CLEARWATER, FL: $26.4M on 53,029 FEC receipts

Reading $26,351,549 as a city-string roll-up

The headline pair is $26,351,549 and 53,029 lines. The implied average is about $497. Cite both numbers. Quoting only the dollars drops the line-count shape of the Clearwater book.

Pinellas County’s Clearwater string is separate from Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Largo on the FEC city key. Filers typed CLEARWATER in the city field. LobbyVault summed rows with that string and state FL. The city total can include a PAC or joint-fundraising committee address when that is the city filers typed. LobbyVault does not recode those rows out of the city string.

If a newsroom map paints Clearwater together with Tampa and St. Petersburg, the FEC file still splits them. Largo too. This extract’s only city total is $26,351,549 on 53,029 CLEARWATER, FL rows, mean near $497.

Why CLEARWATER on the receipt is not a census of Clearwater

Searchers often want “how much did people in Clearwater give.” The honest citation is narrower: itemized federal receipts with contributor city CLEARWATER, FL total $26,351,549 across 53,029 contributions. Dropping “itemized” and “contributor city” inflates the claim.

Party is not in this packet. Do not attach a partisan reading to $26,351,549. Occupation and employer may appear on named receipts on the city hub; they are not rolled up here.

Outside the Clearwater itemized book

$26,351,549 is not spending by Clearwater candidates. A candidate who lives in Clearwater can raise money from other cities. A donor row tagged CLEARWATER, FL can go to a committee anywhere.

A mean near $497 does not describe a median resident of Clearwater. Means move with a few large lines.

Postal confusion with Tampa, St. Petersburg, or Largo is why the city field is a poor residency proxy. $26,351,549 counts rows that stored CLEARWATER, FL. 53,029 lines. About $497 each. Neighbor names need their own hubs.

Clearwater’s fewer-row, higher-mean book

Clearwater posts $26,351,549 on 53,029 lines, a mean near $497. That is fewer rows than several California volume books with similar dollar totals. Fewer rows is not a unique-donor count.

Comparing Clearwater’s mean to another city is only valid on the same series: contributor city, itemized federal receipts. Mixing in Florida state data breaks the comparison.

A Clearwater total of $26,351,549 does not absorb Tampa or St. Petersburg. Those names are other city strings when filers typed them. State FL stays on the citation so CLEARWATER, FL is not merged with a same-named place elsewhere.

City total versus postal codes in FL

53,029 city-field lines can spread across many ZIPs or cluster in a few. This packet does not list those ZIPs. Open the ZIP directory and the live Clearwater hub rather than guessing the split.

After an amendment wave, recheck both the city hub and any ZIP you compared. Snapshots drift independently.

Because this packet carries only city, state, dollar total, and contribution count, every other story about Clearwater politics sits outside the extract. That includes candidate quality, issue fights, and local election results. This guide stays on the two numbers FEC.gov supplied for the city field.

Source tables for $26,351,549

A mean of about $497 is division of $26,351,549 by 53,029. It is fair to report as arithmetic. It is not fair to report as a typical resident of Clearwater.

Internal links on this page go only to the Clearwater city hub, the all-cities directory, and the ZIP directory. Those are the three paths that match this packet.

Clearwater’s $26,351,549 across 53,029 contributions is a Pinellas County city field, mean near $497. Tampa and St. Petersburg are neighboring strings, not subsets. Pinellas County is not summed here. Repeat gifts add rows. Florida state-office receipts are omitted. Cite $26,351,549 with 53,029 from FEC.gov aggregates indexed on LobbyVault.

Researchers citing Clearwater should keep Pinellas County and Tampa Bay off the sentence unless they add Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Largo on purpose. The live Clearwater table can show named committees that this snapshot does not list. A later FEC extract can move $26,351,549 or 53,029 without this guide rewriting itself. Treat the mean near $497 as division only. Florida state-office receipts sit outside both packet facts. If a ZIP page for a Clearwater code disagrees with the city hub, quote both keys rather than forcing a match. The 53,029-line count still is not a headcount of Clearwater people.

Questions

How much is itemized from contributor city Clearwater, FL?

FEC.gov itemized receipts listing contributor city CLEARWATER, FL total $26,351,549 across 53,029 contributions in the LobbyVault aggregate. That figure is a city-string roll-up of federal Schedule A rows, not a unique-donor count and not a census of people who live in Clearwater. Unitemized gifts sit outside it.

What does the Clearwater contribution count mean?

LobbyVault counts 53,029 itemized contributions for CLEARWATER, FL. That is a line count, not a headcount of unique people. Repeat gifts, redesignations, and memo entries can add rows without adding new donors. This packet does not publish a unique-donor figure, so 53,029 should not be quoted as a population. The matching dollar total on the same extract is $26,351,549.

Does the Clearwater total include only residents?

No. The city is the contributor-city value on the FEC itemization. Filers typed CLEARWATER with state FL. Office addresses and mail that list Clearwater can be part of $26,351,549 when that is the city string on the receipt. LobbyVault does not recode the field into a residential-only book. The 53,029-line count follows the same rule.

Are Clearwater numbers from FEC.gov?

The numbers come from FEC.gov itemized contribution aggregates indexed on LobbyVault: $26,351,549 and 53,029 lines for CLEARWATER, FL. Original reports remain on FEC.gov. Unitemized federal gifts and non-federal filings from FL are outside both figures. If a later extract disagrees with this snapshot, the Commission’s filing controls. The mean of about $497 is arithmetic from those two packet facts.