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At least, Karl is happy to assist the Saunders campaign whenever possible.

From a media advisory we received from Steve Saunders’ campaign for City Council’s District 5:

DENVER NUGGETS COACH GEORGE KARL PARTICIPATES IN FAMILY CAMPAIGN RALLY FOR STEVE SAUNDERS’ DISTRICT 5 CITY COUNCIL CAMPAIGN

WHEN & WHERE :

Sunday April 10th, 1:00pm-3:00pm

Crescent Park, at 8th/Roslyn in Lowry

WHAT: Campaign Rally and Volunteer Canvass with George Karl in support of Steve Saunders For City Council District 5. Wear your Nuggets gear and bring cans of food to donate to local families in need.

The basketball puns just write themselves, don’t they? Really, though, the fact that Karl is such a dedicated backer of Saunders’ can do nothing but help the campaign. While most voters don’t even realize they’re going to have to vote in a City Council race, let alone know all of the candidates running, we’re willing to bet most District 5 voters are aware of George Karl. They’re definitely going to remember the candidate the Nuggets’ basketball coach at their front door is talking about.

While the race is still anybody’s guess, the fact that Saunders is recognizable having anchored 7News as long as he did is going to help his campaign immensely. He’s a local celebrity. Above that, he’s made connections to local celebrities like George Karl.

In a City Council race, it’s unlikely that you’re going to be able to raise enough money for TV to be a viable or smart option. In fact, aside from direct mail, one of the best ways to win a race like this one is to make your presence in the community known. Walking and having picnics are consistently smart ways to raise your name ID and win a race. Doing both of those things with the coach of one of the area’s most popular sports teams is even better. And it certainly doesn’t hurt that many will recognize Steve as that guy from TV even if he doesn’t run any spots.

We’ll be posting our analysis of the latest fundraising numbers shortly. Until then, though, Steve Saunders gives us one of the best examples of unique campaigning from an underdog candidate.  

This is a poll of the Denver mayoral race, released by Colorado Pols and conducted by Denver-based RBI Strategies & Research. A summary from RBI research director Kevin Ingham:

RBI mayoral survey shows low voter engagement with just 3 weeks before voting begins

A survey of likely 2011 municipal voters in Denver shows that while Chris Romer is currently leading, a plurality of voters remain undecided and have yet to significantly engage on the race.  When asked who they would vote for in the race for Mayor of Denver, 22% of respondents said they would vote for Chris Romer and 10% said James Mejia with Michael Hancock (9%), Doug Linkhart (7%), Carol Boigon (5%) and Theresa Spahn (2%) all receiving support in the single digits.  Another 5% said they would vote for a different candidate and a 40% plurality say they remain undecided on which candidate they will support.

This survey is a useful snapshot of the status of the race at a time before voters have began to engage.  Though Chris Romer is clearly leading, much of this can be attributed to his name ID advantage and the race remains wide open.  Early horserace surveys, such as this one, tend to show that support is highly correlated to name ID.  Therefore, with such a large portion of the likely electorate unfamiliar with the candidates, the high number of undecided voters is not surprising.  In fact, fully 32% were unable to provide hard name ID for any of the six candidates presented during the survey interview.

As the major mayoral candidate begin to communicate with voters, the race will be sure to become more engaged and is likely to become highly fluid over the next few weeks.

RBI Strategies & Research conducted a telephone survey of 400 Denver voters who indicated it was likely that they would vote in the May 2011 Municipal Election. Interviews were conducted March 21 – March 22, 2010 by Standage Market Research of Denver, Colorado, a market research firm specializing in telephone survey interviewing. Respondents were randomly selected from a list of Colorado voters, purchased from Voter Contact Services, who registered after the 2010 General Election or voted in the 2010 General Election and either 1) voted in at least one off-year election dating back to 2003 or 2) registered after 2009 off-year election.

The margin of error for a survey of 400 interviews is ±4.9% at the 95% confidence level. The margin of error is higher for subsamples within the full sample.

Other sources of error not accounted for by the stated statistical margin of error include, but are not limited to, question wording, question order, and refusal to be interviewed.

NOTE: RBI Strategies is not involved with any Denver mayoral campaigns.

Mr. Ingham will join Colorado Pols readers at 1PM today for a Q&A session.

In more ways than one, obviously. Boigon’s prepping to launch a new TV buy, and she’s doing her best to imitate her elected predecessor:

After all, who could forget Hickenlooper’s skydiving ad in support of Ref C?

Mark our words, though, Boigon is no Hickenlooper. Hick could get away with these charming ads for his mayoral campaign, Ref C, and his eventual Gubernatorial campaign because of who he was. He came off like your good-natured if goofy next door neighbor. He was approachable in the way you’d want your Mayor to be. His boyish charm made these ads a hit.

In developing ads like these, Boigon clearly wants to paint herself as a Mayor in the spirit of Hickenlooper. Unfortunately, that invitation to see her as a continuation of the Hick years might do more harm than good.

Boigon just isn’t approachable the way Hickenlooper is. Those who know her best would be the first to describe her as an “old school” type of politician; she expects respect for her title and positions. And unlike Hick, who gained financial success from what was first a small business, Boigon doesn’t exactly come off as an entrepreneur.

These ads naturally compare Carol to John. It’s what they were written for. But that’s why this ad in particular seems so odd: it’s like the rich woman your boyish neighbor used to mow lawns for suddenly wants to look cool. At least she didn’t jump out of the plane, though.

As the slate of Denver mayoral candidates report their numbers for last month, opponents of city councilman Michael Hancock are turning up the heat over his role in the ongoing denial of PUC approval for Mile High Cab to launch taxi service in metro Denver. Last September, you might recall, columnist Susan Greene argued the plight of Mile High Cab, and competition-stavred consumers in Denver–and the stiff opposition to their bid from Michael Hancock.

In January, Hancock reported over $125,000 in contributions, with at least $8,000 of that total from Metro Taxi or employees. And Metro Taxi has consistently been a top contributor to Hancock–something, as this Xtranormal-ified transcript we were forwarded from Hancock’s PUC testimony against Mile High Cab last fall attests, he’s a little evasive about under questioning:

Ouch! Assuming the accuracy of that transcript, it certainly doesn’t cast Hancock in the best light. For those of you who can’t see the video, it consists of an attorney grilling Hancock about his contributions from Metro Taxi before the PUC. Hancock initially answers “no” to questions about receiving money from Metro Taxi–presumably in a personal context–then is hit with record of his campaign donations. The overall effect is to make Hancock look conflicted arguing against more taxi competition.

Nevertheless, administrative judge Paul Gomez did deny Mile High Cab’s application last year. These decisions are based (in theory, anyway) or an assessment of service, and the PUC tries to balance the need for services under its regulation with demand. It’s worth noting that there are a lot of cab drivers, many of them recent legal immigrants from developing nations, in Hancock’s district today. One of Mile High’s selling points, said Greene in her column, is their lease rates charged to cabbies would be a fraction of that charged by the big competitors. So maybe downtown Denver doesn’t need more cabs, or maybe Metro Taxi just doesn’t want more competition–for customers or drivers.

Either way, say his opponents, you really can’t take Hancock’s word for it (see cartoon).