Dave Dittman, a longtime political pollster and key campaign adviser to several Anchorage mayors, has joined Jack Frost's run against incumbent Mark Begich.

Frost, a self-described conservative who owns a local advertising agency and co-hosts an afternoon talk-radio show, announced his intention to run this summer. So far he is the only candidate challenging Begich, who has said he plans to run for re-election in the April election.

This will be Frost's second try for the mayor's office, and Dittman's second stint as his campaign adviser. During the 2000 mayor's race, when 10 candidates were on the ballot, Frost placed third.

"I would have to say that while I disagreed about half the time about what we ought to be doing, I always deferred to (Dittman's) judgment, because I was paying for it," Frost said in an interview Monday.

"The fact of the matter is he was right almost every time," Frost said. "I have confidence in his ability. He has a great track record, and he understands what we're trying to do and why."

Dittman usually works for Republican candidates. His track record includes helping run two successful mayoral campaigns for Tom Fink in the late 1980s and early 1990s and another two campaigns for Rick Mystrom after that.

Anchorage's local elections are officially nonpartisan, but Republicans and Democrats, and the parties' financial backers, often find themselves on opposite sides in the race.

Although Anchorage mayoral races historically have had numerous candidates vying for the office, both Frost and Dittman said Monday that they don't expect a crowded ballot next year -- at least not with conservative Republican candidates.

That's because voters in 2003 agreed to lower the threshold by which a mayor can win without a runoff election from 50 percent to 45 percent of the vote.

Begich, a Democrat, collected just over 45 percent of the votes in that race, avoided a runoff and became mayor. Republican George Wuerch, who was running for re-election, got about 37 percent of the vote, and Mystrom, also a Republican, took the rest.

Assemblyman Dan Sullivan, who had been considered a strong potential challenger to Begich, said he's supporting Frost and is co-hosting a fund raiser for him next month.

Frost said so far he's raised about $30,000 to pay for his campaign, mostly from friends. In 2000, he said he raised a total of $50,000 and spent another $50,000 of his own money on the race.

Dittman estimates it will cost $350,000 to $400,000 to run a winning race against Begich, a strong incumbent who has earned high approval ratings during his watch. Getting his candidate out on the stump early will be key to rallying support and mustering that much money, Dittman said.

"I'm not even going to mention the mayor's name, I don't think, ever -- certainly not in the advertising. I'm not running against him. I'm running for some things that I think ought to be done."

Rauch, who was Begich's campaign manager in the 2003 election, said Monday that the mayor also has begun fund raising and has already received hundreds of donations, though she couldn't say precisely how much the mayor has in his war chest.

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