When it comes to fundraising, Hillsborough County Commissioner Ken Hagan is killing it.
The Carrollwood Republican raised more than $100,000 in June, the third consecutive month he’s posted a six-figure number, and now has raised more than $300,000 in his bid to win back his former seat in District 2 in 2018.
Now the longest-serving commissioner on the BOCC, Hagan was initially elected in 2002 to the first of two terms in District 2. After being term-limited out of that northern Hillsborough district seat, Hagan ran and won in the countywide District 5 seat in 2010, and again in 2014.
Among the many $1,000 contributors is Stuart Sternberg, the owner of the Tampa Bay Rays. Hagan has been the leading member of the board working to allow the Rays to speak to officials in Hillsborough County about a possible site for moving the team from St. Petersburg.
Other $1,000 contributions come from the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Tampa Bay Storm, the Amalie Arena, and Jeff Vinik’s Strategic Property Partnership, the corporation working with Bill Gates’ Cascade Investment, LLC on the $3 billion plan to redevelop Tampa’s Channelside property.
Several contributors came from the development industry.
Hillsborough Democrats have recently blasted Hagan for being one of four Republican commissioners to vote last month to retain a controversial Confederate monument in front of the county courthouse annex. While Democrats are vowing to oust all four, Hagan and District 4 Commissioner Stacy White seem to be in relatively good shape more than 15 months before the election.
No Democrat has yet filed to run against Hagan in District 2.
