Election 2026
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Bangor City Council candidates have raised nearly $40,000 in total, and one candidate, Terry Dinkins, has raised nearly $15,000 alone, according to campaign finance reports.
That money is one part of a significant influx of cash to the Bangor City Council race. Last year, each candidate raised a few thousand dollars at most, and all nine contenders raised less than $15,000 collectively. The three candidates who have been endorsed by a conservative PAC that’s racked up nearly $30,000 this election cycle are also dominating individual fundraising.
On average, the candidates have raised about $3,500 each, compared with about $1,600 last year, according to campaign finance reports obtained by the Bangor Daily News through a public records request.
But there’s a wide disparity between the highest-raising candidates and the bottom of the pack.
After Dinkins, Anthony Cote has raised nearly $8,000, and Joseph Pratt has raised more than $5,000.
Joe Leonard, the only incumbent councilor running, hasn’t raised any money at all for his campaign. Katherine Devine has raised just over $100, and John King has about $430.
Fundraising doesn’t always correlate with winning the council election. Last year, Daniel Carson won a seat as the highest-raising candidate with about $4,300, but Angela Walker was in the middle of the fundraising pack and Susan Faloon was in the bottom half. The candidate who raised the second most, Steven Farren, came in seventh place at the polls.
About 40% of the money raised by candidates in 2025 came from the candidates themselves or their spouses and domestic partners. This year, that’s only the case for about 16% of the funds in the race.
Only one political committee has given directly to candidates: the Greater Bangor Democratic Committee, which contributed $50 each to Adam Baker and John King.
The other groups working to influence the race, including the Concerned Citizens of Bangor PAC on the right and Food and Medicine on the left, are making independent expenditures, meaning they don’t contribute or coordinate directly with the candidates they support. Wealthy tech entrepreneur and Cape Elizabeth resident Jonathan Bush is also running ads ahead of the election, although they don’t name any particular candidates and are not subject to campaign finance reporting requirements.
Three candidates have campaign balances with a majority coming from their own funds: Katherine Devine, Dawson Nevells and Andrei Yermakov.
Devine is also the only candidate who hasn’t spent any money on her campaign and has not put up signs around the city. Leonard only spent money on an event and seems to be re-using signs from his previous campaigns.
Most of the money spent by candidates this cycle has gone toward campaign literature such as signs and palm cards.
Dinkins is the only candidate running TV ads and has spent about $5,700 to do so on Spectrum TV.
The rest of the candidate expenditures are scattered among categories like hardware for putting up large signs, postage and apparel. Click through the chart below to see all of the expenditures made in this reporting period, which ended Oct. 20.