The numbers keep rising in the most expensive race in Wake County school board history.

As noted in today's article, campaign finance reports filed Monday show that the candidates raised more than $470.000. The wild card though is the spending from the outside groups and the political parties, numbers which are already at $150,000 and rising.

Once the final numbers are in, the spending might hit $700,000 to $800,000 this year.

Will Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo be able to turn things around today thanks to the help of some outside political advice she picked up after the runoff?

After Losurdo only picked up 40 percent of the vote on Oct. 11, the campaign reached out to Jack Hawke to be a consultant for the runoff. Hawke is a longtime figure in state politics, having been the former chairman of the state Republican Party, a former president of the conservative Civitas Institute and a consultant to presumptive GOP gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory.

"I knew we had to change things," Hawke said. "She was 10 points down (as of Oct. 11). I'm proud of what she's done but we had a lot of ground to make up."

Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo is making the local conservative radio talk show rounds to defend herself against the charges by Progress NC Action that she puffed up her resume.

In an interview Tuesday on the Bill LuMaye Show on WPTF, LuMaye repeatedly complained about Progress NC Action's charges and the N&O article that appeared in the paper. He asked Losurdo to respond to the charges.

"That's a lie," Losurdo said about the Progress NC charges she overstated her resume when she said she oversaw $2 billion in small business loans in the Carolinas for First Union. "They're lying. I'm telling the truth. I did exactly what I said I did."