on the belief that I’m the best candidate for the job, and I believe that I had to put my money where my mouth is, or my thoughts are,” she said. “I’m not rich, but I set aside a certain amount, and I’m running the campaign with that amount.
“Also, I’m putting my blood, sweat and tears in it,” Smith said. “What money can’t buy, then my voice and my feet will do.”
