By Keegan Gibson, Managing Editor

Allegheny County Controller Mark Flaherty performs slightly better against Republicans Chuck McCullough and D. Raja, according to a Municipoll/PoliticsPA survey.

Flaherty leads County Councilman McCullough 48 percent to 22, and leads businessman D. Raja 48 percent to 21 percent.

Those margins are slightly better than his primary opponent, County Council President Rich Fitzgerald, who bests McCullough 45 percent to 26 percent and Raja 48 percent to 21 percent.

“It’s early and most voters just haven’t formed opinions about the candidates for county executive,” said Municipoll President Ed Haggerty. “It should therefore come as no surprise, given the Democratic voter registration edge, that the Democratic candidates are leading right now.”

Though these the margins are slight, this supports Flaherty’s argument to Democrats that he is better known and more popular in the County. Flaherty is also viewed more favorably by Republicans (18 percent favorable, 27 percent unfavorable) and Independents (19.5 percent favorable, 19.5 percent unfavorable) than is Fitzgerald (9 to 15 percent among Republicans and 13 to 14 percent among Independents).

It also explains which Fitzgerald, who boasts a cash-on-hand advantage, has already begun to air television ads.

The Republican candidates’ favorability is equally low: 5 percent favorable versus 21 percent unfavorable for McCullough, and 8 percent versus 20 percent for Raja.

Municipoll designed and administered this survey, which was conducted for PoliticsPA by phone using IVR technology from April 1 to April 3. Telephone numbers for the sample were generated by a file of registered voters in Allegheny County. Respondents were compared to the voter file and all interviews that were incompatible with the voters listed for that household, according to their age and gender were eliminated from the sample. The data were weighted slightly by gender, party, and age. Margin of error is + or – 2.68 in the sample size of 1,327.

This is the third part of a a three part poll report. On Monday we discussed a poll showing McCullough leading Raja in a GOP primary. Yesterday we looked at numbers showing Flaherty ahead in the Exec race, and former Pittsburgh Councilwoman Valerie McDonald Roberts leading in the Democratic primary for Controller.