Blacks flex muscle as campaign donors
By TOM BAXTER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 09/29/06

As the South's biggest city, Atlanta has always been known as a good place to raise political money. So it was no surprise this year when three Democrats — former Gov. Mark Warner of Virginia, who wants to be president; U.S. Rep. Harold Ford Jr . of Tennessee , who wants to be in the U.S. Senate ; and Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor, who wants to be governor of Georgia — held fund-raisers in Atlanta within a couple of weeks of each other.

But there was one noteworthy thing about these events: African-American Democrats played a substantial role, both as organizers and check-writers, in all three: a $100,000 event at the Four Seasons Hotel in Midtown for Taylor, a $65,000 fund-raiser for Ford at the 191 Club on Peachtree Street and a
Although candidate Darryl Hicks (left, greeting supporter Brian Poe at a campaign fund-raiser in August) lost his race for secretary of state, a list of the event's hosts Ñ including major entertainers and professional athletes Ñ was testament to the potential of African-American political influence.
 
Nationally, African-American dollars comprise only a tiny sliver of the big money pie that feeds the U.S. electoral system, according to the Color of Money project, which tracks contributions by ZIP code. Historically, blacks have had less disposable income per capita than most other ethnic groups to give to political candidates, and 90 percent of the money they do give goes to churches, as opposed to two-thirds for whites, said David Bositis, of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington think tank that studies black America.

So the glitzy events in Atlanta represented a new kind of venture.

Bositis and other experts are skeptical about any long-term significance. "Embryonic would be a generous term" to describe any movement toward larger-scale political giving among African-Americans, he said.

But state Sen. Kasim Reed of Atlanta , who chairs the Democratic Party committee that raises money for state Senate candidates and ran both of Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin's races, thinks otherwise.

Reed cited the 2001 Atlanta mayoral race, which he said was the most expensive in the city's history, as an example of the emerging power of black dollars in political campaigns. African-American contributions made up about $1.5 million of the $3.5 million raised by Franklin before her election, and much of it came at a crucial early stage before the business community was fully committed to her, he said.

"People in my generation really are getting it," Reed said.

If African-American giving does emerge as a political force, Atlanta — and specifically, the growing portion of the metro area that is young, black, upwardly mobile and involved – is on the short list of cities that would be at the tipping point.

"I think Atlanta is much further along," said Felix Chevalier, a Houston lawyer who is treasurer of Power Pac, a nonpartisan group formed two years ago to raise money in the African-American community there. "In Houston you have it, but it's a much smaller niche group."

What makes Atlanta a hot spot for black fund-raising is the same thing that makes it popular for blacks in general. That was illustrated by the host committee list for a fund-raiser for Darryl Hicks, a Democratic candidate for secretary of state who lost an Aug. 8 runoff race against Gayle Buckner.

Among the organizers: entertainment figures such as Dallas Austin and Fonzworth Bentley; sports figures, including Atlanta Falcon Leigh Torrence; and politicians such as Atlanta City Council President Lisa Borders.

If most of the celebs invited didn't make it to the fund-raiser at Cafe Dupri, music producer Jermaine Dupri 's Piedmont Road restaurant, their checks did.

Atlanta attorney Brian D. Poe typifies the young professionals Reed is talking about. He said he has only begun making contributions to a few legislative candidates over the past year or so, but he supported Hicks strongly enough to make it on the host committee list.

"Hopefully we're at the stage where we have enough income and vision to realize we have to reinvest in order to keep moving forward," Hicks said. "We're investing in leadership."

A recent report on minority buying power by the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia 's Terry College of Business shows that, increasingly, the money is there to invest.

From 1990 to 2006, growth in African-American buying power outpaced that of the country as a whole, and in Georgia the trend was much more dramatic. Disposable income for black Georgians increased 237 percent, compared to 151 percent for African-Americans nationally.

Jeff Humphreys, director of the center, said the increase in black buying power, particularly in Georgia, will inevitably send more politicians in search of money in the African-American community.
"This is where the opportunities for growth are," Humphreys said. "You don't want to ignore 21 cents of every dollar," which is how much black spending amounts to in Georgia, the nation's fourth-largest consumer market for African-Americans.

Brooke Jackson Edmond, who as co-chairman of Taylor's gubernatorial campaign has been raising money from Georgians of all races, said the Atlanta African-American community's history of political involvement, combined with its growing affluence, set it apart. It was probably no coincidence that U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) held one of his first out-of-state fund-raisers at Pascal's restaurant in Atlanta , where so much black political history has been made.

Throughout most of that history, black politics hinged on low-cost, grass-roots organizing. Both redistricting and ghettoization have tended over the years to put elected black officials in "safe" districts, where getting elected doesn't cost much.

But as African-American candidates such as Obama and Ford have ventured into pricey statewide races, and African-American politicos and business figures have worked to extend their influence on those who might be their next president or governor, money has become more important.

"When Maynard was running for mayor, the issue was registering voters and getting people to go vote. Now the challenge is different," said Edmond, whose father was the late Atlanta Mayor Maynard Jackson.

Most political giving in the past has been related to "some kind of access, a job or a favor for a friend," said James Robertson Jr., chairman of Black Dems, another Houston PAC formed about the same time as Chevalier's group.

While the two PACs have different goals, both Robertson and Chevalier said their groups were founded to encourage the kind of giving that spells power in larger political terms.

"We're looking at it from a long-term perspective. Our objective is to build relationships with people who are going to have an effect on the community we live in," Chevalier said.

Ronald Walters, a professor of government and politics at the University of Maryland , said he needs to see many more organizations like theirs to be convinced that a change is taking place.

"You do have some younger, middle-class blacks becoming more involved. But what I haven't yet seen is an explosion in the number of PACs, which is what I would expect to see if they really get it," Walter said.