Not this many City Council candidates … yet Credit: Photo by Creative Commons

There are upwards of 50 candidates now declared or “seriously considering” running for City Council in November, with a visible bump in campaign treasurer filings as May 8 – the first day to solicit or spend contributions from donors – approaches. As of Monday evening, April 28, here’s a list of new names recently added to the district races.

District 1: retired software engineer Norman Jacobson

District 4: Chelsea Brass, program manager, Texas Health Institute; urban planner and city commissioner Gabe Rojas

District 5: Realtor Dan Buda, former chief of staff to Sen. Wendy Davis

District 6: Homeland Defense consultant Pete Phillips, former congressional staffer

District 7: former Council and mayoral candidate Josiah Ingalls, small businessman; Jimmy Paver, development director, Stepping Stone School

District 8: Becky Bray, project manager, Brown & Gay Engineering; Eliza May, public policy consultant

District 9: Erin McGann, program supervisor, Texas Department of Criminal Justice

These names represent just the new names – the latest sample of more than 40 people who have filed treasurer designations with the City Clerk. There are quite a few more candidates who have declared their intentions, but have not yet filed a treasurer designation. We’ll have a full update of all the Council races, and the mayor’s race, in this week’s print edition.

Note: we had earlier reported May 4 as the opening of the money season, but the Clerk’s election calendar confirms the accurate date as May 8 (180 days before November 4).

You can look up your City Council voting district here.

A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.

Contributing writer and former news editor Michael King has reported on city and state politics for the Chronicle since 2000. He was educated at Indiana University and Yale, and from 1977 to 1985 taught at UT-Austin. He has been the editor of the Houston Press and The Texas Observer, and has reported and written widely on education, politics, and cultural subjects.