The Next Mayor

So Al Taubenberger is about to get endorsed by the deeply respected senior Senator from Pennsylvania.

How else did he spend his weekend?

At the Coffee Klutch, of course.

The race is on to see which politician will be first to jump onto the Phils playoff bandwagon. My guess is Mayor Street, since there's a City Hall rally today. But we shall see...

Today on Radio Times, guest host Dave Davies will be talking to Thomas Paine Cronin, immediate past president of AFSCME District Council 47, the union representing the city's 6,500 white collar workers. He's served in the post since 1980 and leading the union though negotiations with six mayors and six strikes.

Perhaps he'll share his thoughts on the next mayor's unenviable task of negotiating new contracts with all of the city's unions.

Tune into 91FM at 10 am (just 10 minutes from now!) or click here for instructions on how to listen live over the internet. Later today, I'll provide a link to the podcast of the show, just in case you were unable to hear it live.

(edited to add) Here's the podcast of today's show. You can right click on it (or, Mac users, Ctrl Click) and save it as an .mp3. I'm a little disappointed that the conversation didn't get more into the city's current and future financial condition and how the next set of contract negotiations need to take that in account. Cronin's stories about his dealings with past mayors - especially the one about the time a the FOP president aimed a gun at Mayor Green's chest - are pretty interesting.

You can also participate in the show by calling 1-888-477-9499 or using the comments section of this blog post to get your thoughts out there.

Admitting his candidacy was something of a longshot, U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter endorsed Republican Al Taubenberger for mayor today at 30th Street Station.

“I endorse Al, realizing fully the steep climb he has as a Republican candidate in the city of Philadelphia,” said Specter, who spoke before boarding a train to Washington DC.

Specter ­– who ran unsuccessfully for mayor as a Republican in 1967 -- said the city needed a change of leadership.

“Michael Nutter could be an agent of change, but it’s tougher if you come in with the party,” he said.

Taubenberger thanked Specter and gave him a Phillies hat, suggesting that his candidacy was not unlike the Phillies’ quest for a championship.

“Underdogs do have a chance at winning,” he said.

Specter will also hold a fundraiser for Taubenberger on October 20th.

Following the WHYY TV-12 50th Anniversary party on Saturday afternoon, at which I manned a "Next Mayor" table, giving me plenty of opportunities to explain why this election is still important even though, in their words, "we already know who it is," I hoofed it over to the Parkway for the Campus Philly Kick Off. Since this is a festival geared towards the students of the region's many fine institutions of high learning, perhaps I'll share what I learned from covering this event:

1. It's a long walk from 6th and Race to 23 and the Parkway when you've got a tripod and miniDV cam slung over your shoulder, 20 feet of cable in your pocket and a stick microphone in your hand. C'mon, you thought this project had money to pay for cans?

2. College students are soooo much younger than I remember them from when I was in school. And music is soooo much louder.

3. If the Simpsons ever did a parody of two candidates addressing a college-age crowd, they would have their Democrat and Republican in exactly the same outfits that Nutter and Taubenberger were wearing.

4. From Taubenberger, I learned specifically that "war is no good," we need the grass to be greener and that his plan for creating more jobs is to give political science majors jobs on his staff.

5. Al may be a nice guy, but that didn't spare him from a number of choice anti-GOP epithets being hurled from the back of the crowd. Apparently, this wasn't a big hang-out for the young Republicans.

Anyway, here are some highlights from Saturday's event:

(edited to add) Judging from his vigorous defense of the President, Taubenberger is anxious to shred his Republican membership card.

At WHYY TV-12's 50th Anniversary event on Saturday, I set up a little Next Mayor information table to remind people that there is, in fact, an election in November and regardless of the likely outcome, it's still an important event.

Why? Elections, unlike any other event, give us a chance to interact with candidates and talk to them, and each other, about all of the many issues that confront us each and every day. They give us a chance to discuss the role that government plays, or should play, in confronting those issues. Elections give us a chance to express what we want from our government officials and help set an agenda for the short term - until the next election - and the long term.

So to everyone that came up to me, read some of my literature, asked about the project, learned about our The Next Mayor Candidate Forum on October 25th, and the said, "Well, we know who it's going to be." I simply replied, "that doesn't mean we shouldn't use every opportunity to get him to talk about the issues."

And then I gave them one, actually several, of these:

(Photo via Flickr from user Triborough)

Here's the deal, folks. I have about 4000 of those buttons and I'd really like to get them all to a good home. If you want one, email me and give me some way to contact you.

While you're at it, get some information about our mayoral forum webcast on 10/25. You're going to have to take a couple minutes to do a quick, simple, and free registration but I guarantee you an experience with a candidate forum unlike any you've ever had. You can also find out how to get your own face on the broadcast through the magic of YouTube.

For all the Phillies fans out there (and I count myself as one of them to the point where the trip to my first Phillies game at the Vet is emblazoned in my memory), it's been a good run, but thanks to a certain sports weekly with a well known cover curse, we can pretty much be sure that National League East Champions will be the only banner we're raising next spring.

However, another Philadelphia institution was featured in a national magazine this week. That's right, Michael Nutter's dream has come true with a nice, long feature in what's gotta be his favorite magazine - Governing. (I mean, c'mon, with a wonkish article that compares "cool cities" to "nerdistans," how can it not be?)

The on-line version of the article includes long footnotes that make it read like something from David Foster Wallace. For those of you who have been following the race from the beginning, there's probably nothing in there that you don't already know but you can gain some insight into how the rest of the country is seeing this race.

It also includes a term that, according to the author, Philadelphians use to describe the city - "Bos-troit." I have to admit, I've never heard that term before but I guess it's as accurate as any term used to describe a city with thriving and struggling neighborhoods in close proximity. The article is also useful for reminding us of things we may have forgotten about in all the "elect the Nutter, save the world" frenzy of primary:

The school situation is a symptom of a larger challenge: Philadelphia has what is technically a strong-mayor system of government, but in fact there are vast reaches of policy over which Nutter will have little or no control. He can’t make decisions about SEPTA, the metro area’s financially troubled transit agency. He will have little to say about two new casinos going up in Philadelphia, the result of a deal arranged by the legislature. Even the parking meters in the city are now operated by the state. “The mayor of Philadelphia has far less power and control than people think,” says Phil Goldsmith, the city’s former managing director. “We’ve become a very balkanized, fragmented government.”

Toss in some reminders of a pending fiscal crisis, unions chomping at the bit for raises and better health care, a tax rate that continues to be higher than most cities and a crumbling infrastructure, and you get a picture that's an even more sobering reminder of the challenges ahead than any sports magazine cover jinx can muster.

You guys do realize you have one week to register to vote in the general, right?

OK, so the general is not quite the thrill-fest that the primary was. But I know there are lots of Philadelphians who haven't bothered to change their registration, or haven't bothered to get registered at all.

This is a good time to fix that. Go to the Committee of Seventy's Web site, here, for a downloadable registration form that you can mail in.

The 13th Floor, Governing Magazine's blog took a moment to play "guess that mayor" and gave the following list of accomplishments:

-A budget surplus

-A pioneering effort to bring wireless Internet citywide

Of course we all know that they're talking about our very own John Street. They then make the comment:

What's more, almost everyone hates him.

They succinctly explain that Street's defenders tend to blame his portrayal in the media for his low approval ratings while his opponents point out that many of his accomplishments can't make up for much deeper problems - problems like a looming budget crisis that threaten to wipe out all of the gains that Philadelphia has made since the early 90s.

How does this set things up for the next mayor? On the one hand, it would seem that Street has set the bar so low that whichever candidate succeeds him needs only be reasonably personable and drop the annual murder total to a previously-unacceptable-but-now-good-by-comparison 390. On the other hand, like the championship-starved Philadelphia fans who now expect the Phillies to lead them to the promised land, the expectations for the next mayor are going to be so high, that one little stumble can send him down to Street's approval ratings.

What can I say? We're Philadelphia. We live with the dizzying highs and the sickening lows. No creamy middles for us.

Here's some really interesting non-Rockies-related stuff from Denver.

Parking authorities there are now using a new, high-tech "boot" to force ticket scofflaws to pay their fines. Now Denverites can use their cell phones to call in and pay their fines by credit card. They'll receive a code to unlock the boot and go on their merry way - though they'll have to return the boot themselves or face additional fines.

Pretty neat stuff.

Michael Nutter and Al Taubenberger continued their back slapping, bosom buddies routine today at a forum at the Union League, hosted by radio personality Michael Smerconish.

Ever congenial, the Democratic and Republican mayoral candidates clashed only a handful of times.

Yawn.

Taubenberger said he didn’t support Nutter’s “stop and frisk” policing proposal, which Nutter seems to have started referring to as “stop, think, don’t carry.”

“I believe in some ways the policy already exists,” Taubenberger said. “If there’s probable cause, the police have every right to stop someone and frisk them.”

Nutter said the plan would improve public safety by getting illegal weapons off the street.

The two also struck different tones on the city’s ability to fund pension and health care costs for city workers.

“We’ve got to come to the reality of where we are today,” Nutter said. “Unlike the federal government, we don’t print money in the basement. Our pension fund currently is about 52 percent funded.”

But Taubenberger seemed to have a different take on the financial situation, saying “you just have to take a look and find where those dollars are.”

The two joked around frequently throughout the hour-long session. At one point Taubenberger spoke about his plans to bring jobs to Philadelphia.

“If I became mayor, I would hire Michael Nutter,” he said.

Nutter shot back: “You can’t afford me.”

Al Taubenberger had a press conference today to release a bold policy statement. Someone else's bold policy statement. That was first put out several months ago.

Ok. I'll ignore for now the fact that the most substantive policy idea to come out of the Taubenberger campaign is a plan that John Perzel introduced in September 2006. The plan itself is more of the same "lets go to Harrisburg to take care of our problems by begging them for money since they won't give us the authority to make laws of our own." Those tactics may have worked in the past, but if this past primary has shown us anything, it has shown us that the same, tired, old promises about being able to "go to Harrisburg" and "go to Washington" and get money out of them have worn a little thin.

So let's take a closer look at Taubenberger's statement:

The plan calls for 10,000 new police officers to be distributed throughout the state with 1,345 coming to Philadelphia. While many feel stricter gun laws are the answer to quell the violence, Perzel believes the current laws need to be enforced first.

Both Taubenberger and Perzel agree - putting more police on the streets is the only way to enforce these laws.

To me, if a candidate is putting a quote from another elected official in his press release to demonstrate his support for that official, it means that he agrees with everything in the quote. Therefore, Taubenberger does not support one-gun-a-month legislation. Yet, according to statements he's made before, including at yesterday's Union League Forum, he also doesn't support aggressive policing (a.k.a. "stop and frisk" or "stop, think, don't carry" or whatever it's being called today) to get guns away from those who can't legally carry them.

So what are those 1,345 extra cops going to all day? Stand on street corners and with buckets and signs that say put your illegal gun here?

Listen as I say this as clearly as I can. I don't begrudge firefighters any benefits they can get. There's is a dangerous job that I don't think I'd ever want to do. I might complain about the eye strain I get from looking at a computer or the boredom I feel from going to yet another candidate forum where no one says anything interesting, but at least I don't have to run into burning buildings.

That said, I get a little more worried about the future of the city every time I read another PICA memo about the budget. This one takes the Street administration to task for not appealing a court decision to award the firefighters health benefit contribution increases equaling 45 percent over three years.

The major problem is that the administration assumed much lower increases in benefits when they presented a barely-balanced five-year plan. So now the city either has to appeal the benefits and hope that they win or change the five-year plan to bring it into balance with this new reality. Of course, the only ways to do that are cut services (more) or raise taxes.

And that's not the worst of it.

According to the PICA memo:

Additionally, with all of the other municipal unions in arbitration or negotiations over health benefits, and the next mayor facing new contracts for all of the unions by July of 2008, this award sets a potential precedent for other agreements that could cripple the new administration as it attempts to maintain or improve services while balancing the Plan.

Yep... cripple. So, once again, here's the situation facing the next mayor. Either he stays firm on bringing the skyrocketing costs of benefits in line by prying concessions out of the unions, most likely after a long, contentious negotiation and/or a strike. So now, we've got costs under control but city workers, who don't really make all that much anyway, have their health and retirement security lessened possibly creating a whole lot of sick and/or poor old people when they retire.

Or... the next mayor gives in and settles for benefits that continue to eat up more and more of the budget until just about the only thing being paid for by tax money are salaries, health benefits and the pension fund (and prison costs). Infrastructure crumbles. Potholes don't get filled. Recycling gets picked up every other week. The grass at parks and rec centers goes unmowed. Not enough cops on the streets. Actually... doesn't seem all that much different from what we have now. Ok. Imagine all of that stuff and a whole lot worse.

Option three is to grant those benefits and raise taxes to get the revenue to pay for them and maintain or, gasp, improve services. Would Nutter do that? Guess we'll know all of these answers by this time next year.

Meanwhile, everyone follow my lead. Set up separate bins in your house for each of the 7 different types of plastic, metal/glass, food waste (make sure it seals), paper, cardboard and every other type of garbage. Then figure out where you can recycle each thing. You can use this site but you're going to find that for a lot of different plastics, you'll have to drop it off on an Ambler curbside for pick up. You may also want to start a compost pile. This will prepare you for next summer's garbage strike. Either that, or buy a pick up truck and charge your neighbors a couple bucks each to haul their trash. Just watch out picketers.

Mike Nutter will be doing the following on Saturday:

9:00 am: Mount Airy Community Clean-Up Chew Avenue and E. Pleasant Street

4:30 pm: South Philadelphia High School Centennial Celebration, South Philadelphia High School, Broad Street & Snyder Ave.

And these things on Sunday:

11:00 am: Congregation Rodeph Shalom Men’s Club Meeting, 615 North Broad Street

11:30 am: Philadelphia Columbus Day Parade Broad & Federal Streets

3:00 pm: Outfest Event Spruce & 13th Streets

And Al Taubenberger will be doing these things on Saturday:

8:00 a.m. – 9:30 a.m.: Attending the "Mutt Strut," a fund-raiser for Philadelphia animal welfare agency PAWS, at FDR Park, Broad and Pattison

10:00 a.m.: Attending the Engine 52 Celebration, Engine 52, 4501 Van Kirk Street

College students, that is.

Temple University has a program called MURL - the Multimedia Urban Reporting Lab as part of the journalism program. For a while now, journalism students have been sent out into various neighborhoods to dig up some stories and the results have been fascinating.

The Next Mayor project is partnering up with this program to help share the work of these students with folks in the city and the region who are interested in Philadelphia's issues. By exploring issues at the neighborhood level, we are hoping to show that Philadelphians, whether they're from Bridesburg or Bella Vista, share similar concerns about the future of their communities and their city.

Check out a few of the videos that we're currently featuring from the MURL program. We'll be changing that page from time to time to feature different videos.

You can also poke around MURL's own website to see what else they've been working on. They take "multimedia" pretty seriously. You'll see in-depth print stories, extra video footage of interviews with neighborhood residents, photo spreads from well-known neighborhood spots and tightly produced video features.

I just settled in at the Doubletree Hotel's Ormandy Ballroom for a two-day conference sponsored by the International Economic Development Council. Over the next day and a half, the biggest names and thinkers in urban economic development will be reviewing 40 years of work in that field, discussing what has worked, what hasn't worked and where we go from here.

They've chose Philadelphia for the site of this event for the specific examples offered by this city's recent history. In fact, at 4 pm today, they're devoting an entire session to "What we learned about urban economic development in Philadelphia."

I'll be live blogging throughout the event and shooting some video from some of the more interesting presentations. I've also just learned that Michael Nutter will be at the lunch today. Though, if you think about it, that's not too surprising. For someone who has "wonk" thrown into his description as often as Nutter does, an event like this is like the World Series is to a baseball fan.

I'll also be using what I learn here to add to our "Good Growth" and "Jobs" pages on thenextmayor.com/

More in a little while...

The conversation now has turned toward a review of a paper on the overview of urban economic development of the past 40 years. The conference participants are adding their own input to this briefing paper, providing specific examples from their own experience and challenging or adding to the historical conclusions of the paper.

But for the lay person, I'd like to start with defining economic development. I've skimmed over the paper now and I think it assumes that everyone knows exactly what we're talking about.

As far as I can tell, "economic development" basically refers to any action or legislation by government - local, state or federal - that is intended, either directly or indirectly, to lead to the creation of new employment opportunities.

Sometimes these strategies and actions work. Sometimes they fail miserably. The paper, which I'll summarize later, gives a lot of example where the unintended consequence of a government action was the direct opposite of economic development in urban areas.

One participant just defined economic development as previously being "smokestack chasing" or business attraction and retention - which simply wasn't working. She then added that it had to evolve to mean "quality of life" as well - making areas livable so that people and businesses would desire to locate in a certain place.

Up to now, the discussion about the changes in cities over the past 40 years and the challenges moving forward hasn't touched on what one participant referred to as "the 800 pound gorilla in room" - race relations.

Mr. John Sower, President of the Chesapeake Business Finance Corp, a Washington-based SBA, started this conversation of race by talking about white attitudes in the 40s and 50s which came into view as a result of the riots of the 1960s when it the conditions of cities and the "white flight" that had occurred over the previous 20 years came to light. Mr. Sower was seconded on this point by Mr. Michael Montgomery who offered that the discussion of economic development needs to include the urban superintendents of schools, for obvious reasons.

The conversation is turning to the mayors of big cities and other city management professionals and how they didn't understand the implications of many federal urban programs for their cities. Economic development policy didn't have a place near the center of power in cities for several years and has only recently been given a place at the table.

The conversation is turning now to how certain cities responded to economic development initiatives. International Economic Development Council (IEDC) President and CEO just gave Philadelphia some recognition for being one of the best cities at putting instruments in place to carry out an urban economic development agenda. (Go Philly!)

Click "Continue Reading" to learn how other cities dealt with their challenges.

The conversation has taken an interesting turn with the question "who were some of the mayors who understood urban economic development and fought the battle for cities?"

Henry Maier, mayor of Milwaukee for 28 years, was the first mentioned. According to Mr. Ronald C. Kysiak, who worked for Maier, the mayor opened an economic development office and forged alliances with other big cities in Wisconsin and rural counties by explaining to them that they all were facing the same challenge - losing jobs to the suburbs. How interesting could that be? The next mayor of Philadelphia linking up, not only with the surrounding suburbs, but with Clearfield, Dauphin, Forest and other primarily rural counties in Pennsylvania.

Mayor Bill Schaefer of Baltimore was also mentioned for the work he did for that city. Others mentioned include George Voinovich for his time as a Republican mayor of Cleveland during the Reagan administration.

(edited to add) Mr. James C. Hankla from Long Beach, California, made the important point that successful "economic development mayors surround themselves with prominent economic development professionals." The mayor can't do all of the work himself and for the most part needs to use the bully pulpit to push for changes. The takeaway of this statement for Philadelphia is that it will be important to watch the next mayor during the transition period to see if he surrounds himself with these "prominent economic development professionals."

(edited to add II) Mr. Finkle from IECD has asked for more names of mayors who have walked the economic development walk, to which the following mayors were put out there:
Shirley Franklin from Atlanta
Francis Slay from St. Louis
Ed Rendell
Rudy Giuliani
Tony Williams, who will be featured in a future Next Mayor video, and Adrian Fenty from Washington D.C.
Richard Daley in Chicago

Check out the links for more info about these folks.

The morning session has come to a close and lunch will be starting at noon. Walt D'Alessio, who would be in the Urban Economic Development Hall of Fame, if there were such a thing, for his work in Philadelphia, will be introducing Michael Nutter.

Just before breaking, Jeff Finkle introduced me and explained my role on The Next Mayor and then solicited from the crowd their advice for the next mayor of Philadelphia. (Actually, he asked what advice would they have for Michael Nutter. Looks like everyone understands the reality of the political situation here.) I scribbled some notes rather furiously which I'll share later. Apparently, Nutter himself will be asking for such feedback from this eminent group and I plan on getting some video of that.

Live blogging will pick up after lunch.

...for today's coverage of the endorsements so far in the race. The Service Employees International Union, which represents health care, public services and building services workers and has over 13,000 members in Philadelphia, is planning to endorse Michael Nutter tomorrow at 1 p.m.

Just got back from the lunch session where I got some video of Michael Nutter speaking to and taking questions from a room of urban economic development professionals. Of course, the reception he got was pretty warm. Nutter got the rock star treatment that Bono seemed to get from the folks in the Inquirer/Daily News building a little while ago.

I'm going to scarf down some food real quick and do a post that includes the recommendations made by this group for Philadelphia's next mayor.

Stay tuned.

How come every time I hear the word Dayton, I immediately think of the SNL skit referred to in the title of this blog post?

Right now, the group is getting a presentation about economic development efforts in Dayton, Ohio. Starting in 1972, these efforts included several downtown redevelopment projects, industrial park and site development, neighborhood development projects, etc.

Click on "Continue Reading" to see just how similar Dayton's experience has been to Philadelphia's.

"9/11, as tragic as it was, broke the molecule of economic development into various pieces allowing us to see the effects of each part of those pieces." - Ken Patton on the effects of 9/11 on lower Manhattan.

I'm sitting through a pretty interesting discussion of market forces on real estate decisions in New York. Mr. Patton says, in spite of predictions that businesses would relocate far away from the urban core due to safety concerns and prices, the opposite has happened. Businesses, nationwide, have actually been moving to the high-rent, less vacant spaces, primarily in Class A, modern office space. He compared these offices spaces to graphite shafts on golf clubs. They're more expensive but everyone who's serious about golf realizes that they need them to compete.

We're seeing the same thing in Philadelphia with the low vacancy of new buildings like the Comcast Tower.

The presentation shows, however, just how much of an outlier New York City is when put in with the rest of the nation's large cities. One chart placed lines representing employment and real wages on graphs over time from the 1970s for New York and the United States. In New York, employment has remained relatively flat (how could it go up?) while real wages have skyrocketed. The opposite is seen for the nation as a whole, with employment growing rapidly and real wages actually remaining flat and, most recently, declining.

The lesson? I guess if you want to be the mayor of city with high productivity, high-wage jobs, move to New York. We'll see where the conversation goes and whether the room thinks New York has any lessons to offer to other cities. I expect the Philly inferiority complex to rear its ugly head.

Click "Continue Reading" to read about the comments or questions on the New York experience.

Before we take an in-depth look at the lessons that Philadelphia has for economic development efforts, we're using a few minutes to talk about what the future holds.

Mr. Don Hunter started the conversation by asking whether housing or something else revitalize cities and drive economic development.

Mr. Herb Bailey picks up the ball on that question by talking about his experience in Miami. Mr. Bailey is the former assistant city manager for Miami's departments of Development, Housing Conservation, Finance and Community Development. He makes the point that downtowns need to become "user friendly" to attract people to live, shop and play there.

Jeff Finkle focuses the question. Have we given up on maintaining urban spaces for anything other than residential and retail? Have we given up on manufacturing in cities?

Participants agree that this a big issues, especially because of the point already raised about the relative cost to governments of residential vs. industrial/commercial space.

Click on "Continue Reading" to see where the discussion goes.

I have some crazy complicated notes written down about this part of the conversation and I'm going to have to sort through them to make some kind of coherent blog post out of it.

I will say, it's kind of cool to see all of these economic development professionals with such intense interest in what they can learn from Philadelphia. It's nice to know that we've done some things right.

I'll be back here tomorrow when the conversation will turn a little more to recommendations for where to go with all of this information. What does the future hold for urban economic development? I'll also work on piecing together the video from Nutter's lunch time speech. That should be ready by the end of the day tomorrow.

Things are just about to get started this morning at the International Council of Economic Development conference. The first item on the agenda is a presentation about PIDC, the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation, by it's president, Peter Longstreth.

PIDC is one of those many "quasi-public agencies" that many people in Philadelphia don't know anything about. Hopefully, this session, as well as being a tutorial for the folks in the room here can also shed some light on this organization for readers of this blog and followers of The Next Mayor project.

More updates to come soon.

Peter Longstreth, the president of PIDC, starts by reminding everyone about the national trends that have affected all cities - suburbanization, corporate consolidation and relocation, productivity gains, transformation from manufacturing to service-based, reduction of federal resources and many of the social/poverty problems affecting urban areas.

9:01 AM: Fun fact: there are about 662,000 workers in Philadelphia down from probably over a million in 1950. However, there has been a growth in employees in Philadelphia in 5 of the last 9 years.

Click on "Continue Reading" to read more about Peter Longstreth's presentation on urban economic development in Philadelphia.

Peter Longstreth from PIDC just wrapped up his presentation about current economic development efforts in Philadelphia. So this is as good a time as any to start tying up some loose ends.

I started this live blogging effort with a question: What is economic development?

Jeff Finkle, the organizer of this event, saw that question and my attempt at an answer and provided me with an answer that is, at the same time, more concise and broader than mine:

Economic Development is the creation, retention, and expansion of jobs, the development of tax base and the enhancement of wealth.

I think I came close.

We're about to move on to the final sessions. Where do we go from here? And how do we apply those lessons to Philadelphia or any urban setting? What advice does this group have for future urban economic developers?

While acknowledging that "there is no Marshal Plan for urban areas," Mr. Victor Hausner says that there is a debate going on, especially among Democrats, about a national economic development strategy to deal with globalization. What's missing however, is what he calls a "sub-national" economic development strategy, specifically a coherent plan for economic development in urban areas.

What can, like the ones assembled in this room, do to fill that void? Hausner gives examples of past influences of urban economic development professionals on the federal level, citing the Carter administration specifically. He also cites the examples of Great Britain where e.d. professionals have influenced that nations government to invest tens of millions in urban economic development.

Opportunities

Hausner continues by describing how the international economy provides an opportunity for cities. The potential for partnership between foreign and American firms is substantial. Other nations have programs to expand their small and medium-sized businesses to other countries. The United States should be welcoming those firms into its cities. There's also an opportunity to attract the wealth that is being built up in other countries by making it easier for wealthy foreign individuals to get their green cards and relocate themselves and their families to the U.S. (ala the EB-5 Visa)

Provided without attribution (my apologies) because my position in the room makes it tough for me to see all of the names. The recommendations are probably the most important parts of this post.

1. Incentives are key. Tax incentives for brownfield reclamation are an example. Be careful about the use of eminent domain for economic development. Economic developers need more business people in their ranks, participating in their conferences and giving them feedback.

Click on "Continue Reading" to see what the room has to offer.

Walt D'Alessio offered his perspective as a longtime Philadelphia economic developer on what Philly can take away from the recommendations in the previous blog post.

He said that the most important point was establishing the connection between economic development AND workforce development.

According to Walt, the new mayor (Nutter) has to take the initiative of breaking down the political and geographic boundaries in the region.

Michael Nutter today appeared in the Northeast with U.S. Sen. Bob Casey and U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz to talk about crime fighting strategies, and Catherine Lucey was there to report on it.

(The Northeast location had no real significance beyond proximity to Schwartz's office.)

Casey and Schwartz pledged their support to Nutter, but mainly wanted to talk about the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program, which provides grants for state and local law enforcement.

The Senate is expected to soon send a bill reauthorizing the program to President Bush. Schwartz and Casey said they feared he would veto it.

“The decision shouldn’t be to cut a program that works,” said Casey. “He’ll give $100 billion to wealthy people in a tax cut.”

Nutter agreed.

“Everyone knows crime went down in the late 90s when we had full funding for the COPS program,” he said.

I've been recovering from my marathon live-blogging sessions at the International Economic Development Council's "Celebrating 40 Years of Economic Development" event on Monday and Tuesday. It's given me time to go through a lot of my favorite blogs and some new ones that I hadn't seen before. I realized that I've gotten away from one of the things that I think a good blog does - provide links to other interesting things on the internet so that the blog's users don't have to do it themselves.

And trust me. There's plenty of good information being generated about pretty much every Philadelphia issue you can imagine.

So let's get started.

One of my old favorites, Young Philly Politics, uses its own cyber bully pulpit to take Councilman Darrell Clarke to task for his alleged involvement in getting a political rival's vacant lot cleaning contract terminated. You may remember that I wrote about this when the Inquirer first did this story. YPP's Dan U-A shares the outrage of City Paper columnist Bruce Schimmel and encourages the media "to keep hammering away at Clarke and the Mayor, and [get] some answers." As a fairly new member of "the media" my investigative skills aren't quite as polished as some of the good folks at the Daily News, but if anyone has any tips for me, feel free to share.

Staying with YPP for a moment, contributor CharlieNJ uses a New York Times piece on Seattle's amazing transformation as a leader in recycling to point out, once again, the sad state of Philadelphia's recycling rate. Where Seattle seems to collect, nay, mandate that just about everything made out of, um, matter be recycled, Philadelphia recycles just 5% of its waste stream. In fact, I think I cause more environmental damage driving my plastics and cardboard to a recycling drop off site than I prevent by recycling them.

It's tough to find anyone who has ever spoken on the record to explain why this hasn't happened. Most explanations come in the comments sections of stories about recycling and are some anonymously written variation of "John Street and [insert city official's name here] don't care about recycling." In a 2005 Philadelphia Weekly article, Streets Commissioner Clarena Tolson attempts to explain it by placing the blame back on you and me:

But Tolson insists improving residential recycling rates is an epic task.

"In some ways our citizens haven't embraced recycling, and they haven't embraced enforcement," she says. "We need to reproduce some of the public awareness efforts done in the past and promote them more consistently."

She also blames high start-up costs (distributing new bins, buying new trucks, paying the waste processors) and seems to ignore the dollar figures that get tossed around as the NET benefit of more recycling.

Next item, please.

Phil Goldsmith, former managing director, joins the chorus of folks who think that Jannie Blackwell is, to put it nicely, using "councilmanic privilege" improperly in her opposition to relocating the Youth Study Center. To his credit, he doesn't use the phrase "holding the city hostage." Reading this column led me to find Phil's blog, where his latest entry is a supplement to his column advocating for non-partisan elections. Apparently, New York has been talking about such a change for a few years - and they've actually elected mayors from both major parties!

Next item, please.

Heard in the Hall, the much more active predecessor to Mayorpalooza, reminds us that while there's little doubt left in any of this year's city elections, some Council candidates are still floating interesting ideas. The promise to "look into" candidate Green IV's budget plan (please, don't fall asleep) and I look forward to seeing their analysis. Most promising seems to be Green's use of the oft-mentioned-but-never-implemented idea of tying his "Zero Based Budgeting Model to service benchmarks" and "tying costs to programs" so that "taxpayers can more accurately evaluate the value and the need of a program." In other words, we'd finally know exactly how much it costs (in employee wages and benefits, materials, equipment etc.) to operate a library or fill a pothole. One of these days someone will actually make this happen. Michael Nutter seems to want to go in this direction (see page 4).

Next item, please.

I have little to add to the discussion of City Council's attempt to ban trans fats from the city so I'll defer to D-Mac. It seems to me, that a city that once had a "bowling alley tax," which effectively closed all of the city's bowling alleys, would realize that if you want to get rid of something, tax the crap out of it (cf. wage tax, effect on jobs).

Great Expectations has been doing the yeoman's work of, well, raising expectations. On Monday, they invited zoning expert Matt Blanchard to field questions about the work of the Zoning Code Commission. His answer to the guy who basically said "why do we even need zoning?" is especially good. Short version - you don't like zoning? Move to Houston where you can live next door to a rendering plant.

Sticking with Great Expectations, Tom Ferrick took a stab at ranking, from best to worst, the city's last seven mayors. His best - Ed Rendell. That's no surprise since chronological proximity to the present time often influences such rankings (IMDB's second best movie on its top 250 is Shawshank Redemption). His worst - Frank Rizzo. Mr. Ferrick, consider your South Philadelphia privileges revoked. He doesn't include Joe Clark who I think needs to be in there just to round out the post-charter reform group of mayors. What's your ranking? I'll share mine in the comments. Another interesting note, which Ferrick himself points out, is that one of the only two responses he got to this post comes from noted bibliophile, St. Rep. Mark Cohen.

The Metro's Metropolis blog, the successor to Best of Philly winner "Fight For Room 215," offers a little commentary on yesterday's made-for-the-media event featuring Sen. Bob Casey, Rep. Allyson Schwartz and Michael Nutter. They ask the most important point about an event that really didn't generate any news aside from putting these three people in the same place: "Let's see how their cooperation stops people from shooting each other throughout the city."

Finally, Brett Mandel at Philadelphia Forward also wants to remind you that (1) there's an election on November 6th (2) there are two candidates and (3) they've both been captured and places in small prison cells reminiscent of the Phantom Zone from Superman II. The winner of the election will be freed from Brett's cell and then quickly reimprisoned (seriously? that's not a word?) in the aforementioned Room 215.

Ok... folks, so rank the mayors! And if you do it here, please do it on Ferrick's post too, since I basically ganked his idea.

I mean, c'mon. The guy's name is David! Just think of the possibilities.

But seriously, mdcphilly at Young Philly Politics had a nice long conversation with Mr. Oh, who, while supporting tax credits for the film industry to create jobs in Philly, is a pretty respectable filmmaker himself.

Oh yeah, and Sam Katz endorsed him too in an ad that you won't see on television.

There's still 26 days left until the election and already the story is being written about this project, albeit, by me. Check out the article in Quill, read by literally tens of journalism professors.

I've always wondered how the "El" in Chicago achieved its iconic status (I mean, it's featured in the open credits of Perfect Strangers) while the "El" in Philadelphia has, at best, been a large hulk, darkening the neighborhoods it runs through and, at worst, turned those neighborhoods into our own versions of mid-80s Beirut.

That may soon change if the work of one lone filmmaker, with his small, unassuming video camera and tripod, gains greater notoriety. Yesterday's Philadelphia Weekly cover story tells the story of David Kessler, whose work, Shadow World, chronicles the stories of various people who live, work, play, or simply exist in the shadow of the El as it runs through Kensington. He'll talk to just about anyone who will talk to him and he turns these conversations into short web videos that he's been sharing on his blog.

If you're not from this part of the city, it's a great way to get to know just a few of the folks who live there and hear about their daily struggles and triumphs. In the article, Kessler emphasizes that he's not trying to comment on the condition of the neighborhood, not trying to paint a picture of Kensington as "good" or "bad." He's just trying to get people to tell their own stories:

...Kessler created a set of rules for himself when filming—things like never placing himself in the video and, whenever possible, letting the direction of the conversations be dictated by the subjects themselves.

“When people talk about Kensington, they often give really canned answers—it’s drugs; it’s prostitutes; it’s really bad here. I’m not making a documentary about how bad it is. I’m looking for what I find beautiful and what I find ugly. I’ll let the viewer decide if it’s bad.”

The next mayor has the opportunity to take on a challenge that has confounded this city for decades. One of Philadelphia's perceived strengths - that it is a "city of neighborhoods" - has also been, in some ways, a barrier to achieving citywide consensus on important issues. Perhaps the first step is take advantage of the work of people like Kessler who are bridging the gaps between people in different neighborhoods. I, for one, am already learning something by watching.

The City Paper's Political Notebook floats this idea for the Nutter-elect's new chief of staff - Councilman Jim Kenney.

One person who seems to be opposed to the idea - Councilman Jim Kenney.

I've more or less given up on taking the Political Notebook's predictions seriously, ever since I bought into their idea that State Senator Anthony Williams would definitely run for mayor.

Fool me twice... you won't get fooled again.

Philadelphia Weekly has an article about one of the results of the recent CNN-YouTube debate - spinoffs! (Yeah, we're doing it too. Great minds think alike, apparently, and steal the same great ideas.)

I don't know what else can be said about Next Great City's October 15th event since the deadline for video submission has past and it's sold out. You can get on the waiting list.

Hopefully, they'll make it available on-line afterwards for everyone who didn't get a chance to see it.

As for our event on the 25th, don't forget to take a couple minutes and register so that you watch from the comfort of your office computer!

The Jewish Exponent has a pretty decent wrap-up of recent, separate appearances by Michael Nutter and Al Taubenberger at Congregation Rodeph Shalom.

Not too many groundbreaking things in the article. Both hate taxes and pay-to-play. Their differences in their approaches to illegal guns get some play.

Most of the more fun campaign fund raisers I've heard about have included big time Hollywood celebrities or lots of alcohol. Never before have I seen a political fund raiser featuring a "puzzle master."

Until now.

Leave it to a low profile township commissioner race in the suburbs to lead the way with creative campaigning.

(by the way, the answer is fundraiser)

According to Dan U-A at YPP, the answer is cover City Council elections:

The media:
What can I say? The Philly political media basically had a blackout of the District Council races. As I mentioned a while back, I thought the print media did a decent job of covering the Mayor’s race. But in the 8th? There was basically nothing until almost the last week of the campaign. If reporters feel like they have some civic responsibility to help inform the issues, then they need to really look themselves in the mirror before the next set of political races. Really, the only thing that got press in the Council races were ballot challenges, and things of that nature.

While I'm not endorsing or even necessarily agreeing with Dan's specific claims (and to his credit, he recognizes how, as the son of a candidate, the media would look especially skeptically at information he provides), I do appreciate his larger point and it's something I've been talking about for a while now - though not as much on this blog.

We, the media, need to figure out a way to dig deeper into all of these elections and deliver that information - especially during the primary campaigns, which are, for better or worse, the de facto elections for City Council. It does no one any good to dig up information about council candidates after the primary. We may like to think that people can still decide to give such candidates the boot in November, but let's not be naive about it.

We need to be able to do this given the fact that resources are continually being stretched, almost to the breaking point. Newspapers have anywhere from 1 to 5 reporters who would have had to have covered up 5 mayoral candidates, 10 district council primaries with anywhere from 2 to 4 candidates, dozens of At-Large candidates, etc. At any given time, WHYY has 2 or 3 radio reporters. KYW has a handful of reporters. The commercial television stations often rely on general assignment reporters to do political stories - if they do them at all.

The mass media model simply isn't designed for and hasn't adapted to the needs of voters in these lower profile elections - hence the tendency to focus on things that are easy to understand, like ballot challenges.

So what is the answer? How can we make sure that the proper, objective, well-researched investigative stories are done for each of these campaigns? Reporters who aren't following the day-to-day developments of the campaigns can't be expected to provide the same kind of quality pieces that they would for a race like the mayor's race.

Just as importantly, how do we get people to pay attention to that information?

If I knew the answers to these questions, I'd go write a book like Attytood.

Perhaps, as Wendy suggested when I talked to her about this, there's a way for media outlets to partner with the people who actually live in these various council districts. Give them the proper journalistic training, hold them to the same standards, exercise the same, tight editorial control and then provide a way to distribute the information. The internet is a great way to get such information out there, but actual print, radio or television play still lends that certain degree of credibility necessary so that enough folks aren't dismissing the information.

There may also be a way of engaging journalism students at the various universities - in a way that's deeper than just the usual internship. Give them the same editorial guidance, hold them to the strictest of standards and help them do the proper digging. Then send them out to cover each race. If each outlet did this (including television who could broadcast the product on the internet), the blanket of coverage may just be thick enough so that all of the information is out there.

There are still questions about distribution. Can the city's major newspapers provide inserts that are targeted to specific areas of the city? Where would television and radio find time in their newscasts? Is it enough to get this info on the internet?

Your suggestions are welcomed.

The Daily News has a pretty extensive profile of Terry Gillen, a close adviser to Michael Nutter and a senior member of his campaign staff. She could end up with a pretty significant position within city government if Nutter is able to hold on and win this thing.

If you want a sense of the type of person that Nutter will seek to surround himself with, this is a good read.

What can the next mayor do to make this a more sustainable city? That's the subject of tonight's forum at the Academy of Natural Sciences, hosted by The Next Great City project.

Today's Daily News editorial about the event sums it up best:

From blight removal to recycling to air pollution, issues of the environment and sustainability are often discussed in terms of faraway places like the Arctic wilderness or the Amazon rain forests. But for those of us who live and work here, Philadelphia is our environment. We use its land, we drink its water and we breathe its air. Our neighborhoods house its parks. Our streets carry away its flooding and store its litter.

Tonight's forum is an opportunity to let the candidates know that Philadelphians care about these issues, that we want to know their plans to address them, and that we will hold the winner accountable. In fact, it's our job to make them better at their job.

Unfortunately, I think the event is sold out, but we'll see what we can do to find video so you can check it out.

Mark Alan Hughes is back and he wants to remind you just how bad things are around here. He makes his point very clearly and simply:

Our biggest problems ARE NOT FIXABLE.

And you know what, he's right. He's so right that before I read past that point I wasn't even considering what his thought of as "our biggest problems" as our biggest problems.

Before you rip me to shreds for not caring about poor people, let me explain. Poverty, and the conditions described by Hughes, are a problem and in a sense they are our problem if you define the "us" in "our" as all of humankind, or at least, citizens of the richest nation that the world has ever known. It's up to all of us as humans to care about our fellow man and it's up to those of us who are lucky enough to have been into a life in this nation, in which we're not going to bed hungry and cold, and we have a roof over our heads.

However, if "our" means the voters and residents of Philadelphia, then no, poverty is not our problem. So as Hughes writes about our biggest problem in Philadelphia being unfixable, I immediately thought that he much be talking about things like the shaky long-term prospects of the city's finances or its crumbling infrastructure. But those problems are fixable "if," as Hughes puts it, "we just proceed in the right way: not too fast, not too slow, with just the right expectations for our next mayor."

And then he's right, when the time comes that our city government is doing the best job it possibly can, when we as Philadelphians have nothing more to complain about in the delivery of city services or what we're getting for our wage, business and property taxes, then we as Americans can focus our attention on those big problems.

Good to have you back, MAH.

Dan U-A at Young Philly Politics is continuing to keep the pressure on for an answer to the Haile Johnston - Darrell Clarke saga, which first came to light in an Inquirer story that we commented on a while ago.

To illustrate his point, he uses some pictures that he snapped of some overgrown, trash-strewn lots in Clarke's 5th Council District. There's no indication in the post that these are lots that were formerly cleaned by Haile Johnston, nor does he provide any examples cleaned, well-maintained lots for comparison. But the larger point is clear, and has been made often, a city service - the cleaning and upkeep of vacant lots - is not being done...

(segue time)

... and if Tom Ferrick (and PICA and this blog) are right about the long term trend in city budgeting, which requires more and more funding for employee benefits, it may be just the beginning of many city services being left undone.

Normally, Democrat Michael Nutter and Republican Al Taubenberger have such similar positions on the issues that it is impossible to differentiate between them. They've even stood together to denounce the city's business privilege tax.

So it's interesting that today we have an issue that actually separates the two:

Taubenberger is opposed to full valuation. That's the idea that the city reassess all properties for what they are really worth, as opposed to the patchwork system we have today.

That's what he said at an event today. And it's one of Al's strongest statements to date. From the press release:

“They say these new assessments will be revenue neutral,” he said. “Neutral to whom, is what I ask. This will be turned into a backdoor tax increase for those who care for their properties. ...

“It’s the nice homes that contribute to nice neighborhoods, which make a great city,” Taubenberger said. “The people who don’t care for their homes should be the ones paying the penalties.”

Taubenberger also delivered a letter to Michael Nutter asking him to also oppose full valuation.

But Nutter is on the record as supporting a "fair and accurate city-wide property reassessment," as long as there are enough safeguards, including a homestead exemption for current property owners and a "cap and deferral plan" to protect property owners from "unreasonably large and rapid increases."

Which sounds like full valuation, with many safeguards, to us.

There's a tendency in this city to look back to the "good ole days" when things were simpler and great men got things done. In my imagination, such reminiscences always conjure up pictures of very stern looking men, all wearing three-piece suits and hats and smoking cigars.

One group that seems to get pounded for its lack of civic concern these days is the business community. Specifically, critics contend that the business community isn't doing enough to combat the wave of violent crime that promises to put the city over the 400 murder mark by the end of the year.

The Inquirer business page blog (I swear, pretty soon they'll have separate blogs for each page of each section) takes this feeling at puts it to two representatives of the business community - Chamber of Commerce President Mark Schweiker and health-insurance company CEO William George.

At one point, George refers to the "good ole days" when he's asked whether the city lacks "a business-class elite with the city's interests at heart?"

He answers:

I don’t think it's as strong as it once was, or as cohesive as it once was with these large (business) families. ... Now there are a lot of competing inteersts (sic) and it's hard to get peple (sic) focused. You look at peoples' focus on issues like cancer and global warming, or the sale of a famous painting. It's so diverse and it gets people excited. Things were a lot simpler when the Clothiers were here.

Check out the Q&A and let us know: what do you think the next mayor can reasonably expect from the business community in taking on the crime issue or any other issue (infrastructure upkeep, city service delivery, economic development, etc.)?

At the end of last week, the good folks over at the 13th Floor did some live blogging of Governing Magazine's annual Management Conference that rivaled my own from the International Economic Development Council's meeting.

Setting aside the fact that they'd probably attract a lot more Hollywood Stars if they changed the name to Managment-aganza-palooza-fest, a lot of interesting government management insights came out of the conference. Here are some highlights so you can click through to whatever interests you the most:

Blogger Josh Goodman uses a taxi incident to ponder the question of what role cities should play in ensuring the quality of taxi drivers.

ERPs (no not Earps as in Wyatt) - enterprise resource planning and why getting a new system (say, a 311 system) won't work unless you also change the people using it.

Seven steps to a better city.

Congratulations, you are the 50 millionth caller to New York's 311 system.

When it comes to a city's or state's website, sometimes little things - like making all of the pages look the same - matter.

Nice work by the 13th Floor for bringing this to policy nerds like me while saving me the trip to New York.

Just got word from the event organizer that in addition to the seats at the Academy of Natural Sciences, there will be a number of satellite screening locations for tonight's forum. They are:

Temple University, main campus, 1801 N. Broad St., 301 Tuttleman Hall

Temple University, Ambler campus, 580 Meetinghouse Rd, 211 Widener Hall, Ambler

The Enterprise Center - 4548 Market St

Germantown Friends School, 31 W. Coulter St.

So yes, even if the event itself is packed, thanks to the magic of the internet, you can catch the action.

Michael Nutter's blood pressure is OK, for now, reports the Daily News' Catherine Lucey.

She just returned from a mayoral forum on health care at the College of Physicians tonight that gave a brief insight into Nutter's personal medical history.

Nutter revealed that his last blood pressure check was "excellent": 120/80. "I think I am going to make it through the rest of the campaign," he said. During a question on obstetrics, he also told the crowd of doctors that his well-known daughter, Olivia, was born prematurely.

Nutter and Taubenberger both pledged support for public health efforts, saying they'd be cheerleaders for better health habits in the city. They also agreed that violence is a public health issue.

Nutter said he'd work to promote Philly's standing as a center for health care. But the candidates seemed to briefly disagree on issues surrounding malpractice lawsuit reform, which some have blamed for the closing of maternity wards in the city. Taubenberger called for tort reform, but Nutter pointed out that it is likely not a city issue but a state matter.

Finally, Nutter cautioned about taking too health advice from pols. "We keep the worst hours, and eat the worst food."

This is just ONE of the debates tonight. We'll bring you news from the cool high-tech one at the Academy of Natural Sciences a little later.

I fully intended to live blog at the forum tonight but it seems that I overestimated the wireless connectivity of the Academy of Natural Sciences. I'll still provide a minute-by-minute account but if you were expecting to be able to refresh your screen for constant live updates, I'm sorry I disappointed you. (So I'm posting this from home after a healthy dose of the Daily Show and the Colbert Report to help me keep perspective.)

As I write this post, it's about twenty after seven and the auditorium at the Academy is just starting to fill up. Surprisingly, the crowd is just a little bit smaller than the one that attended The Next Great City's primary forum. Tonight's host, Flavia Colgan, is working the room and there are actually three television cameras stationed in the back. A number of folks from the Daily News are here as are representatives from just about every other media outlet in the city. Heck, (correction) NBC 10's CBS 3's Larry Mendte is sitting across the aisle from me. For our entertainment, we're being shown a series of pictures of greening efforts from cities around the word alternated with shots of some of Philadelphia's most picturesque green scenes (though that picture of Jefferson Square park is a lot nicer looking than the actual park).

Ok. Now that I've got you hooked with the pre-game, I know you'll be jumping at the chance to hit the "Continue Reading" and get the good stuff after the jump.

No, not like THAT. He's testifying today today at Council's finance committee, on the need for domestic partners to be given the same benefits as married couples when it comes to the city's real estate transfer tax and his plan for prisoner re-entry. It's at 1:30 p.m.-ish.

Nutter's been a supporter of tax treatment for domestic partners that equals that of married couples, a big issue for gay voters. In March, he told the Liberty City Democratic Club that he'd support an ordinance that would fix a provision of the City’s domestic partnership law that had been struck down by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. From the press release:

Nutter was the original author of that law, which passed in 1998. “This new ordinance will further ensure fair and equitable treatment of domestic partners in Philadelphia,” he noted.

As to prisoner re-entry, he's got a lengthy plan for that. And if you are really interested, he's got the video of his announcement of it.

OK, this isn't about the mayor's race, but this is AMAZING.

Politics PA, Dan Gross of the Daily News and The Morning Call in Allentown have reported that Larry Platt of Philly Mag is considering a run for Jim Gerlach's 6th District congressional seat in 2008.

Reports the Call's Josh Drobnyk:

"I'm seriously looking at it," said Platt, 44, today.

"When you are a journalist you spend all this time wringing your hands about what other people do and at some point you say, 'What are you doing with yourself?' "

Platt said he was approached by U.S. Rep. Bob Brady, D-1st District, in recent weeks about running for the seat and has received a warm response from other party officials, including Montgomery County Democratic Committee Chairman Marcel Groen.

Ironically, Philadelphia magazine was scooped on the story of its editor: PoliticsPA.com posted an item on its Web site this morning.

*fans self over the idea of an interesting race*

I'm at Temple University's Center City campus in the Multimedia Urban Reporting Lab for a special web broadcast of a Q&A session with Al Taubenberger. Things are scheduled to get underway at 4pm but the candidate seems to be running a little late.

If you want to watch the proceedings or even pose some questions to Al, you can check it out here. In fact, if you go there now, and click on the link to bring up the video feed, you should see the Temple "T" on the wall.

(edited to add) Click "continue reading" to for the accompanying play by play.

Check back here for some real "meta" blogging of the events.

Despite what Al Taubenberger thinks, situations like this make me believe that a real fix is necessary when it comes to our property tax system:

OF ALL THE damning details made public about state Sen. Vince Fumo since the February release of the 267-page indictment outlining 139 criminal counts against him, perhaps none is more infuriating than the detail that came to light last week: that his property-tax bill for his home, listed for sale at nearly $7 million, is $6,000.
...
Fumo's 27-room mansion, valued by the Board of Revision of Taxes (BRT) at $250,000, is the poster child for this broken system. And every homeowner in the city should be outraged.

But of course, as Al points out, if the system is changed, if we move to a full valuation system with the required changes in millage to make it a revenue neutral change, there will be some winners and some losers. Folks like Fumo, who pay way too little, will lose. Folks whose houses are already assessed at a high rate by the BRT could pay less, and win.

Which side are you on? Are you a winner or a loser if this change happens? Are you someone who wants the system "changed" (which you would call "fixed") or are you one of these folks:

...taxpaying homeowners, who have a part in this mess. Fearful of having our homes assessed accurately instead of at the absurdly small percentage of their true value, panicked about paying more in taxes, we have made sure politicians are too afraid to go near this.

Discuss.

... I want my money.

Ray at YPP, is seeking to start a conversation about the next mayor (which he calls "Michael Nutter") and his role in the "future of Philadelphia's economy." Questions include, "What City Government Can Do To Raise Wages, Lift People Out of Poverty and Grow Our Middle and High Wage Earning Households?" (ok, as stated that's not a question but he fooled me with that question mark).

Check it out to join in the conversation.

Since I was away for a couple days this week, I just got around to this interesting story that may help shed some light on some of the city's lesser known governmental bodies.

Apparently, the ethics board has taken a big step in removing politics from the operation of government by applying essentially the same political activity prohibitions that apply to full time workers to the part-timers who sit on some of the city's boards (Zoning Board of Adjustment, the L&I Review Board, the Board of Building Standards and the new Malt and Brewed Beverage Hearing Board). And what's more:

...it could be a harbinger of future rulings that would extend the political-activity restrictions to dozens of other city boards, some well-known and others obscure, depending on their powers and how much the members are paid.

The article brings up a few of the big name folks who would be affected and one who doesn't seem to be affected, Zoning Board of Adjustment Chair David Auspitz. Since his activity seems to be limited to voting and making personal contributions (both allowable), he doesn't need to make the choice that others are faced with - low-paying part time job or higher paying political activity - but he did offer a choice quote:

Auspitz said he occasionally makes political contributions, but "very, very rarely. . . . My wife has to write the check. Need I say more? She squeezes a nickel so hard the buffalo craps."

As a former scout and (Eagle Scout class of 1990 - wooooooo!) and former summertime employee of the Cradle of Liberty Council and as someone who disagrees completely with theirs and the national organization's position on gays in scouting, I ask is this an issue for the next mayor:

City hikes Boy Scouts' rent by $199,999 over gay ban

And why or why not?

Aside from the kick-off of a very short (though I'm sure, very exciting) media-sponsored debate season, the candidates for mayor will be out and about as usual this weekend.

Michael Nutter's itinerary for Saturday features some more barnstorming at one of his townhall meetings and a visit to the Holocaust Awareness Museum. Oddly, the itinerary includes Nutter's 7:30 appearance on KYW-3 with Larry Mendte (an event that's being taped at 11 AM on Saturday). So, yes, according his itinerary, that's the actual Michael Nutter, shrunk down, and in your television. At least, that's where he plans on being.

Taubenberger, who prefers to send a media advisory for each... and... every... event he's attending, has one event on his Saturday schedule aside from the debate. After taping at 11 a.m. he'll be heading out to a mural dedication at the Uptown Theatre in North Philly. Maybe he's going for the music by SIDDIQ, The Ebonys, Uptown Reunion Band & more (source: philly.com)

Stay tuned for some blogging about the debate. Feel free to use this thread to comment about it if you're watching on Saturday night.

D-MAC at Philadelphia Will Do pretty much sums up most people's thoughts about this election:

You know, I think New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg has about as much chance of winning this election as Al Taubenberger does.

YouTube link.

What did anyone else think? (About the debate or this :58 second clip)

...So he tells KYW's Tony Hanson.

"...he doubts mayoral hopeful Michael Nutter's proposal to 'stop and frisk' to get guns off the street will help much, and won't outweigh what the city loses in public relations. Despite that, he says Nutter (right) will get his vote, and Commissioner Johnson says he'll continue trying to make the city better, even after he retires."

Governing.com's "Idea Center" features a good idea born out of a simple observation:

Four in five of the youths held in Jacksonville, Fla., detention centers are considered functionally illiterate. In hopes of curbing the dropout and crime rates among juveniles, Mayor John Peyton launched a book club four years ago for all 4-year-old prekindergarteners in Duval County.
...
Early research shows that children who participate function better with reading when kindergarten begins. The club is funded by the city, grants and donations. Organizers are expecting a larger enrollment this year with the introduction of online registration. Two other cities—Charleston, S.C. and Longmont, Colo.,—have implemented similar book clubs, and the National League of Cities calls such literacy programs a best practice.

Here's more information about the book club.

Two items to discuss here - first the one referenced in this title.

Governing Magazine's Management Insights column features a piece written by long-time public sector employee/current president of the William Penn Foundation Feather Houstoun. (Full disclosure: The Next Mayor project is made possible by a grant from the William Penn Foundation.)

In this column, Houstoun discusses the fact that as the current boomer population ages out of the workforce, the public sector will lose a good amount of its own workers. These jobs will be filled with a generation that has come to have far different career goals and career paths than their predecessors had:

Research and anecdotal experiences suggest the incoming workforce will be less hierarchical, more entrepreneurial, more likely to move from one job to the other, more accustomed to working in teams, and more technologically skilled.

One cannot help but be struck by how out of touch with contemporary workplace expectations the public sector often is. We want to attract smart, agile knowledge workers, but offer them rigid hiring processes and a non-portable pension that optimizes after a lifetime career.

I wonder if this applies to Philadelphia's municipal workforce, a place where people have gone (aside from a higher calling to serve the public) precisely because of the stability afforded by a lifelong job and secure retirement benefits. If, as Houstoun says, the next generation of city workers is more likely to be looking to jump from job to job and therefore require more portable retirement benefits, then perhaps it could be time for the city to get the unions to agree to one of PICA's suggestions for managing pension costs (p. 9):

Under a defined contribution plan, the City would no longer bear that market risk. Eligible retirees would be responsible for investing so that they would get the benefit of strong earnings, but also shoulder the risk of weak earnings. In order to help employees minimize their investment risk, the City should offer the best available investment counseling if it moves to a defined contribution plan.

It'll be interesting to see if this gets any mention during the upcoming negotiations.

Item two:

Speaking of budget-straining employee benefits, you may have missed it in Saturday's Daily News, but the city has decided not to appeal an arbitrator's decision to give the fire fire fighter's union a 45% increase in health-care contributions. Just in time for the next round of contract negotiations.

(The quote which I borrowed for this title can be seen here about 1:15 in.)

Tom Ferrick, whose column in Sunday's Inquirer rephrases "Crime... boy, I don't know" much more elegantly with:

That crime is like the weather, subject to cycles beyond our control. It rises and falls to rhythms we cannot fathom, for reasons we cannot discern.

was taking questions today at the Great Expectations blog. You can read the thread, the questions and his answers. All of which seem to point to... "I don't know."

One thing is for sure. If the next mayor can perform the type of miracle (def: unexplainable event) that would be dramatically lowering the murder rate, his place in history will be cemented.

The Philadelphia Business Journal has a poll about the mayor's race this week. Very simply, they ask:

What is the top issue the next mayor must address?
Crime
High business taxes
Improving regional cooperation
Other (explain)

So far, there aren't any reader comments and crime (surprise) is winning in a walk. But it's early.

Today's Daily News story about the Parking Authority - or, one of my uncles once called, "the most ruthlessly efficient agency in city government" - has inspired a New Rule (to be considered if we ever have another radical rewriting of the Charter).

First fact one from the story:

The authority's top job now belongs to Vincent J. Fenerty Jr., a longtime Republican ward leader (edited to change emphasis) who joined the authority as a booting supervisor in 1983, initially earning less than $28,000 a year.

Fenerty now makes $194,830 annually as the authority's executive director - more than any of the doctors, lawyers and other professionals on the city payroll, and $50,000 more than Mayor Street.

Fact two:

the agency now employs six party ward leaders - five Republicans and one Democrat

Fact three:

The payroll includes at least 131 Republican committee people and 58 Democratic committee people.

Now the New Rule. Please let me know in the comments whether you think it's (a) legal, (b) workable, (c) likely to be accepted by the voters and (d) necessary.

If you work for "the city" either part time or full time, in any department or agency, for any elected official (commissioners, council members, mayor, controller, district attorney, etc.) or for any of the "quasi-governmental" agencies, then you can not be a committee person or ward leader for any party. Once you get the job, you have to give up your role as a functionary in any political party. Make a choice.

And for those of you who think that being a committee person is all about "community service" and not about politics, are you telling me that you can't organize park clean-ups, bake sales and deliver food to the elderly if you don't have a the title of committee person?

Discuss.

Click here.

I'm watching now. They're starting with the crime issue using FBI crime stats from 2006 to show that New York, LA and Chicago's incidents of violent crime actually went down while Philadelphia, which ranks first, is going up.

Click "Continue Reading" to see my own recaplet.

Great Expectations has is making the environment today's issue of the day. At noon, Chris Satullo, whose column ran in today's Inquirer, will be on-line to answer questions about the issue and what he wrote. Check it out.

Tonight at 7, channel 6 will be holding a LIVE mayoral debate. (Sorry, Jeopardy fans!) They'll also be streaming the debate live on their website - 6abc.com.

I'm working late tonight getting ready for our own mayoral forum on Thursday so I'll have the television on to watch tonight's debate on channel 6.

Join in the conversation in the comments!

It seems the mayor’s race is just too polite for a good old-fashioned name-calling debate, reports Catherine Lucey.

Instead Democrat Michael Nutter and Republican Al Taubenberger appeared tonight in an “informal conversation” live on 6ABC.

The session was hosted by news anchor Jim Gardner -- the "informal" line was his -- who sat at a table with the candidates, along with anchor Monica Malpass and reporter Vernon Odom.

As always, the exceedingly polite Nutter and Taubenberger largely agreed on major issues of crime, education and jobs – differing most clearly on property tax reassessments.

Nutter supports moving to full value reassessment of properties, which he says would reduce taxes for some low income home owners while raising them for those with more pricey homes.
Taubenberger last night said he feared some homeowners could be hurt.

“The average person, the low income person, the senior citizen, their property taxes will go through the roof,” he said.

But Nutter said the current system is broken and should be fixed.

“There is a built in inequity and unfairness in the system,” he said. “People should pay the fair value that they’re supposed to pay.”

In his closing remarks Nutter asked voters to join him in the “revolution" of Philadelphia. Taubenberger asked voters to consider the underdog.

Open message to readers and my fellow blogger:

Didja know that the Republican candidate for mayor in 1951, against Joe Clark, was...

DAN POLING?

A new Keystone Poll is out in today's Daily News. We'll spare you any drama: Michael Nutter is in the lead.

And we mean waaaaay in the lead. Like a potentially history-making lead. From Dave Davies' story:

Nutter leads Republican mayoral hopeful Al Taubenberger 74 percent to 8 percent among registered voters, and 83 percent to 8 percent among likely voters.

“In all the 15 years I’ve been polling, I’ve never seen a major-party candidate in single digits two weeks before an election,” said Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Opinion Research at Franklin & Marshall College.

OK, so it's no surprise that Nutter is gonna win the general election. The problem is, this no-ad, no-disagreement, no-heat "campaign" could lead to low turnout in Philadelphia. And that's worrying Democrats running for statewide office, who count on Philly's Dem votes to offset Republicans elsewhere in the state.

And there's another problem.

The Keystone Polls throughout this election (the Daily News did its first way back in July 2006, when Nutter was at 10 percent among primary candidates, and some guy named Tom Knox barely charted with 1 percent) have consistently shown that Philadelphians are extremely concerned about the welfare of their city. In this poll, reports Davies:

Only 20 percent of those polled said the city was headed in the right direction, while 73 percent said it was on the wrong track. Sixty percent said Philadelphia has gotten worse than it was four years ago. Only 9 percent said things had improved.

Those are some of the most negative views of Philadelphia ever measured by Keystone polls, and they parallel a generally negative view of Mayor Street.

Nutter faces extraordinary voter demand to fix crime, deal with the advent of casinos, fix the tax structure, rustle up more jobs and handle, well, everything just as soon as he walks in the door to Room 215. He's certainly promised enough.

And, this being Philly, the first misstep will be greeted with the kind of boos usually reserved for Rod Barajas. This "campaign" has been a nice long break for Nutter, who did have to claw his way to his victory in the primary.

I don't think the honeymoon will last much past his inauguration.

Don't forget folks, today is the big day for the first ever, interactive, web-broadcast candidate forum. Michael Nutter and Al Taubenberger have generously agreed to give us some of their time to take part in this historic event. We may talk a little about polls but we're going to try to keep it focused on the issues.

You can help by participating, listening to what they have say, and submitting good follow up questions if you don't hear a complete answer. But you need to watch in order to do that. If you've already registered, then just click on the picture below to log in and participate.

You can still register at any time up to and even during the event. Click here to do the quick, easy and free registration.

See you at 10am!

Who says debates are boring?

At our Next Mayor online debate, underway RIGHT NOW (click here to join in)...

Al Taubenberger just said that perhaps "Andy Reid should be in the cell next to his son" because his son had an allegedly illegal gun.

Taubenberger is getting respect for his position on property tax full valuation. And there are some good zingers. The latest:

Nutter: "I respect Alan Butkovitz, but his name is Butkovitz, not Alan Greenspan."

...but we will be posting a transcript of the VERY active chat and other links this afternoon.

I also asked the candidates for answers to questions that they didn't get to, and I will be including those with the transcript.

Thanks to everyone who participated!

A few days ago, in the wake of a fine piece of investigative reporting by the Daily News' Bob Warner about the Philadelphia Parking Authority, I wrote that we should establish a New Rule:

If you work for "the city" either part time or full time, in any department or agency, for any elected official (commissioners, council members, mayor, controller, district attorney, etc.) or for any of the "quasi-governmental" agencies, then you can not be a committee person or ward leader for any party. Once you get the job, you have to give up your role as a functionary in any political party. Make a choice.

In today's Daily News we learn that the Governor Rendell is also frustrated with what the PPA has become:

"They've got to clean up their house fast, save money where they can and send money to the school district," Rendell told KYW Newsradio. "They should start reviewing those jobs, and those that aren't essential to productivity should be closed down."

But more importantly, longtime PPA scrutinizer St. Rep. Michael McGeehan agrees with our "New Rule."

[McGeehan] has unveiled a plan to oust the board members and prohibit political activity by authority employees - the same restrictions that apply to most employees covered by the city charter.

"The Philadelphia Parking Authority has become a bloated political-patronage machine where employees feel compelled to contribute time and money to candidates to keep their jobs," McGeehan said in a memo to other House members.

That's right... make a choice.

We'll have the transcript from the chat soon. I'm told was pretty intense but I missed it since I was holding cue cards.

For now, here are all of the questions that were submitted for the candidates. We could only get to a few of them in the time we had and we'll certainly work on ways to get to more questions when we do this in the future.

Click on "Continue Reading" to see all of the questions (unedited).

I think in many ways the conversation that was going on in our chat room among viewers of the debate was more interesting than the debate itself.

Click on "Continue Reading" to see the transcript. It's a little tough on the eyes but it's worth a read. Sometime tomorrow we'll post links so you can see the entire forum again on your computer - including the chat as it unfolded.

My favorite comment in yesterday's online Next Mayor debate (which was just great, and the chat was a blast) actually happened after it.

That was when I was following up with Michael Nutter, asking some questions that readers submitted and we just didn't have time to get to. (Check out the debate coverage page for all of them, to Taubenberger and Nutter.)

I asked a simple one, from a chatter named Fredricka. She had asked:

"Are the candidates aware of how dirty this city is? There appears to be little effort to get it under control."

I asked Nutter if anything could be done to keep the city clean. Check out his answer:

"What I propose is, should I be sucessful, we're going to organize a massive citywide cleanup, involving hundreds of thousands of people throughout Philadelphia. Volunteer and, of course, city support -- all agencies and departments, all hands on deck, because everyone can do something about this."

"I want to set a certain standard with regard to litter in Philadelphia. We've got to re-examine trash cans in neighborhoods, how we get them empty, regular weekly cleanups that people should be doing anyway, it's a part of your committment to being a citizen here in this city. I go New York, I go to Chicago, I have gone to other cities,. They are clean, Philadelphia is filthy, and I am sick and tired of it."

"We're going to clean up this city literally and figuratively."

Whoa! A massive call to action, across the city, targeting litter in the short term, and who knows what else in the long term? That's a pretty interesting way to channel all the excitement that's built up around Nutter's election into positive action.

Jump on over and vote in the Philadelphia Business Journal's weekly poll.

Question:

What is the top issue the next mayor must address?

Of course, we've been asking that same question since this website started in December 2005 but you can never hammer away at it too much.

Here's the promo copy from the folks at Radio Times:

The Philadelphia Prison System is the fifth largest urban jail system in the country. Its population continues to grow and often jails are overcrowded. We discuss this issue with LEON KING, Commissioner of the Philadelphia Prison System and DAVID RUDOVSKY, civil rights attorney and Senior Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

You can listen live at 10 AM by clicking here. A podcast of the show will be available shortly after it airs.

I hope I'm not stealing Will Bunch's thunder but I couldn't resist posting today's Daily News Editorial Cartoon by Signe Wilkinson:

Now that the legwork of the investigative reporting has been done, and it's become an issue in the mayor's race, and the governor has weighed in, and it's been editorialized by both the Daily News and covered by the Inquirer, and it's been immortalized in cartoon form by a Pulitzer-prize winning cartoonist, will anything happen with the Parking Authority?

All over the blogosphere (ok, at least on the Metro's blog and the Weekly's blog), much fun is being had with a little gaffe that Taubenberger made at yesterday's homeless rally in which he apparently said, to a group including many homeless people.

According to Josh at Metropolis (the artist formerly known as Fight For Room 215):

He said this to a group of homeless men:

"Wanna hear the title of a sad book? My check book."

I'll leave the humorous commentary about this quote to the professionals, like D-Mac over at Philly Will Do.

It's too bad Al's comments about City Controller Alan Butkovitz's so-called "definitive" study about Full Value Assessment can't catch as much fire through the internet.

A letter to the editor in today's Daily News posits an interesting theory about the Daily News' recent editorial support for fixing the property tax assessment system:

SO THE Daily News editorial board wants the property-tax system changed.

Richard Kraus, Philadelphia

Well, I just did a quick calculation of my house and figured out that my fiancee and I are really big winners. Apparently our house (ok, her house) has a BRT market value of about 15% of its actual market value (according to my rough estimate). I used Philadelphia Forward's reassessment calculator, which also probably undervalued our house's actual reveals that in the best case scenario, aka:

If The City Combines These Policies Recommended By The Tax Reform Commission [City Reduces The Tax Rate To Make The Change "Revenue-Neutral," City Uses "Buffering" To Provide Tax Relief, City Decreases The Tax On Buildings And Increases The Tax On Land To Reduce Tax Burdens For Most Homeowners] To Make Real Estate Taxation Fair And Understandable In The Most Painless And Effective Possible Manner...

Our tax burden would go up by 108 percent - more than double. Most people probably see it that way. The fact is, it probably means that right now, it's probably half of what it should be, which also means that somewhere out there a lot of folks are paying more than they should be. The new amount would also be a heck of a lot lower than what a lot of suburban folks are paying.

While I think it was a bit of an exaggeration for the letter writer above to say that the only thing he gets for his taxes is trash pick-up, I do understand - and agree with - the sentiment that people may be less upset about potentially paying what their supposed to be paying if the services they received were top notch. I also agree that if there's any way at all that this reassessment project is going to work, City Council and the new mayor have to be smart, sensitive, efficient, rapid, cohesive and on message in taking all of the steps to do it "In The Most Painless And Effective Possible Manner."

If they can't do that, why should we just agree to continue a broken system? Why can't we just agree to toss them and give a new council a shot at it?

I'm still trying to figure out how a story in today's Inquirer about a YouTube video from April 24th is news.

In the video, a candidate for traffic court judge is apparently asking bikers to "hook him up" with campaign contributions in exchange for deferential treatment should they ever appear before him:

"I'm telling you all just like it is. I need some money," the 26-year-old Democratic nominee told the crowd. "I got some stuff that I got to do, but if you all can give me $20. You're all going to need me in Traffic Court, am I right about that?"
...
"You're all going to help me out?" Singletary begins. "There's going to be a basket going around because I'm running for Traffic Court judge, right, and I need some money. . . . Now you all want me to get there, you believe I'll hook up, right?

My problem with this story is that it probably doesn't make a difference. As a winner in the Democratic primary, Willie Singletary is more or less assured a victory in November just by virtue of straight ticket voting. Oh well... a missed opportunity for journalism to have an effect on a race. We just have to be careful not to let the next one get by us... and we have to get out there with video cameras at more events.

Nutter has a lot of money.

Taubenberger doesn't.

Hmmm... imagine you're at KYW 1060 and you decide that you need a logo that says "Boy Scouts" "gays" "controversy over use of city land" to go with the city v. BSA story. Well, this is what they came up with:

Brilliant.

I ask again... is this an issue you want the candidates to respond to?

The Inquirer has endorsed Michael Nutter for mayor. No way!

From the editorial:

"The farce that has been called an election campaign should come to a swift end on Nov. 6. Voters should not hesitate to cast their ballots for Nutter, a former City Council member who, in Republican Al Taubenberger, faced only token opposition."

But the editorial is not Al-bashing. It says, "Taubenberger has agreed with Nutter so much because on most issues Nutter has had the right answer."

And it continues:

"Nutter's election promises to usher in a new day for Philadelphia, full of hope and free of the type of corruption-stained allegiances that will taint Mayor Street's legacy. Nutter has long been a proponent of ethics reform."

So you've been wondering why the city's GOP ran Al Taubenberger. It's an understandable question, given last week's news that Taubenberger has raised less than $80,000 during the primary (compared to $7.5 million from Nutter, who now has 40 times the cash on hand that Taubenberger has) and that Taubenberger hasn't cracked double digits in the polls, which could lead to a historic landslide vote for Nutter.

Today's Daily News has an answer: They looked hard for another candidate. Arlen Specter even solicited Michael Nutter and Dwight Evans to switch parties before the election:

“That’s true," Specter says in Dave Davies' story. "I also asked ... Lynne Abraham.”

But no one was particularly interested in the suicide mission that is running as the GOP mayoral candidate in Philadelphia in a year when the national party is more of a millstone around the neck than a help.

“This year the elected officials we have just don’t long to be a mayoral candidate," says GOP counsel Michael Meehan.

Still, this election looks to be a major embarrassment for the Philadelphia Republicans, almost certain to be the biggest rout of the GOP in mayoral primary without an incumbent ever (the next-closest: Rendell v. Egan after Rizzo died mid-campaign, which Rendell won 64 percent to 30 percent).

And there's apparently an attempt at change brewing in the party, from young turks and even from the party bosses.

“I want everyone in the party to recognize where we are,” Kevin Kelly, a developer and Republican chairman of the 5th ward in Center City, told Davies. “We are at rock bottom.”

...wouldn't it be more fun if it were more than just a list of his press releases? I would love to read a real Al Taubenberger blog.

These blogs are addictive aren't they? Let me save you about an hour of web surfing.

Here's a round up of recent blog posts about Philadelphia mayoral/city issues and politics:

Head in the Hall has proof that Michael Nutter has been thinking about what he's going to do after Election Day. I wonder what the dry erase board in Al Taubenberger's headquarters/basement has on it. Feel free to give suggestions.

YPP contributor Ray Murphy really wants a woman... to be mayor of Philadelphia. His short list of potential candidates is impressive but I betcha that 8 years from now, someone who we're not even talking about will be the successor to Nutter. (So easy to make such a claim. Who's going to dig this up 8 years from now?)

Speaking of YPP, Brett Mandel has ventured into what have sometimes been unfriendly waters by commenting on a post about Vince Fumo's house and his property taxes. He's essentially challenging the headquarters of Philly's progressive blogosphere to talk about the property tax reassessment system. I've also been wondering why this issue hasn't been brought up too often in that forum before. The Property Tax itself got some play on YPP during the primary (especially here, here, here, and a really good one here . But the full value assessment has been left alone for the most part. (Disclaimer: even the folks at YPP would tell you that they don't speak for all of Philly's progressives but it would be interesting to hear from a few of their main contributors. We'll see if Brett gets an answer.)

Speaking of property taxes (can you tell I've been totally fascinated by this topic for a couple weeks now?), Metropolis, the blog the Metro (and hometown of Superman), pivots off the Fumo house to get to the latest topic for their "Reformer Roundtable" - full-value assessment. There's some choice quotes in there.

Uber blog Atrios has a comment about one of his hometown's coolest programs - PhillyCarShare. (See Inky article for more.)

Philly Future contributor Albert Yee wrapped up his coverage of the Great Expectations Civic Leader summit with a post about Nutter and Taubenberger's Q&A with the crowd. I've got to hand it to Albert, I've always been impressed with his photos. He could probably make me look good (says Dan with 5 stitches in his split upper lip).

Finally, in his column on Sunday, Chris Satullo took on one of the most difficult, complex, potentially-positive-but-often-thought-of-as-negative issues facing this and every city - gentrification. Today he was online to take feedback for the article and discuss the issue in more depth. Some of the feedback and stories he received are absolutely amazing.

And don't forget to check out today's headlines for a rundown of all the issues and politics you can handle.

In today's Inquirer, you may have noticed that the Police Commissioner isn't done firing away just yet on the stop-and-frisk (aka stop-question-and-frisk aka stop-think-don't carry). A week after both the Inquirer and Daily News quoted a high level cop who was speaking at City Council hearing as Commissioner Sylvester Johnson's spokesperson, the commish himself apparently disagrees with what was said on his behalf.

Last week, Lt. Francis Healy, special advisor to Commissioner Sylvester Johnson said the following:

The reality is that police officers are stopping people based on reasonable suspicion every day. (Daily News)

Johnson also was not there. His adviser, Healy, said it was incorrect to represent "stop and frisk" as a new strategy for the police department. The program, an outgrowth of a New York City-developed practice known as the "broken windows" strategy, already exists, he said.

The aim is for officers to focus intensely on low-level offenses, such as public urination or graffiti, with the notion that doing so will consequently lead officers to come into more frequent contact with people who carry weapons and commit more serious crimes. (Inquirer)

So what does the Commissioner, presumably speaking for the Commissioner, have to say about this?

[Johnson] says Michael Nutter's proposed "stop-and-frisk" policy would be a "disaster."

And that's just the lede. There's more:

"What Nutter is saying - this stop-and-frisk is going to be a disaster," Johnson said in an interview with The Inquirer. "What he's saying, too, is that he wants a police commissioner to be harder. Well, harder on what? . . . Do you think locking people up is making a difference?

"I mean, and he gives the opinion that he's going to run the Police Department, not the police commissioner. He will run the Police Department - 'I will do deployment.' Well, how are you going to deploy? He's never been a police officer in his life, yet he knows more about deployment than we do."
...
"Unless the community buys into some of these things, it's going to be an adversarial relationship," he said. "Again, it's going to be the police against the community. And I think that would be a disaster."

By having acknowledged, albeit through a spokesperson, that stop-and-frisk (I hate using that three-word phrase to describe an entire program - go here for more info, especially how it worked in other cities) is already happening, Johnson is either saying that's ok as long as it's happening while he's commissioner or that when it happens under a new commissioner all of the safeguards (community-based policing, public education, strong supervision and topnotch training) will be absent.

This is a difficult ad to analyze given that the race is essentially over. He's essentially holding a thirty second pep rally to remind people to get out an vote. It's like a Get Out The Vote strategy for a ward or division that you know is going to get you 8 or 9 out of every 10 voters in that division - you just bring everyone out. In this case, the whole city is one big division. He knows he's going to get 8 to 9 out of every 10 voters so he may as well just bring them all out.

He's probably also hoping that the ad, which will air throughout the region, will bring out voters in the suburban counties so that Democratic candidates for county commissioner have a better shot (not to mention statewide democratic judicial candidates).

I do like the little graphic of the sun rising over City Hall. Wouldn't that be nice?

(Edited to add) And there's Olivia again!

So, blog readers, are you planning on voting in one week? How about your friends, family and neighbors?

It's not too late for another position paper! Michael Nutter will be releasing "The Nutter Plan for a Healthier Philadelphia" at a press conference outside the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania today at 11:30.

Hmm. This is interesting...from the press release...

“We have some of the finest medical institutions in the country right here in Philadelphia,” said Nutter. “Yet too many Philadelphians do not have access to the kind of quality affordable healthcare that they need and deserve.”

Three people shot at 15th and Sansom at around 10:30pm. A cop shot pursuing the suspect.

You know who else is at 15th and Sansom at 10:30pm? People. Lots of 'em. People walking back to their cars in the parking garages on Sansom St. after a night out for dinner. People going to one of the many establishments on Sansom St. itself.

Who's not going to be walking around 15th and Sansom if they think there's a chance they could get hit by a stray bullet or even robbed at gunpoint? People. Lots of 'em.

Remember when people were saying, "If these shootings were happening in Center City, there'd be citywide outrage!"

Well, I wonder what happens next.

Via on of the many comments in a post on the Daily News' Crime Blog - Philly Confidential, here's some video of Michael Nutter at a community meeting in West Philadelphia. He alludes to his "stop, question, don't carry" (aka stop-question-frisk, aka stop-and-frisk) policy at the end of the clip:

Michael Nutter had a scheduled press event today to release a new plan on health care, but took a moment to address the tragic shooting of Philadelphia Police officer Charles Cassidy.

“We have people who are aggressively taking on the Philadelphia police,” he told the Daily News' Catherine Lucey. “This behavior will not be tolerated in the city of Philadelphia.”

He added that if he is elected, “of course we’re going to have a new police commissioner, and we’re going to change the entire philosophy on how we fight crime.”

He released his health care plan today standing in front of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, flanked by white-coated doctors.

Nutter promised to increase staffing at city health centers and better fund the Health Department. He also offered a series of lifestyle and education initiatives, including setting up fitness centers around the city and deploying community health workers in neighborhoods.

“Many people in Philadelphia lack access to decent health care,” he said.

The overall price tag or funding details weren’t provided, but Nutter said some funds would come from the city and he also expected private support from foundations or corporations, as well as assistance from local hospitals.

Nutter also said he would try to educate people who lack insurance about the available public insurance programs.

"There are plenty of people who are eligible who don’t have insurance,” Nutter said.

Check out Philebrity.

So since we're already talking about expectations and how high they are for the next mayor (in some circles referred to as "Michael Nutter"), what event would make you think that the clock has struck twelve, turning Nutter-ella* into a pumpkin?

Conversely, how long into the next term will you give the next mayor before you start to think that your expectations are not being met?

*yes, I know. Cinderella didn't turn into the pumpkin, her carriage did.

Waaaay back in May.

Well, Nutter got the endorsement of the editorial board of the Daily News. And they're not shy about saying what they want in return:

We challenge Nutter to have fun: Take a page from Mayor Rendell's playbook - make the city feel good about itself. Don't be afraid to be seen around town - Avenue of the Arts, a Flyers game, the art museum, as well as in the neighborhoods. Bring Olivia and her friends. Let everyone know this is a fun town, and you're having the best time of all.

Finally: Don't manage our expectations. Demand that we raise them even higher.

Oh don't worry. My expectations are up there pretty high.

Like the city as a whole, I was deeply shaken by the shooting of Officer Charles Cassidy in Oak Lane yesterday.

By the evil coolness of a gunman who would rob a store in broad daylight, and when interrupted by Officer Cassidy, did not hesitate to shoot the police officer in the head, leave him bleeding by a trash can, and steal Cassidy's weapon.

By the sight of a city neighborhood overrun by hundreds of police, including SWAT members in full gear toting massive guns, searching any man who remotely fit the suspect's description, and frightened city residents welcoming the crackdown. By schools where students were told they could not have recess because a gunman was on the loose. By parents who cancelled Halloween for their kids, because they just didn't know what was out in the neighborhood.

By police, who remembered an officer who had faced danger before, and yet was known to sometimes drive by his old school to talk to friends there.

After the shooting, Mayor Street and Sylvester Johnson both responded that there were too many guns in the city. Front-leader Michael Nutter, however, talked about a change in the police department, and for the larger city. From the Daily News story:

The Democratic nominee for mayor, Michael Nutter, said the recent rash of police shootings highlights an “ongoing pattern of behavior.”

“I think Stevie Wonder would see, or Jose Feliciano would see, that there’s obviously a problem here,” he said. “We have people who are actively and aggressively taking on the Philadelphia Police Department.”

Nutter pledged that if elected, his administration, which will include a new police commissioner, will change the “entire philosophy” of how the city fights crime.

I won't pretend to know if any of the above will work. Once it's OK to shoot cops -- not every now and then, but three in this week, and two in just 12 hours -- how do you hand the city back its moral judgment?