Twenty-two of the candidates on Tuesday’s Detroit Public Schools Community District ballot reported raising under $1,000 and were excused from filing a detailed statement. The money that was reported sits overwhelmingly with a first-time candidate.

Thirty-four names, five seats

The ballot Detroit voters see on Tuesday carries 34 names for the district’s board of education, and almost all of them are chasing the same four places. Thirty-one candidates are standing for four full four-year seats, and the remaining three are contesting a single partial term running two years. Those five people will join a board that in June approved a general fund budget of $1.1 billion, covering school security staffing and pay rises across the district.

Against that budget, the campaigns are tiny.

The waiver that hides two thirds of the field

Michigan excuses a candidate committee from filing a detailed campaign finance statement when its contributions stay under $1,000, and 22 of them took that waiver. What remains is a public record covering eleven candidates, drawn from contributions and spending through 18 October and due with the county by 5 p.m. on 23 October. Chalkbeat Detroit, which reported the filings on 29 October, put the combined total at $108,360.

Dr. Jameel Smith, a clinical psychologist standing for office for the first time, accounts for $75,505 of it. Smith reported more than 250 individual donations between August and that cutoff and spending of $56,959, with his largest support coming from Linh and Dug Song, who together gave more than $16,600. He paid Pamela J. McClain $9,500 in wages and $3,500 in consulting fees, and TCA Smart Strategies $3,500 in staff wages and $7,000 in consulting.

The rest of the reported field, in order:

Bobby Christian, $10,500, all of it loans to himself, with no expenditures reported.

Terry Whitfield, $8,585 raised and $4,722 spent.

Tyshea Pope, $4,050 raised and $2,790 spent.

Steve Bland Jr., $3,991 raised including loans, and $994 spent.

Shinese Johnson, $1,807 raised and $1,106 spent.

Bessie Harris, $1,750 raised, no expenditures.

Vilma Escamilla-Duran, $1,289.96 raised and $1,263 spent.

David Harris II, $575 raised and $305 spent.

Cidney Calloway, $306.74 raised, no expenditures.

An eleventh candidate, Christopher “Allen” Hubbard, did not receive a waiver and his statement was not publicly available when Chalkbeat reported. Hubbard told the outlet he had raised close to $4,000 and was working to file.

Whether the loans count

Chalkbeat headlined its filing story on the finding that one candidate raised nearly 80 percent of the money, and the figure repays unpicking, because Smith’s total is closer to 70 percent of the combined one. The gap comes from loans. Set aside Christian’s self-loan, which is money he lent his own campaign rather than money raised from anybody, and the pool of genuine contributions falls to $97,860, of which Smith holds about 77 percent. Bland’s total also folds in loans of an unstated size, so the share of actual donated money running to a single candidate is higher still.

Both numbers are defensible. They answer different questions, and a voter deciding whether this race has a money problem is better served by the second.

What the spending raised

Within the small sums, several entries drew scrutiny. Some candidates spent campaign contributions on clothing, travel and meals, Chalkbeat reported. Johnson, who directs substance abuse prevention services at The Youth Connection, filed and then revised a statement that at various points included $40 at a Southfield salon, $46 of volunteer meals recorded in Myrtle Beach, a $34 candidate meal in Kissimmee, $100 at a tailor to alter a suit before a meet-and-greet, and two cash withdrawals of $104 and $84 labelled administrative expenses. Michigan law prohibits campaign payments of $50.01 or more in cash, and both withdrawals cleared that line. Johnson said her corrected report had been reviewed and approved and that she would work with her treasurer and the county finance office.

Smith reported about $846 in candidate meals, which he described as meetings with potential donors, and paid a consultant’s airfare from Texas for a campaign photo shoot. David Harris II recorded $110 at a Westland branding shop for clothing and did not respond to Chalkbeat’s request for comment. Escamilla-Duran, a district parent and registered nurse, reported $220 of out-of-state travel in Tennessee and Kentucky plus an $85 hotel stay for a special education conference, saying the trip was to help a Detroit family self-deport after a member was detained by immigration officials.

Mark Brewer, an attorney at Goodman Acker who advises candidates on spending and who commented after a reporter read the documents to him, called several of the entries questionable. Donor meals, he said, are likely legitimate, and travel for campaign work is allowable where it furthers the campaign. Clothing carrying a campaign logo promotes the candidate; a suit bought to look professional is harder to defend. Violations in Michigan draw civil fines.

How this race compares

Two years ago the reported money in a Detroit school board election ran to roughly $230,000 by late October, more than double this year’s figure, on a shorter ballot. Go back to 2016, the first election after years of state-appointed emergency management, and more than 60 candidates ran for seven seats with only fifteen reporting any contributions at all; the leading fundraiser that year, Angelique Peterson-Mayberry, reported $57,980, much of it traced to a union-linked political action committee.

Set beside those years, 2026 looks like a race with a long ballot, a shallow pool of money and one well-funded candidate in it. Statements covering the final stretch, including the days when most voters were making up their minds, are not due until after Tuesday.

Sources

• Hannah Dellinger, Chalkbeat Detroit, “Some Detroit school board candidates spent campaign contributions on clothing, travel, and meals,” 29 October 2026
• Hannah Dellinger, Chalkbeat Detroit, “1 Detroit school board candidate raised nearly 80% of campaign money, finance statements show,” 29 October 2026
• Chalkbeat Detroit, “Detroit school board approves $1.1 billion budget that maintains extra school security, raises pay for all employees,” 16 June 2026
• Erin Einhorn, Chalkbeat, “Detroit school board candidates rake in thousands from friends, unions and their own pockets,” 3 November 2016
• Wayne County Clerk, elections and candidate information