Early Ballot and Fundraising Update

We got a nice big update on the May Election today with new early ballot returns and fundraising amounts as well. Its hard to believe but 34,613 early ballots have already been turned in for this election. I got a lot of positive feedback from my projections from last time, so I figure that I will do them again:

Districts 1-4 (Smith 63.7%, Griswold 36.3%)
15,236 Early Votes
Smith - 9,705
Griswold - 5,531

District 5 (Griswold 61.7%, Smith 38.3%)
9,115 Early Votes
Griswold - 5,624
Smith - 3,491

District 6 (Smith 53.3%, Griswold 46.7%)
10,262 Early Votes
Smith - 5,470
Griswold - 4,792

TOTAL Early Voting Projection:
34,613 Early Votes
Smith - 18,666 (53.9%)
Griswold - 15,947 (46.1%)

Now, I recognize that since I used the same formulas as last time, the percentages are going to be similar. However, you can look at the turnout and see how the vote margin is potentially changing based on where the votes are coming from. And since the votes are coming in steadily from across the city, you can see that if things hold to last election, Smith's lead has grown from 1900 votes to 2700 votes.

Combine that with the fact that Smith outraised Griswold by more than 2 to 1 over the last period, and you can see that Griswold potentially has a steep hill to climb. Griswold changed his tone a few weeks back and this may have softened Smith's lead a bit, but the real question is, has he done anything dramatic to change the trend from last time? I think the answer is no. That combined with the fundraising disadvantage and I predict that there may be some desperation in the last week.

As for Higgins and Austin, I still have to assume that Higgins has the advantage because of the big lead she had in the primary, but being outraised 8 to 1 over the last month is not a positive sign. She somehow got the big lead with early ballots in the last election without raising any money, so perhaps she can do it again. Clearly Austin has the money advantage - however, with over 9ooo votes in their race, is there a whole lot of change that he can drive in these last 11 days?