{"id":25723,"date":"2025-10-09T05:37:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-09T09:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=25723"},"modified":"2025-10-09T06:15:18","modified_gmt":"2025-10-09T10:15:18","slug":"democrats-dwarf-gop-campaign-war-chest-in-brick-mayor-council-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2025\/10\/democrats-dwarf-gop-campaign-war-chest-in-brick-mayor-council-election\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats Dwarf GOP Campaign War Chest in 2025 Brick Election: Here Are the Top Donors"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"An<\/a>

An Ocean County, N.J. polling place sign. (Photo: Daniel Nee)<\/p><\/div>\n

Candidates for municipal offices in New Jersey were obligated to file a fresh round of pre-election financial reports this week, and in the case of the high-profile campaign for control of the Brick Township mayor\u2019s office and township council, both slates of candidates filed their reports on time. The Democratic ticket, led by incumbent Mayor Lisa Crate, reported nearly three times the campaign contributions Republicans garnered so far this election cycle, though the latest rounds of fundraising saw both sides beginning to shore up their war chests. Republicans reported donations primarily from legal and engineering professionals, the reports showed, while Democrats received the largest donations of the cycle from a slew of union labor organizations.<\/p>\n

According to the reports, the township\u2019s Republican slate tallied $36,659 in receipts so far this election cycle while the Democratic slate had raised $98,100. Spending thus far was closer between the two camps, with Democrats having spent $35,059 by Oct. 6 and Republicans having spent $20,836.<\/p>\n

Crate is running alongside fellow incumbent Councilwoman Heather de Jong and newcomers Dan Ward and Rocco Lepore. The Republicans are led by mayoral candidate Madeline Iannarone \u2013 currently serving as school board president \u2013 along with incumbent Perry Albanese and newcomers Lisa Reina and Gregory J. Cohen.<\/p>\n

The primary purpose of the mandatory reports are to track campaign contributions within certain time periods before an election. The Democratic ticket was bolstered by a number of intra-party transfers between individual candidate accounts and the \u201ccandidate committee\u201d that now represents the slate as a whole. Democrats had filed reports up to Oct. 6 on a per-candidate basis, while Republicans filed a single report for the entire ticket as a candidates committee.<\/p>\n

Democrat Fundraising<\/strong><\/p>\n

For the Democratic mayoral campaign, Crate\u2019s top donors included Trilon Group, the parent company of local engineering firm CME Associates, that donated $3,000; Brick Progress, a PAC administered by former Councilwoman Kathy Russel, that donated $1,000; the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), which donated $1,500; the Wilentz law firm of Woodbridge which donated $1,000; Joseph Maurillo, president of IMAC Insurance, who donated $500; and Girish Mehta, principal of Prestige Environmental, who donated $500.<\/p>\n

Lepore garnered heavy support from unions, with the largest single donation of the campaign \u2013 $17,500 \u2013 coming from the Greater N.J. Carpenters union. He also received $3,500 from Brick Progress; $2,500 from the District Council of N.J. Ironworkers; $2,500 from the Plumbers & Pipefitters Union Local 9 PAC; $1,500 from the Bricklayers & Allied Craftworkers Union; $1,000 from the Painters Union PAC; $1,000 from the catering company owned by Maurillo; $1,000 from Essex-West Hudson Labor Council; $1,000 from the Laborers Union Local 102 PAC; $1,000 from the IBEW (Electrical Workers Union); $1,000 from the N.J. Building and Construction Trades Council; $1,000 from the Teamsters PAC; and $500 each from \u201cUnite Here!\u201d Local 54, Elizabeth Stavola, a cannabis industry entrepreneur, Asbestos Workers Local 32, the Asbury Park Education Association, Bergen County Building Trades, the Building and Construction Trades Council of Union County, Everett M. Johnson of the Wilentz law firm, the Monmouth and Ocean County Building and Construction Trades Council, the Monmouth County Democratic Organization, the NJ State AFL-CIO PAC, the N.J. State Laborers PAC, the Firefighters Mutual Benevolent Association, Pallone for Congress, Risa Clay for Mayor (Tinton Falls), the Somerset Building Trades Council, Sprinkler Fitters Local 696, Asbestos Workers Local 32, Friends of Anthony Verreli for Assembly (Hunterdon County), and the Election Fund of Robert Lane (Neptune).<\/p>\n

A catering company owned by Maurillo also donated $500 to the individual campaign of council candidate Heather de Jong, while the Wilentz firm also donated $500.<\/p>\n

Ward, as an individual candidate, received a $5,400 donation from the Ocean County LGBTQ+ Caucus, $500 from Maurillo, and $250 each from Democratic chair Wyatt Earp and BABS PAC, which donates to LGBT Democratic candidates.<\/p>\n

Republican Fundraising<\/strong><\/p>\n

Republican candidates filed a single report, with the top donor being the Ocean County Republican Finance Committee, which made a combination of cash and in-kind donations of $13,642 for campaign advertising and political consulting.<\/p>\n

The ticket also raised $2,600 from Remington and Vernick Engineers; $2,500 from Ocean County Commissioner Frank Sadeghi, $1,500 from the law firm of Dasti, Murphy and McGuckin; $1,100 from auditing firm Holman Frenia; $1,000 from consulting firm Bruno Associates; $1,000 from the committee representing Ocean County Commissioners Robert S. Arace and Jennifer Bacchione; $1,000 from law firm Parker McKay; $1,000 from Restoring America\u2019s Mission PAC (Brick); $1,000 from Mesimo Yezzi of architectural firm Yezzi Associates; $1,000 from Warren C. Wolf; $600 each from law firm Berry, Sahradnik, Kotzas & Benson (Toms River), the Citta, Holzapfel and Zabarsky law firm, and Catherine Shea; and $500 each from attorney Joseph Coronato, and Richard Alaimo of the Alaimo Associates engineering firm; contributions between $300 and $350 each from Bellia Interiors Group (Woodbury), John Catalano, Edward Dolton, Joseph Marra, attorney Brian McAlindin, attorney Bruce Padula, Michael Thulen, Michael J. Wright of Michael Wright Construction, and John Hazelet.<\/p>\n

Next Reports<\/strong><\/p>\n

The next round of reports is due Oct. 24, 2025, followed by a post-election report Nov. 24. Campaigns are also obligated to report last-minute contributions for donations between Oct. 22 and Oct. 27 within 72 hours and Oct. 28 to Nov. 4 within 24 hours.<\/p>\n

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Candidates for municipal offices in New Jersey were obligated to file a fresh round of pre-election financial reports this week, and in the case of the high-profile campaign for control of the Brick Township mayor\u2019s office and township council, both slates of candidates filed their reports on time. The Democratic ticket, led by incumbent Mayor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":291,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[15,2],"tags":[24,5513,5381,4484],"class_list":["post-25723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brick-elections","category-government","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-campaign-fundraising","tag-election-2025","tag-featured"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/pollingplace.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-6GT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25723"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25732,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25723\/revisions\/25732"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}