The Next Mayor

Hey folks, in case you missed it on the front page, today's episode of Issues Forums deals with the slots parlors and Delaware waterfront planning.

You can watch it on that page, download it as a podcast (caution, you need iTunes for that link to work), or just watch it right here:

For more information, you can also refer back to this post that I did about the unveiling of the Central Delaware waterfront planning committee's plan.

If you're really interested, that committee will be having public meetings tonight and tomorrow to show the results of their work and answer questions from the community. Here's the info:

For nine months, a group of citizens -- led by Penn Praxis, the Philadelphia Planning Commission, and planning and design firm WRT -- have been working on a new concept for Philadelphia's waterfront. Now, they are ready to show off their collaborative vision.

The seven-mile PennPraxis vision calls for integrating mass transit, bike trails, car sharing, and remote parking to shift the focus of the central Delaware from the car to the pedestrian. A new open space network reclaims the waterfront as public domain, calling for a park for every riverward neighborhood, connected by a trail system that will make the Delaware a regional destination.

The public can see the plans today at the Cescaphe Ballroom, 923 N. 2nd Street. Refreshments will be at 5:30; the presentation will be from 6:15 p.m.- 9 p.m. Another presentation will be held tomorrow at Settlement Music School, 416 Queen Street, at the same times. Register for each at www.planphilly.com

So, folks, what do you think? Do you think these casinos can be a good thing? If not, do you think there's any way that they can be stopped? If you think they're inevitable how do you feel about the city's chances to integrate them into a vibrant and attractive Delaware waterfront? Or... should we just sell that strip of waterfront to Camden since we can't seem to do anything good with it anyway? Your comments are welcome.

Over at YPP, not-quite-ready-for-prime-time mayoral write-in candidate, Larry West made an interesting point, if not with his blog post, at least with the title of his post:

How the Media can Help Lower the Murder Rate

You can read his post but I don't necessarily agree with his point that there needs to be more coverage of the murder rate, nor will placing those stories higher up in television newscasts do the trick. In my comment (reprinted below) I argue that it may be about the quality of each individual story, rather than the quantity:

We've been kicking around this question for a few days now as we try to figure out where to go with thenextmayor.com once "the next mayor" becomes "the current mayor." Some of the concerns that we see with the media coverage of the murder rate is that all of the stories tend to be the same - whether they're done by print media and get on the front page or cover of the paper or by television news.

Does anyone else have any more thoughts about what the media could do about this?
So, any ideas?

Governing Magazine's website has a weekly "Management Insights" column published in collaboration with the Government Innovators Network at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. As the network's name indicates, this is about innovative efforts by governments to improve the cities and states which they govern.

The latest column spotlights Cleveland, OH's strategy to create a broadband infrastructure and (gasp) it may be better than ours!

The essence is found in what Cleveland is doing with broadband infrastructure for innovation on a regional basis. Cleveland is unique in its approach to broadband, its emphasis on entrepreneurial innovation and its focus on the region rather than on the city, the state or the nation.

The columnist, Jerry Mechling, is a lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School of government and seems to like this whole idea of "regionalism" just as much as we here at The Next Mayor do:

Cleveland could not create broadband-enabled innovation on its own. It tried but could not get much help from the state capitol in Columbus. It tried but could not get much help from national policy in Washington, D.C. The reality for Cleveland and all northeast Ohio is that jobs are increasingly mobile while people and the regional workforce are remarkably stable. Despite the fact that roughly 20% of Americans move every five years, nearly half live within 30 miles of where they were born. The regional economy is the essential unit of community and change. (emphasis is mine)

I've got some ideas for actions that this region could take to solve a lot of different problems. However, step 1 continues to be, opening the lines of communication. Once the next mayor does that, then just about anything is possible.

I've been writing a lot about urban planning lately, especially since today's episode of Issues Forums deals with the casinos and waterfront planning, so here's a story about what happened when one London street was stipped "naked" (via "The 13th Floor"). Given the emphasis that urban planners like to place on preserving the pedestrian friendly aspects of the urban landscape, it's interesting how, according to the "shared space" philosophy, bringing walkers in closer contact with cars may actually make them safer.

Could you imagine east Market Street without curbs, lines or crosswalks? Yeah... neither can I.

My apologies to my Daily News partners for plugging a blog written by their rivals at the Inquirer, but I just found this one and since it's about a subject near and dear to my heart, I just had to point it out.

Inquirer writer Melissa Dribben (with a little help from Ned Rauch-Mannino of the "Pick-up Philadelphia" campaign) has a blog that is essentially about the crazy amounts of litter on the ground in our fair city. It seems to consist mostly of citizen-written comments about the dirt in their part of the city or the "way things used to be" (everyone always remember it being so clean in the past, but I've seen Rocky and Philly in the 70s looked pretty dingy).

Anyway, I'm not one who believes that it's a core function of government to pick up litter, afterall no boroughs or townships pick up litter off the streets in suburban communities and those seem pretty clean. But the next mayor could make it a priority to make it easier for people to do it themselves or (and this I'm fine with) enforce the laws on the books and prosecute to the fullest extent. Start handing out a few $300 littering fines and we'll see how quickly people stop tossing their trash on the ground.

Is John Staggs of the Socialist Workers Party, 60, a meatpacker living in Germantown.

Those who have followed local campaigns will remember his name. As Bob Warner reports in Thursday's Daily News:

He ran third in the 2003 mayoral contest, collecting 1,292 votes against John Street and Sam Katz, less than one-half of 1 percent of the total votes cast.

Last year, Staggs challenged state Rep. Rosita Youngblood for her House seat and got 3.7 percent of the vote, without a Republican in the race.

He has, however, already created change in government: Also last year, Staggs refused to sign the “loyalty oath” that the state had required of political candidates for more than 50 years, in which the candidate swore he or she is “not a subversive person," Bob reports. That led state Attorney General Tom Corbett to tell election officials statewide not to enforce it.

Though Staggs is the only one running for mayor, a number of third-party candidates and independents also filed for other city offices. The candidates had to file their papers by today.

They are:

8th councilmanic district: Brian Rudnick (Green), Rev. Jesse W. Brown Jr. and Jim Foster

7th councilmanic district: Luis A. Pineda

Council at large: Jacinth Brown Roberts (Green), Osborne Hart (Socialist Workers')

Sheriff: Jacque Whaumbush

City Commissioner: Lewis Harris Jr. (Green)

Since we happen to be focusing on the isssue of casinos and development along the Delaware, I should point out that planphilly.org has a report about the first meeting for public feedback on the work of central Delaware planning group at the "elegant Cescaphe Ballroom" (includes video). Apparently, while it seems that most people liked the ideas presented in the plan, there were diverse opinions about its feasibility. But overall, it sounds like they took this advice:

The audience divided itself into seven groups of 15 to 20 participants to respond to the proposals and offer their own. Harris Sokoloff, who leads the Penn Project on Civic Engagement, asked them to rise above the perception of the city as a nay-saying “Nega-delphia” and explore the opportunities the plan offers. Mostly, they obliged.

It's funny, but I have a feeling that most of the "Nega-delphia" comes from people who think that "the politicians will never do it," not realizing that the politicians will do it if the people tell them to. I know... I know... how naive. But there is a grain of truth.

Anyway, if you missed last night, you can tonight to the meeting in Queen Village. You may even get a chance to see me. I look like this.

(edited to add)
In case your interested, planphilly.org also has information about the people who will be determining what the city looks like for the next... 40 or so years! It appears that some of them will be meeting tomorrow. And it's only "some" since the mayor and some council folks haven't gotten around to making their appointees yet. Remember how long it took for him to make his appointments to the ethics board? Maybe they should postpone Friday's meeting.

Here's your chance to comment about today's issue du jour: Education.

Check out today's episode of Issues Forums, available any way you want it - streaming video, a video podcast (link will open iTunes), or on everyone's favorite tube, Youtube:

My takeaway from this video is that is doesn't matter whether or not the SRC - School Reform Commission - continues to be the governing body of the School District. The next mayor can have an impact on the schools by doing things that are as simple as actually visiting the schools on a regular basis. This next mayor will get about 6 months of a honeymoon during which television crews will flock to him like moths to a flame. Use that and bring those tv cameras into some of the more troubled schools. Don't hide from the things that are wrong with the schools. Bring them to light so everyone knows about them, use that pulpit to lay out a plan to fix them and then get everyone to buy into that plan.

Also, influence over decision making comes with money. If the next mayor dedicates a portion of the budget to the schools, greater than what it is now, and puts that money in place for specific actions - like new teacher recruitment and retention - he can make those decisions.

Anyway... people who think about this stuff much more than I do have actually written about what the mayor can do about the schools. Check out this summary of the report from the Cross-City Campaign for School Reform, which includes links to the entire report.

Check out the video and sound off in the comments.

The Equality Forum, an international group promoting civil rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people, has taken a deep look at the primary vote in Philadelphia's gay neighborhoods. And the group says that, as a block, Philadelphia gays voted for Michael Nutter.

According to the Forum's research, about 70% of the vote in gay neighborhoods went for Nutter.

The methodology behind this report is interesting. The Equality Forum started by identifying "seven distinct Philadelphia gay neighborhoods" and found that Nutter took 74 percent of the vote there.

If picking gay neighborhoods sounds a little subjective for your research tastes, well, the Forum went at this in a scientific way too: the group used Census records to identify the 12 city Census tracts with the most same-sex couples residing in the same household and found Nutter took 69 percent of the vote in those neighborhoods.

Obviously, either method sweeps up a lot of straight voters -- and, just as clearly, a lot of gay votes too.

So why is it that gay voters went so solidly for Nutter?

Nutter had walked the walk: as a City Councilman, Nutter introduced what became the city's domestic partnership law. And during the primary, he issued a policy paper on LGBT issues.

But several other candidates had their own LGBT bona fides to point to. In February, Evans was the first candidate to issue a plan to address LGBT issues -- and he pledged his support for Dan Anders, a gay candidate for Common Pleas judge . Brady was feted by Congressman Barney Frank when he picked up an award from the Philadelphia Gay Tourism Caucus. Fattah was endorsed by OUTFRONT!, a advocacy group serving LGBT communities.

That's not all: Brady, Evans, Fattah and Nutter all attended a forum hosted by The Liberty City Lesbian and Gay Democratic Club in March (Knox was invited but did not attend). It's an interesting indication of the power of the gay vote in Philadelphia that, at that meeting, each candidate there had something to crow about (as reported by Catherine Lucey March 9):

Nutter noted that when he was on Council he worked to give domestic-partner benefits to city employees.

Evans discussed his recently released LGBT agenda, which calls for reforms including greater diversity in City Hall and sensitivity training for police.

Fattah pointed out that he had voted against the Defense of Marriage Act - which sought to bar gay marriage - in Congress.

And Brady talked about how he had gotten the carpenters to work for free on the William Way [Community] Center.

And Nutter, Fattah and Evans all attended The Rustin Forum for Philadelphia's Future in April when more than 100 members of Philadelphia's LGBT communities presented the issues that they want Philadelphia's next mayor to deal with. (The video is here. Knox, Brady and Taubenberger were invited but did not attend.)

So what made the difference among the four candidates who were obviously gay-friendly?

The Equality Forum's Executive Director, Malcolm Lazin, suggests that it was how Nutter campaigned that made the difference. He said gay voters responded to Nutter's style, reading into it (and his legislative history) that he would work for their issues. "A candidate who can provide the right cues can be the beneficiary of a GLBT block vote," he said.

Lazin continued: "Nutter was viewed as a progressive outsider by a community that is perceived as outside the mainstream. Nutter actively campaigned for the gay vote and sent cues that he embraced diversity and wanted to shake up the establishment for Philadelphia's benefit."

Interesting.

I also wonder if those seven to 12 neighborhoods are home to voters with higher socioeconomic status, which might affect voting patterns as much as anything.

Regardless, the Forum's Lazin is impressed with the political strength of Philadelphia's gay communities, and sees a future in measuring the strength of gay voting in future elections. "Block voting increases a group's political importance and power," he said.

It's crazy to think what's going on here in our city this week...

We have another fatal police shooting, 11 for the year.

We also have the Casino business with town councils meeting the governor to talk about relocating the casinos, though, with the casino security, it may actually reduce crime, who knows?

And, back to crime, sort of... two sisters were evicted because their house apparently did not meet safety standards, but one must ask, with the murder rate moving like a Ferrari with no brakes, can we, or they, really afford to worry about a family's house? Especially since the only reason the residents claim the repairs were not done was because they couldn't find a legitimate contractor to do the work.

Meanwhile, the Teachers turned down a multi-million dollar merit pay program, but there are certainly justifications as to why, but for that one must read the article...

The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers turned down a 20.5 million dollar program from the Federal Government. The program was supposed to give incentives to both the teachers and the school system to outperform their current educational trends.

The Teachers were not interested because they claim that the program cannot be run fairly, that they have no control over the makeup of their student body, likewise, they say the rating will be to subjective. Who knows, perhaps their right, but could it hurt to try?

Every time the contract is up, there are innevitably complaints about the salaries of teachers, so from a monetary standpoint, this policy would hurt nobody, at least not directly. Think about it like extra credit, and teachers should understand that, if you get it, it helps you, if not, your situation will not change.

And, to complain that the system is unfair seems to be a faulty argumant, not because it is untrue, but what do teachers say to students when they complain about things being fair... life is not fair. Teachers need to practice what they preach regardless of the situation they are in. People do not expect the teachers in Philadelphia to train their students to work at NASA, but they need to pass critical tests, and thus teachers need to do their job, extra money or not, so it cannot hurt them.

One could argue that the schools could use the money in better ways, and that may be, but if the Federal Government has 20.5 million dollars ear-marked in this fashion, it would be silly not to take it, because by turning down this money, do you hurt yourself in the future? If Congress acts in the policy of Don Corleone, they will not offer again now that they have been refused this offer.

If that is the case, then this could have been a terrible decision, but time will tell... your thoughts?

Welcome to the Capital, no not DC, but Philly, the Homicide Capital of the World. With homicide rates skyrocketing like a Shuttle Launch, someone needs to step up and accomplish something.

Unfortunately Philly, this isn't Gotham City so we're not going to get a billionaire to hand out justice from a rocket car. Maybe i'm crazy, but usually, i expect policemen to protect and serve, and perhaps they do, but not well enough it seems. According to an editorial in the Daily News, it would seem that the police are okay with this self fulfilling prophecy, so somebody needs to get it done.

Unfortunately, Philadelphia only seem to want one thing, John Timoney. People in Philly need to step out of their shell, he's gone. But there has to be another person with top cop potential, there has to be somebody, but John Timoney is gone, get past it.

I pose a question of sociology, were things that good under his reign? Or are things just horrible now that we want what we once had? And, while we keep checking our rearview mirrors for the now Miami Chief, we're driving off the road here in the present... does anyone know how to drive this thing? Or do we just continue to spiral out of control?.

One thing is for sure, with the new mayor, there will be a new top cop, the question is twofold, who and is it too little too late?

I've been sitting on this link for about a month now, not because I was waiting for a particularly slow news day (because now that there's a cheesesteak war, I can't imagine any slow news days for a loooong time) but simply because I wanted to mull it over a little before I offered my own thoughts.

The author focuses specifically on the qualities of "transformational leaders" or people who bring about significant change to a public sector organization. Since this election has been mostly about a call for change, it stands to reason that the next mayor needs to be one of these so-called transformational leaders. That said, let's go through the column and relate some of it back to some of our situations here in Philadelphia.

Governing in a democracy necessarily involves managing varying, often conflicting, interests. Organizations can easily get side-tracked responding to these interests, so leaders need laser focus.

The next mayor will come into office in January after a year in which the city may have seen its highest murder rate since the late 90s. While this is going to be the dominant issue, it's also a symptom of many much larger, structural problems that can only hope to be fixed with a complete transformation of many parts of city government. If the next mayor gets bogged down in a number - the death toll - at the expense of maintaining that "laser focus" on the long term solutions that can make permanent, sustainable changes in a lot of different numbers, including the murder rate, then while he may experience some success, it will be shortlived.

They challenge their organizations with “unreasonable” or “impractical” goals.

A woman I once worked for who had experience in city government said that there's a large class of city workers who consider themselves "be'eres" as in "we be here before you got here and we be here after you leave." While their institutional memory and the continuity that a lot of these long time workers provide can be invaluable, if the next mayor is unable to change some of the things that haven't worked, things that they do just because "it's always been done that way," then he will fail. At the very least the next mayor needs to challenge his department heads and appointees and be ready to let them go if they don't meet expectations. He should then leave it to those department heads to do what they can to transform their own departments.

They are ready to invest in change.
This point is perhaps most relevant to Philadelphia, since we always seem to be in some sort of budget crunch or are facing one down the road. The author makes the point that it's even more important to make these investments when the organization (the city) is facing a budget crunch. It makes sense. Why keep throwing away money on the old habits that helped contribute to the budget crunch in the first place? Also, since it's difficult enough to get people to believe in change, those investments and plans are usually the first to go when things get tight.

They create a high-level blueprint for change — a picture of what the transformed organization will look like.
I absolutely love the puzzle metaphor that the writer uses here. The next mayor has to create the vision - the picture on the puzzle box - for what he wants the city government to look like and then let that picture guide everyone involved in the transformation as they bring their own pieces to the puzzle. We've all put puzzles together. You do the easy parts, the edges first, then it gets tough as you try to fill in the middle. As you get closer to the finished product, it gets easier and easier until you snap that last remaining piece into place. The next mayor and his closest advisers need to paint the picture for his appointees, for the unionized workforce and, most importantly, for all of us. If transforming the way the city works is the goal - and that seems to be the message that the voters and poll respondents have been sending - then we all have a part to play.

They get personally involved with the day-to-day issues involved in change.
This is especially true in Philadelphia. The next mayor can't just task this off to someone else. No one else in city government is going to have the authority or public profile to pull this off. There will be a lot of things on his plate but the next mayor absolutely must set aside some time - call it "change time" - every day to see this through. It also wouldn't hurt to devise some sort of message calendar so that every high ranking member of the city uses whatever opportunity they get in the media to deliver the "change message of the day." We voters and citizens have short attention spans. For example, without looking it up, who represents PA's 8th Congressional District and who preceded that person? We need to be reminded in some small way, every day, about what our city government is trying to do.

They are willing to celebrate what is good about the past. People do what the system rewards.
The headlines are filled with bad news these days. Bridges are crumbling. People are dying in the streets at an insane rate. The Phillies are still out of the playoffs. But that doesn't mean that some good things haven't happened in the last eight years and aren't continuing to happen.

Whole neighborhoods are being transformed - most with the benefit of a "transformation initiative." Some schools have made vast improvements. Many Philadelphians are sitting on an immense accumulation of wealth simply because the value of their home has increased. Philadelphia will soon be blanketed by the largest municipal wireless internet system in the nation, creating a whole host of opportunities. The next mayor doesn't need to stop the good work of the previous administration just because it was the work of the previous administration. We've been through that before. He also doesn't need to do a wholesale, public shredding of the city's bureaucracy. The next mayor will be well served by finding something, anything, that he can celebrate about the way the city works. It'll boost the morale of the folks working for him, make him the captain of the "team" rather than the ax man and help to convince the "be'eres" that everyone will be happier with a new way of doing things.

A tall order? Yes. But no one said change is easy. Now, where were we on that puzzle?

In case you missed it, Saturday's Inquirer reported on the PA Supreme Court's final decision about the casino referendum and ruled that city officials can't zone the casinos out.

So where does this leave anti-casino activists? Is it time for them to come to the table and try to get what they can out this process? Councilman Dicicco's chief of staff seems to think so:

While DiCicco had promised to fight the sites with every tool available - including sponsoring the referendum and introducing a casino-buffer bill that would force the casinos to move - his spokesman suggested yesterday that opponents may have to shift tactics.

"Our toolbox is pretty empty at this point," said chief of staff Brian Abernathy. "Frank and I have both said publicly that it's unlikely we're going to change these locations, and maybe it's time to get to the table."

The cynic and conspiracy theorist in me was about to suggest something about Councilman Dicicco and a bunch of Philly state reps and the timing with which they started to oppose these casinos. But I won't. I'm sure plenty of folks will do so anyway in the comments.

In a ballot referendum that we'll be watching with some interest, the city of San Francisco will be choosing whether they want more money for public transit or more downtown parking.

Here's the tricky part. This isn't so much an "either/or" questions as it is two "yes/no" questions. Even if voters vote "yes" for both... well... aside from the voting booth exploding, they won't get both. Those sneaky pro-transit folks fixed it so that the question of whether to give the Muni (is that a better name than SEPTA?) also includes a slap against the parking plan:

In a last-minute move aimed at securing needed support from the more liberal supervisors, the Muni measure was amended to preserve the city's current restrictions on the creation of new parking - a direct hit against the parking initiative.

If both measures were to get a majority of the vote, the board's Muni measure would take precedence because, unlike the Fisher [that's Gap founder, Don Fisher, who has apparently been having trouble finding a parking space] plan, it would be cemented in the City Charter, the bible of local governance.

Take that, people who want to park!

I encourage you to read the article. There's some pretty choice apocalyptic language in there that pretty much equates more parking to the rapture, or at least a serious blow to the city's "transit-first" policy. Here's a sample:

[San Francisco Planning Director Dean Macris] predicted that if the initiative were to pass, there would be "significantly" more traffic downtown, bringing "increases in congestion, air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, delays to public transit, and conflicts with pedestrians and cyclists... and locusts, frogs, black flies, the Bay will turn to blood and McDreamy Mayor Newsom will get a really ugly boil on his face."

Ok, so I added that last part.

Wouldn't it be cool if Philly had a "transit-first policy" instead of the current "screw you policy"?

More about this later but for now, take a look at the list of people who are on the Zoning Code Commission (or ZCC as they're trying to be known). Notice any candidates for mayor?

Yep. That's right. Al Taubenberger is there and doesn't even have a designated alternated in case something happens to him... like getting elected mayor. Does anyone have a problem with Mr. Taubenberger participating on a commission that should be devoid of politics while he runs for office?

(Tip of the hat to a friend of The Next Mayor for bringing this up.)

I'm fascinated by Bob Warner's stories published in today's Daily News about John Sabatina, the 56th ward leader who has created a role for himself as a consultant who gets judges (and other candidates) elected.

Bob's profile of Sabatina is here; his piece on how consultants are changing the machine-driven system is here.

Sabatina is very successful, by any measure. He raked in $150,000 from the seven candidates he represented in the primary. Five of those got elected. The Democratic City Committee, by contrast, endorsed four judge candidates; one (Linda Carpenter, who was at the top of the ballot) was elected.

There's much to discuss here, including the fact (made in this story) that the rise of these consultants seems to help relatively well-off candidates. But what fascinates me is the argument -- which he makes, and I certainly have no reason to doubt -- that these consultants are needed.

Huh?

Reading between the lines, the argument is this: 1) The Democratic City Committee's endorsement counts for less these days, and ward leaders are not pushing a single slate of candidates 2) There are a lot of ward leaders and other important pols who candidates need to meet and extract promises of support from 3) Ergo, candidates need to hire these consultants to manage the introductions (and, as one source says to Bob, to make sure that the ward leaders make good on those promises).

It's a rational market-based argument -- there's a need, people will pay to fill it, so someone steps up to take the money -- but good grief. Michael Erdos spent half a million dollars to become a judge, $77,000 to four noted consultants (including Sabatina).

Is there no better way to spend that money during an election?

I guess as an homage to a time when this was big news, the Inquirer and the Associated Press had a story about Michael Nutter's new campaign manager, Tricia Enright. She's got an impressive resume and people I know who know her well have spoken very highly about her. In fact, she may even be overqualified for the job. While it's a good pick up for the Nutter crew, it's kind of like if the '92 Dream Team had added Shaquille O'Neal for good measure.

While the celebration over a new campaign manager must have been great, it didn't slow the candidate down as he took time to send a bunch of newbie environmental activists on their way into the harsh, pollution-choked world. More about that later from a very reputable source.

Wendy already mentioned this biographical piece about ward leader and highly-paid political consultant John Sabatina, a piece which Dan U-A over at YPP calls "puff." While I'm inclined to agree with him, I can't help but think that Bob Warner asked the very questions that Dan U-A brought up. Also, a lot of the criticism about the role of consultants in elections is brought up in the companion piece about how rise of the indepedent ward leader/consultants has made Democratic City Committee about as effective 2004 "Dream Team."

If you love really flimsy, thin pieces of tissue paper that cost 60 cents, have we got some good news for you. 'HYY, the Daily News, the Philadelphia Tribune, the Inquirer and the Metro give Barbaro treatment to the transfer (which could be bad news for the transfer given how the whole Barbaro thing turned out). How good could "home rule" be if our transit agency can't even stick it to poor people without the feds stepping in?

Turns out this guy should have just turned himself in for the outstanding warrants that he was facing. Given the charges he was facing, his situation couldn't have turned out any worse than it did. I remember a big part of "Safer Streets" being an intense push to find and arrest everyone with an outstanding warrant since the statistics were showing that a large number of violent crimes and homicides were being committed by people who shouldn't actually be allowed on the streets. I guess that was more difficult than the mayor and commissioner thought it would be.

Finally, it's that time of summer that all kids look forward to... the release of their PSSA scores! Yippee! Metro, Tribune and 'HYY have this one. Let's get it up for... suuuuuuh-light improoooooooovemeeeent! Of course the real fruit of these improvements won't be known for several years when we see whether increases in the numbers of students who are "proficient" in reading and math translate to an increase in the high school graduation rate which hovers around 50 percent.

Earlier today, I received an email from Brett Mandel of Philadelphia Forward. That's hardly big news. I'm on his list and I get at least 4 emails a week from him (or so it seems). I generally read them, click through to his sight check some stuff out and get back to whatever it was I was doing.

This one was different.

Its subject line "View of Philadelphia from Manhattan is troubling" caught my attention. I don't know. Maybe it's because I still care way too much about what people think of me. I also happen to care a lot about what people think of my home city. I reprinted the article he refers to here so you can check it out. In his email, Brett had this caveat for his readers:

While City Journal definitely has a slant, as a publication of the Manhattan Institute it should not be ignored and authors Harry Siegel's and Fred Siegel's take on "Street Cleaning in Philly" (subtitled "Is reform finally coming to a corrupt city?") is instructive for us. Some facts are wrong and some ideas are questionable, but the perception comes through loud and clear. (emphasis mine)

Then I read the piece and realized just how wrong some of the facts are. In fact, I hesitated to post it because of how ridiculously wrong some of it is. However, as much as that bothered me, I couldn't help but have two opposite feelings simulatenously: (1) these Siegel guys are being really unfair, we (the people of Philadelphia) aren't that permissive of our corrupt politicians and (2) or are we?

Aside from lumping all black voters in a group and blaming them for what the authors call an "at-least-he's-our-bum" attitude, they don't specifically target the citizens of the city. They keep their criticism aimed at elected officials that they characterize as "a classic suit in search of an office," "political fixer," and leaving "the city little better off than he found it." These criticisms are precisely about the citizens of Philadelphia - voters and non-voters alike - who, in the authors' minds, are happy to keep putting people like this in office.

It's not as bad as Siegel and Siegel make it out to be. Or is it?

PS. If you don't have the energy to respond with substance to this post, feel free to use the comments section to point out all of the factual errors in the column.

Excuse my language for a second as I'm having a hard time controlling my emotions right now but how the whipperpoop did I not already know about Al Taubenberger's blog! Turn your volume up and let the music flow through you!

Where were Philebrity or Philadelphia Will Do on this one or even my favorite Best of Philly blogger, Fight for Room 215? I depend on these guys to keep me informed when there's stuff as crap-tastic as this on the internet. I had to learn about it from some "we hate SEPTA" blog.

Keep up the good work, Team Taubenberger, and don't even THINK about getting rid of the music.

Really, aside from all those words I just wrote, I'm absolutely speechless.

(And I dare you to listen to the music, with headphones, for a half hour... another reason I'm speechless. I've forgotten how to speak.)

Ok... I've recovered from my encounter with Al Taubenberger's new blog (oh no... I opened it again!)

Several minutes later and still whistling the Taubenberger tune...

This election is over as far as I'm concerned. I don't know what Nutter can do to compete with that. The Olivia ad was a stroke of genius but a midi version of "You're a Grand Old Flag" will be impossible to top. He's not giving up, though. Taking a page out of Sam Katz's 2003 playbook, Nutter is courting the skater vote, which I think got Sam all of 3 votes and those were guys who accidentally showed up at the voting booth. I can laugh about it since it was partially my idea for him to do this. I stand by the idea since it I still think embracing LOVE Park's iconic status would go a long way in upping the city's cool factor and generating some of that great buzz that helps draw creative, entrepreneurial types... that and lowering the costs of starting a business.

Anyway, Nutter doesn't quite see LOVE Park in the same light but he is willing to help out with the compromise plan, which, I gotta admit, looks pretty cool. Judging from the location of tomorrow's fundraiser, a penthouse at the Phoenix apartments, I don't think Nutter will have to worry about bringing a helmet.

Oh yeah, and he's doing the "vision thing" with some very thoughtful Drexel students.

The latest episode of Issues Forums in on the air and the web. You can watch it by a number of different platforms: catch it on TV-12, Comcast Digital Channel 242, Comcast Digital Video OnDemand by selecting "Get Local -> WHYY -> The Next Mayor," check out streaming video on our website, or use this link to open up your iTunes and subscribe to our video podcast and watch it on your iPod (my favorite method).

Ok, that's a pretty long-winded way of saying we have a lot of different ways for you to get our content. But what the heck, why not just watch it here:

So let's go through the list of things that the mayor can directly do to improve the local environment:

1. The Visual Environment - There's a sign on a telephone poll near my house that says that littering will get you a $50 fine. This sign violates two economic principles. Laws and fines designed to combat nuisance crimes need two things in order to work - some chance that they will actually be enforced and a crazy steep penalty if they are enforced. Otherwise, rational actors who aren't governed by any higher moral considerations (ie it's just wrong to litter) will multiply their percentage chance of getting caught by the amount of the fine and if that number is less than some number in their subconscious which puts a value on their effort to take their trash to a trashcan, they will litter. Since, in Philadelphia, the chance that the law will be enforced is zero, that number will always be zero so they will always litter.

Even if the city starts enforcing the law, they would need to raise the level of the fine by a lot so that the probability times fine number is high enough to change behavior. Again, a long-winded way of saying that the next mayor can increase the fine and order a crackdown. If he doesn't want to do that, he'll have the far more difficult task of teaching people (adults) that littering is wrong after their parents failed to do so.

2. Clean water - With Philly's combined storm water and waste water system, heavy rains means that the sewage treatment plants are often overflowed. The sewage (human waste and the cat litter that I flush down the toilet) bypasses the treatment system and goes right into the rivers... or into basements. It's an expensive proposition but the next mayor needs to consider overhauling the entire sewer and storm water system. Part of the money can come from charging people according to their impact on the system.

No, that doesn't mean charging people who eat a lot of Mexican food more. It means charging parking lots more for their water-sewer fees. At the very least, even if it doesn't produce enough to overhaul the system, changing the fees would reflect their impact on the system and could generate enough money for other storm water mitigation efforts.

3. Recycling - Once a week, single stream, plastic, glass, metal, paper and cardboard. Some cities even recycle food and yard waste like Seattle's "Zero Waste Strategy." City saves millions in landfill fees and generates millions from the recycling (that's double millions if you're keeping score at home).

4. Fix SEPTA. Ok, ok... the next mayor only has indirect influence over SEPTA but whatever influence he has should go towards modernizing and possibly expanding the system.

5. Renewable energy. I have my own vision for a city that's complete "off the grid" - generating all of it's own power by covering all of these thousands of urban rooftops with solar panels or photovoltaic paint and urban wind farms. No more electricity from the coal fired plants whose waste product follows the wind currents to our city and helps turns the sky into that soupy, opaque color that we've got today.

Surplus electricity could then be sold back to PECO, which would then sell that electricity to the suburbs thus creating a new and mutually beneficial transfer of money from suburbs to city and enable us to eliminate the wage tax - c'mon folks, this is the dream zone. Ever since the power outage I experienced on Monday night, I've since scaled back my vision to solar panels on my house that could power my central air.

Ok... so I went a little overboard and far beyond anything that or panelists had to say. I'm just sick of watching all these other cities do cool things like "green roofs," "zero waste," hybrid cabs, bike stations etc. To borrow a quote from yesterday's Metro, "I think compared to a lot of big cities, Philadelphia probably hasn’t made the leaps and bounds to be seen as a leader on environmental issues... Other cities are willing to take risks to get out front.”

So watch the video and fire away in the comments.

So, the schools have released their newest test scores... Math and Reading scores are up 3 and 2.5 per cent respectively... so what does this mean? It means that there is still a long way to go.

The schools still have 33.5 per cent of students coming in at "below-basic." This equates to almost 62,000 children. A staggering number to be failing expectations. It seems unbelievable to me that this can be the case, but it is, so what can they do?

Who knows what the answer is?

More schools? More teachers? Who knows?

What is known is that something must be done immediately, because though they have made progress steadily over the last five years, more must be made going forward to meet standards as well as do the job of any school system... educate children.

The question is, do the kids want to learn? I know that when I was in High School, it was the last place I wanted to be. Retrospectively, I'm glad I went, but at the time, I did not want to be there, but there was a lot of pressure to go, and I went. This was in the suburbs. In a lot of the schools in Philadelphia, people don't have that pressure because they are worried about other things like staying alive, their next square meal, helping to take care of siblings and other pressures that no child should have to face.

The problems of the Philadelphia schools is greater than the schools themselves, especially if children are distracted by violent crime and their famillies are not pressuring them to attend school because they are worried about the same things.

Finally, who is ultimately responsible for answering this question? Whom do we hold accountable? Is it an unelected official like the CEO of the School District? Is it the 5 unelected members of the SRC who hired the CEO? Or can we hold the mayor and the governor accountable? It's clear that both of them, especially the mayor, need to step up and grab that responsibility, stake their whole reputation and career on it. For the long term success of the city, not much is more important.

Got a tip in response to my glowing praise for Al Taubenberger's blog. Apparently his alternative media savviness can be explained by taking a look at his media adviser's website. Apparently his motto is, "when you're this good, you don't need to advertise." Can I get a copy of that Flash video for my next party so I can play it on an endless loop projected on the wall.

I can't take credit for finding this site, but I want to protect the anonymity of my tipster in case he doesn't want his identity revealed.

Continuing with our theme of Environmental Issues:

David Masur, executive director of PennEnvironment sent in this report.

Monday August 6

To learn more about PennEnvironment or to become an e-activist and stay caught up on local environmental issues, you can visit their website at www.PennEnvironment.org.

And here's a reminder that you can check out our latest episode of Issues Forums to see what some other environmental policy experts had to say about what the next mayor can do to help clean the land, air and water in our region.

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, whom I've referenced so many times on this blog that people are probably starting to think I have a crush on the guy,* was named as one of Esquire's best dressed mayors. The always self-deprecating Mayor Hick, wearing clothes temporarily on loan from Esquire, commented "I have suits that cost less than that [$160] tie."

He also responded to someone who asked about the juxtaposition of the $1200 suit with his $12 haircut with: "Actually, I think my haircut looked good with those fancy clothes."

And just to clarify, I guess there are two reasons why I'll never win such an award. I'll never be a mayor but the chances of me being "best dressed" anything are even more slim than becoming mayor of any place.

I've decided to extend our conversation about environmental issues for another day for a couple of reasons. One, I want to give folks another chance to check out our latest episode of Issues Forums:

Two, I happen to be very interested in this issue because of the potential it has for expanded economic opportunity, energy independence, etc. Articles like this one in the City Paper about affordable green building are right up my alley:

That green housing will one day be as much a part of the building code as safety regulations is probably inevitable; already many states, including Pennsylvania, offer incentives for going green, and some cities, such as Chicago and New York, have begun to do so (Philly has not yet, although Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter has proposed such incentives). But what we may be witnessing with the advent of green affordable housing is something that seems unthinkable in today's America.

Any other "green" ideas that the next mayor can pursue? Sound off in the comments.

Is it time for the Mayor to go to school? Perhaps not as a student, but as an administrator? A new study would say yes.

In a new book by Brown education Professor Kenneth Wong, The Education Mayor,
it shows how cities that disband their school boards in favor of mayoral control perform better on tests.

There is a lot to it, but, according to the study, the improvements would show the equivalent of an additional 4 months of schooling. If this is the case, Philly would be stupid to maintain its educational bureaucracy. One of the reasons that the Mayors can run schools better than boards is because they sit atop the foodchain and can cut through red tape to get things accomplished. If nothing else, the system would be more efficient.

The only real blockade would be that the schoolboard would almost certainly not go peacefully, so it would be up to the mayor to send acting school CEO Tom Brady and his crew packing. It would requirer a lot of intiative, but would be worthwhile? Almost certainly.