If Mayor Brandon Scott and the Baltimore City Council are able to defeat Baltimore County media executive David Smith’s effort to reduce the council’s size at the ballot box this November, they will have labor unions to thank for it.

The mayor’s “Stop Sinclair” ballot committee has raked in $158,000 since Aug. 21, with $150,000 coming in from unions, according to the most recent campaign finance disclosures filed Thursday. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees made the largest contribution with $100,000 toward the campaign. The Baltimore Fire Officers union and the Baltimore Washington Construction union both gave $25,000. Councilman Ryan Dorsey and Del. Robbyn Lewis both made smaller transfers of $3,000 and $5,000, respectively.

Stop Sinclair has $155,952 on hand, a sizable advantage over Smith’s group, which has just over $5,100 in its account.

Smith, the executive chairman of Sinclair Broadcast Group and owner of The Baltimore Sun, is personally financing a ballot question that seeks to reduce the number of city council members to eight from 14, which will appear as Question H. Smith, who has denied that Sinclair has any involvement in his political causes, has given $415,000 to his own committee, People for Elected Accountability and Civic Engagement, PEACE, since 2023.

But Smith hasn’t given any more money since February and the group hasn’t spent in months. Smith, who has considerable financial resources, could choose to cut a check at any time between now and Election Day.

Stop Sinclair spent $24,000 on radio advertising, according to campaign finance documents, and seems poised for additional spending in the closing weeks of the campaign season. A cadre of elected officials, labor organizers and concerned groups have been canvassing Baltimore neighborhoods, encouraging residents to vote no on Question H.

In a column published in The Sun in August, Smith took issue with Scott and others’ claims that he is just a white man from Baltimore County seeking to consolidate political power for himself, with Smith arguing it is the mayor who wishes to retain power.

“I believe that the once great Baltimore City where I grew up is rapidly following the in the footsteps of of the once-great city of Detroit,” Smith wrote, ”which finally became so corrupt and fiscally irresponsible that it was forced to declare bankruptcy in 2013.”

Smith wrote that his effort is separate from Sinclair and The Sun, and that the opposition’s branding is using the company as “a boogeyman to scare their constituency.”

Sinclair’s flagship station, WBFF Fox45 in Baltimore, has devoted significant coverage to the issue. They regularly runs segments questioning whether City Council’s current makeup is effective. Recently, the station aired a series of pieces called “Fox 45 soapbox” in which a reporter went around to different council districts and had residents appear on camera to “unleash” on their representatives.

The Sun has also published a series of City Council report cards in recent weeks.

Fundraising advantage aside, the Stop Sinclair campaign has an uphill battle. There have been 147 ballot questions posed to city voters since 1999; only one has been rejected. And Smith has had previous success — a measure he funded in 2022 to impose term limits passed with 71% of the vote.

It also remains to be seen how successful a ballot initiative opposition campaign, even one with the support of the mayor, City Council and major government unions, can be in Baltimore — Stop Sinclair is the first in modern history.