Heard in the Hall

How about this for a customer service: You get half off if we screw up! Sound like a bad radio come-on for an appliance emporium? Wrong – it’s Fairmount Park’s new deal on park permits. If your application for a picnic permit ($30 to $125, depending on the site) or a wedding permit (a ceremony alone can cost several hundred dollars, depending on the site) is not approved within 10 business days, you get a 50 percent break! Here's the small print: That's for a future permit application, so you can save some cash the next time you get married. Permit applications will be date stamped to hold the department accountable, Fairmount Park executive director Mark A.Focht testified in a budget hearing Tuesday.
It’s part of the park’s response to Mayor Nutter’s demand for better customer service and accountability in city departments. In addition, Focht said grass will be mowed every two weeks from April 15 to Oct. 1, and any turf that is subject to a complaint will be mowed within one business day. Those who complain about overgrown grass are also entitled to a verbal explanation and apology. Those inquiring or complaining about tree planting, pruning, or removal are also entitled to some response within 10 business days.

Reclaiming the city’s East Park Canoe House is on the “fast track,” Fairmount Park executive director Mark A. Focht said Tuesday, but park officials are still awaiting a consultant’s report on needed repairs, due in early May. Rowing teams from Temple University and three local high schools – Father Judge, LaSalle and North Catholic – were forced out of the house Feb. 15 after the city’s Department of Licenses and Inspections cited the building for structural problems in January. Focht said there is no plan to drive the schools from the canoe house, and that talk of the Fairmount Park edging the schools out in favor of a new public school rowing program amounts to "rumors" that have never been discussed with him.
A question to be answered is whether the city will charge the schools rent to use the boathouse once repairs are made. Focht said it's too early to make that determination, without even knowing the future of the boathouse at the moment. "There's a lot between the point where we are and the point we want to be," Focht said.

Still a popular guy, it seemed unlikely that Mayor Nutter would be booed by baseball fans Monday when he tossed out the first pitch at the Phillies opening game. And he wasn’t.

In case he had been, though, the mayor had his own cheering section on hand.

Fifteen members of Nutter’s staff received tickets to watch the game from the free box that Nutter now controls as Philadelphia’s CEO. They were raffled off as part of an intra-office lottery.

Some of the winners included Nutter spokesman Doug Oliver; chief integrity officer Joan Markman; senior economic development adviser Terry Gillen; research, policy and planning director Wendell Pritchett; city solicitor Shelley Smith; and deputy chief of staff Patricia Enright.

How that box – and other ones like it at Lincoln Financial Field, the Wachovia Center, and the Spectrum – were used grew controversial under former Mayor John F. Street. During the 2003 federal investigation of City Hall, the FBI secretly recorded Street talking with his chief fund-raiser, lawyer Ronald White, about “selling" seats at the Eagles stadium for as much as $20,000 apiece.

Larry Farnese's slick, four-page political mailing has arrived in the First Senatorial District, where he is up against John Dougherty and Anne Dicker for the Democratic nomination to succeed state Sen. Vince Fumo, who is not running.
"Honest. Ethical. Committed to Philadelphia. For Larry Farnese, public service is personal," the ad reads. It features his father, talks about supporting stricter gun control laws, Gov. Rendell's health care plan, putting more police on the street and strengthening schools. It even notes that he volunteers as an escort at a women's health clinic, "where he was assaulted by an anti-choice extremist, requiring spinal surgery.
There's only one problem with the mailer: It doesn't say what Farnese is running for.
Oops.
The omission generated several hundred calls to the campaign (the number is on the mailer), said one staffer.

From diligent Inquirer reporter Joseph A. Gambardello:

John Dougherty’s campaign has released polling data showing the labor union honcho leading his two opponents in the Democratic primary race for the state Senate seat Vince Fumo will vacate later this year.

But it also shows that even more voters are undecided — 37 percent — than support Dougherty with the primary just three weeks away.

Dougherty, in an email today to supporters, says the survey conducted March 25-26 shows him leading with 31 percent to a "healthy" 18 percent for grassroots activist Anne Dicker and 14 percent for Center City lawyer Larry Farnese, whose campaign has attracted the support of Fumo’s allies since the senator decided not to seek re-election.

A footnote to the survey points out that a poll in February showed Fumo leading the race with 28 percent. The research firm Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin & Associates says the latest results indicate that Johnny Doc has "clearly gained" more of Fumo’s supporters than the other two candidates in the race.

"… these results suggest that the primary is now Dougherty’s to lose," the candidate’s email quotes the research firm as reporting.

All this polling seems to have given a real confidence boost to Dougherty - so much so that the email emphasizes Doc's political strengths, but implies that he held this office before. He hasn't, and neither have his opponents.

Says the email: "We have got to get this violence situation under control, and as such we cannot afford to send a freshman Senator to Harrisburg."

Hmm. But with Fumo's retirement, that's the only option voters have.

City Councilman Frank DiCicco went off on the state legislature and Supreme Court Thursday in the wake of Wednesday's Supreme Court ruling that essentially removed City Council from any oversight of the Foxwoods Casino project.
"It was all about allowing a public process to continue, to allow the citizens of this city to be heard," said DiCicco, who scheduled four hearings on the Foxwoods proposal, which are now rendered meaningless because the city has almost leverage to demand changes in traffic plans and other aspects of the project. "And we have been denied that opportunity again, the same way we were denied to create laws that will to protect our citizens from illegal guns. This is consistent, it all fits in, we don’t matter in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. We are only here as a city to generate revenue, and I don’t know what else the other folks outside of the city limits care about."
DiCicco's rant had an additional political subtext, because he targeted state represenatives in the River Wards. One of them is Rep. Bill Keller, whose opponent in the April 22 primary is DiCicco's son, Christian.
DiCicco was singled out as "obstructionist"by Foxwoods and the other planned casino, SugarHouse. The Supreme Court agreed, saying that DiCicco's bill to give Foxwoods its zoning, introduced in January, was too late. Mayor Street has requested zoning for the site last May.
"I believe it’s the responsibility of an elected official to do the things that he or she needs to do to protect the people that he or she represents," DiCicco said. "If that was an obstructionist is, I gladly accept the title."
DiCicco said he would go foward with a hearing Friday, which will look at the casinos impat on the local economy, police and fired departments.
While DiCicco said he is still exploring legal strategies, Councilman Bill Green offered several. Green said the Supreme Court's decisions can be challenged, presumably in Federal Court, because the state law forbade any taking of property to build the casinos. Green said the elimination of city streets, even if they're only paper streets on a map, equates to an unconstitutional taking of property. " It calls into question the entirety of the decisions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in this regard," Green said.
Green also said agreements between both Foxwoods and SugarHouse casinos, in which the casinos agreed to pay the city of percentage of taxes that they are not obligated to pay under the city's 10-year tax abatement for new construction, are invalid. Any such agreements that last more than a year require City Council approval. Instead, they were worked out between the casinos and Mayor Street's law department, the Foxwoods agreement in the final days of his term.
Green wants to eliminate the tax abatement for casinos, saying two casinos licensed for a monopoly should not qualify.

So, you think Mayor Nutter is blowing it by cutting taxes too fast? Not fast enough? You're sure City Council's spending priorities are out of whack, and that instead they ought to invest in libraries, or the park system, or rec centers, or the schools?

Do you think, in short, that you could do better?

Late this summer, you'll get the chance to prove it. In August, the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia hopes to launch an interactive city budget simulation that will let citizens fund their pet projects to their hearts' content: so long as they make it up by slashing services elsewhere.

The idea is to give residents a dose of fiscal reality, as well as an understanding of the hard choices Nutter and City Council face.

The project will be funded by a $100,000 grant from the Lenfest Foundation. The Inquirer's Great Expectations project is a partner.

From Inquirer reporter Joseph A. Gambardello

This may not qualify as guerrilla campaigning, but state Senate candidate John J. Dougherty’s people have struck on a way to get name recognition with young voters on a Friday night. A pub crawl.

Traveling in a trolley, Dougherty supporters -- including some eye catching young women -- visit selected bars. They wear Dougherty for Senate badges hand out literature and where possible also put up posters. Of course, they also patronize the bar they are visiting.

Two stops on Friday by 14 supporters included Tir Na Nog at 16th and Arch and the Public House at Logan Square.

Keely Wittrock, 26, of Port Richmond, said taking part in the pub crawls allows her to both show her support for Dougherty and to get people of her generation to vote.

“We have all the power in the world to make a change,” she said.

Rose O’Brien, 25, of Fishtown, said she backs Johnny Doc because “he will fight for the working class.”

Does it work?

There’s no way to tell, but when was the last time you heard a conversation about a state Senate race in the men’s room,?

Democratic City Committee just voted to endorse electricians' union leader John Dougherty for the First District Senate seat.
Why is this odd? Two years ago, Dougherty was ousted as city committee treasurer, largely because of a squabble he was having with Democratic Party chairman Bob Brady.
Why is this not odd? With seemingly endless campaign funds to draw from thanks to the union dues of his members, Dougherty has plently of GOTV money to spread around now, and in years to come.
The entire City Committee did not vote at the noon meeting, only those ward leaders who live in the First District.
Larry Farnese, Dougherty's opponent in the primary along with Anne Dicker, lambasted Dougherty, calling him a "thug" in a statement to City Committee provided below.

Mayor Nutter said this morning that Saturday's Philly Spring Cleanup exceeded all goals. A look at the numbers.

Trash collected: 2.56 million pounds (goal was one million)
Volunteers: 15,000 (goal was 10,000)
Commercial corridors cleaned: 71 (goal was 50)

The 15,000 volunteers filled nearly 80,000 trash bags.

Named "Get it Done," a new television ad for Hillary Clinton is about to hit the airwaves. It features one celebrity attraction: Mayor Nutter.

"I know. You want to know why I'm supporting Hillary," Nutter starts out.

Indeed, a lot of people do, given his reformist message that sounds like Barack Obama's, and that he is an African American mayor in a heavily-populated African American city that appears to be leaning toward Barack Obama.

Nutter talked about his reasons for choosing Hillary a bit with the Inquirer last week.

Here is what he has got to say now.

The three-way race to succeed Sen. Vince Fumo is as much about the candidates in the race as it is about deep-seeded feuds between several of Philadelphia's powerbrokers. Primarily, it's about John Dougherty, one those three candidates, and Fumo, whose backers include City Councilmen Jim Kenney and Frank DiCicco.

From the Dougherty camp, here are two observations, courtesy spokesman Frank Keel.

1) Larry Farnese may claim a close bond with and the support of Kenney, but are they that close? Farnese spells Kenney's name wrong in his latest mailer.  It is a picture of Farnese walking with Kenney, with the text "Larry Farnese is endorsed by Jim Kenny."

2) In the latest Dougherty for Senate direct mail piece titled "Why Are Women Supporting John Dougherty for State Senate," one of the women quoted is Fran Price, activist in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. She states: "Our community needs a fighter in the State Senate. John has spent two decades working for children and all Philadelphia families. That is why I am voting for John Dougherty."

The punch line? Fran Price is Frank DiCicco's cousin. Her maiden name is DiCicco.

Here's an idea that just might tantalize City Council members: go ahead and cut the business privilege tax, but ONLY for smaller businesses. The big corporations? Keep squeezing 'em.

That's the pitch One Philadelphia has made recently in a letter to council members. Only about 500 companies pay more than $100,000 a year, and those big guys account for about 55 percent of the city's total BPT take. If they were excluded from the BPT cuts Mayor Nutter's proposing, the city would save over $60 million a year (by 2015, when the proposed cuts would be fully in effect) -- or so argues One Philadelphia.

But if the whole idea of cutting the BPT is to attract businesses and grow jobs, what's the logic in excluding the big corporations from the deal? Is Philly only interested in small employers? One Philadelphia's answer: for the biggies, the BPT is nothing more than a "blip in their accounting records."

We bet the CEOs of those businesses would say otherwise.

In any event, expect this issue to come up next week, when Council will deign to open its doors to the public for open comment (only three public comment sessions are scheduled during this year's budget hearings).

From Inquirer reporter Joseph A. Gambardello:

The state Supreme Court today denied state senate candidate John Dougherty’s bid to get challenger Larry Farnese’s name taken off the ballot.

Commonwealth Court Judge Rochelle Friedman initially denied Dougherty’s petition on March 7 and the higher court upheld her order today.

The Supreme Court said it would issue an opinion later.

By now, anyone who wants to know knows that Mayor Nutter is backing Hillary Rodham Clinton over Barack Obama in Pennsylvania's April 22 primary.

What has received less attention, though, is why Nutter predicted that Obama would win the race for president in February 2007 at a mayoral forum at Central High School.

The Huffington Post asked him this question last week, and here was his response.

"It wasn't so much a prediction," he recalled. "We were at a high school sponsored candidates forum and we were asked who do you think will be the democratic nominee or who will be the next president. I said I thought Sen. Obama. Now, at that point, I was at fifth place. Since I was a long shot and it appeared to me that he was a long shot, I was trying to get some solidarity with the long shots."

Had his political crystal ball changed?

"Absolutely," Nutter replied, saying he thought Clinton would now win. "Obviously, I had no way of knowing that we would be where we are here today... [Back then] I was trying to give little hope to my own candidacy."

To read the entire story, click on The Huffington Post above.

Looks like the Ed Coryell and the Carpenters Union (obligatory disclaimer: they are investors in the company that owns the Inquirer) have chosen NOT to picket a minority contracting job networking event at City Hall today. At least not so far.

Although Coryell declined to talk to the Inquirer, he expressed his displeasure with the event to plenty of other folks. It wasn't the goal of helping minority construction firms get more work that ticked him off, but rather the sponsor: Associated Builders and Contractors, an organization that labor considers anti-union. In the extreme. Consider the words of Pat Gillespie, business manager of the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council, when he talked to Heard in the Hall about ABC late last month: "The whole predicate for their existence is to destroy the sanctity of collective bargaining. We couldn't hold them in any lower regard. They're as disingenuous a group as you can find. I wouldn't expect City Hall to allow the Klan to meet there, or Aryan Nation."

In any event, no carpenters are lined up around City Hall. The show has gone on.

How much do endorsements matter?

Considerably, it seems, given the passions that have come to define this presidential primary race.

State Rep. James Roebuck joined a group of a dozen-plus city and state lawmakers yesterday who announced their support ofBarack Obama at a press conference in City Hall. His name was not on the original press release reporters received publicizing the event, and so it was not included in this story today.

But in fact he did speak at the event. Also in attendance - though not noted in the story - were state Sen. Leanna Washington and state Rep. Tommy Blackwell.

Nutter policy advisor Wendell Pritchett will not be leaving the administration. He was one of three finalists for the vacant Temple Law School deanship, but the university announced today that the job would go to JoAnne Epps.

Pritchett failed to wow faculty and students, who got the distinct impression during interviews that he didn't want the job all that much. Epps, presently the associate dean, was probably the odds-on favorite all along.

CORRECTION: Pritchett withdrew his name from consideration before Epps was formally selected. The full correction is available here.

Mayor Nutter has yet another public appearance on his schedule in Philly's burbs this weekend. This time at the Lower Merion and Narberth Democratic Party Spring Dinner. Of course, it could be a favor to his pal Joe Manko, who was a big wheel in Lower Merion's democratic party before he moved to Philadelphia not long ago. But we'd bet Nutter would have been happy to show up even without that connection. He's been popping up all over the region in recent weeks. Rotary clubs, universities, political dinners.

Nutter seems to be emulating the Richard Daley leadership model, trying to assert himself not just as the leader of Philadelphia, but as a leader of the region.

Not that he's neglecting his Philly appearances. Before that Lower Merion supper, he's got three in town events. On a Sunday.

Want to get an audience with Mayor Mike?

You might try serving up a grilled cheese, and chocolate milk.

That was Michael Nutter's food of choice at Little Pete's the other day, where he sat down with a New York Times reporter to explain, yet again, his reasons for backing Hillary Rodham Clinton over Barack Obama. It seems to be a conundrum to others, but not, of course, to him.

From the story:

“

He’s a really nice guy who’s talking about really important issues,” Mr. Nutter said last week while sitting over a late dinner of grilled cheese and chocolate milk at his favorite diner, Little Pete’s, “and I am aware that he is African-American.” Mr. Nutter’s wit is dry almost to the point of brittle.

“But there is this fascination, mostly in the press, with certain elements of race issues that, for whatever reason, only get raised with high-profile African-Americans,” Mr. Nutter said. “Have you asked any non-African-American politicians why they are supporting Senator Obama, and if they are getting flak from their constituents for supporting Senator Obama?”

Nutter said much the same last week in The Inquirer.

Next?

Mayor Nutter will appear on the Colbert Report tonight. Hizzoner can be a pretty funny guy, so we'd expect him to hold his own. You can catch him on Comedy Central at 11:30, along with John Legend and the borderline insane Chris Matthews.

Not bad. Not bad at all. Note how Nutter drinks in the audience applause before sitting down.

And here's Nutter cutting it up at the cast party with Colbert and, naturally, a mummer (photo courtesy of GPTMC). Today, Nutter likened his Colbert appearance to the ceremonial first pitch he tossed at the Phillies home opener on March 31st.

"So if you have a national program come to the city, notwitstanding that it is of course a tremendous opportunity for me to make a complete fool of myself, it's just kind of one of those risks that you take," Nutter said today during an appearance at Penn. "It's like throwing out the ball on opening day. There are so many things that can go so wrong."

Mayor Nutter (who, let's face it, has enjoyed glowing press coverage for pretty much his whole career) ruminated on his relationship with the media in a Penn classroom today.

His "basic philosophy," Nutter said, was to start with the idea that the media are "not my biographers."

"It's not their responsibility, directly, to make me look good or make me look smart," Nutter said. "On the other hand, commensurately, it's not their job to make me look stupid, which they have not done."

Another key, he said, was to actually talk to the media. That's a more novel approach then you might assume.

Before taking office, for instance, Nutter met with reporters and top brass at the city's largest media outlets to "talk about the city's image, to talk about trying to change the nature of the relationship between the mayor's office and the news media."

"Not commenting on the previous mayor, but you know, it was kind of a challenged relationship," Nutter said of Mayor Streets (lack of) rapport with the press corps. "I have a much more open and engaged relationship with the media."

Which might help explain why Nutter is one of those few long-serving public officials who says he has rarely been misquoted or badly misrepresented by the news media.

Students wondered what Nutter made of the media’s relentless focus on what you might call bad news: crime, corruption, that sort of thing. Nutter said it cut two ways. He said the intense coverage of crime last year clearly shaped the mayor’s race (in his favor, it would seem) and focused the city – including the Police Department – on the magnitude of the problem. But daily homicide headlines definitely take a toll on the city's image, Nutter said.

New Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery, the former Philadelphia cop and Superior Court judge who once presided over Eagles Court, is already bringing some color to the generally staid proceedings of the Supreme Court.
The Court was in session in Philadelphia yesterday, presiding over cases including several death-row cases. He listened to a case about a death row inmate, and seethed. He said he had restrained himself with difficulty, then noted to one defense attorney that the family of one murder victim had been waiting 25 years for justice. He reminded the attorney that "I was the one who picked up the bodies," and notified family members in such cases. "It's all so sterile, it's all so mechanical," within the Supreme Court's chambers, he smoldered. But what about the family members, he asked. "Do we care about them?"

Senior mayoral policy advisor Wendell Pritchett told Heard in the Hall today that he dropped out of the Temple Law dean search before the school settled on someone else for the job. He was not passed over, as incorrectly reported on this blog last week. Heard in the Hall regrets the error.

Pritchett, who was one of three finalists for the job before he removed himself from consideration, said there were two reasons he took his name out of the hat.

"One was what I was doing with the mayor was pretty important. Two it was clear they had a pretty good situation over there and it made sense for them to go with JoAnne," Pritchett said.

He was referring to JoAnne Epps, an internal candidate who was the favorite for the job all along.

Pritchett said he applied for the Temple post before Nutter offered him a job in the new administration. Currently on leave from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Pritchett said he remains interested in a deanship down the road.

Public testimony sessions on the city budget tend to be predictable affairs, and for the most part today's was no exception.

There were earnest pleas for more funding for the arts. For culture. For youth programs. For health centers. And so on.

"I'm falling asleep in here," one council member confessed to a reporter. And the session had hardly begun.

Four council members didn't bother to show up at all. Brian O'Neill, Joan Krajewski, Jack Kelly and Frank DiCicco skipped the session, which is one of only two chances each year the great unwashed are given to sound off on the city budget. DiCicco, it should be said, had endured a long morning session on an important development in his district that was chock full of public testimony.

In any event, the usual routine was sharply interrupted when a trio of speakers (Jonathan Stein, Sherrie Cohen and Stan Shapriro) rose to take issue with the Nutter administration's tax plans, which including cutting business taxes and discarding a tax credit that would benefit the working poor. Representing a group of progressive organizations, they called on council to restore the tax credit for the working poor and asked them to limit business tax cuts to relatively small businesses.

A Philadelphia public relations whiz will collect stories of Election Day problems in Philadelphia using a web-based "widget" that anyone can download and feature on their site. Rob Stuart's device is pop-up form that anyone can fill out to briefly detail a problem they encountered. The device automatically "collects and catergorizes complaints and then shares voter stories with a network of election protection groups," Stuart said. Those groups include Voter Action, Committee of Seventy, NAACP Voter Fund and the National Lawyers Committee for Election Protection. The widget also promotes the 1-866-MYVOTE hotline, which provides polling places and records verbal complaints. Anyone can grab the widget for their own page at voterstory.org.

From Inquirer reporter Joseph Gambardello:

Electricians union leader John J. Dougherty today picked up the endorsement of the Philadelphia Tribune in the Democratic primary for State Senator Vincent Fumo’s seat.

In announcing its support for Dougherty, the nation’s oldest African-American newspaper noted that it had been critical of Dougherty in the past on racial inclusion in his union and refusal to dislose the number of minorities in his local.

“For many readers, this will be a surprising choice,” the editorial said.

Still, the paper said, Dougherty has promised to increase the minority presence in his union and during his campaign has “made an effort to reach out to African Americans, particularly in the Point Breeze section of his district where many residents say they have been neglected for years.”

The paper also noted that Dougherty had won the support of some African American leaders, includings state Sen. Anthony Williams and Sheriff John Green.

“As an elected official, Dougherty can be held even more accountable for his actions than as a labor leader and we plan to do just that, the Tribune said.

Dougherty’s two opponents – Larry Farnese and Anne Dicker – have received the endorsements of the Inquirer and Daily News, respectively.

From Inquirer reporter Joseph A. Gambardello:

In the waning hours of the campaign, candidates John J. Dougherty and Anne Dicker are ganging up on Larry Farnese in the First District state Senate race.

Johnny Doc’s people are charging that allies of incumbent Sen. Vince Fumo are intimidating insiders and others who are supporting Doc and State Rep. Bill Keller in his race against Christian DiCicco, son of Fumocrat City Councilmember Frank DiCicco. Fumo, you may recall, has been supporting Farnese’s bid behind the scenes.

Dicker for her part is offering a history lesson. Here’s what she is saying in an email to supporters:

“In 1978, State Sen. Buddy Cianfrani was convicted of federal charges of racketeering, mail fraud, and obstruction of justice and was forced to give up his state Senate seat for a seat in jail. Buddy Cianfrani engineered that his protege and first-cousin, 35-year-old Vincent Fumo, replace him in a special election. It is widely understood that Cianfrani pulled the strings of the young Fumo from his jail cell.

“Now facing a 139-count indictment for mail fraud and obstruction of justice himself, Vincent Fumo has stepped down and is supporting Larry Farnese for state Senate. Although not a direct relative, Farnese's grandfather is closely linked with Vince Fumo. Many believe that the strings are firmly tied to the 39-year-old Farnese.”

The Dougherty campaign has been hammering the same theme for weeks now.

Brian Abernathy, a spokesman for Farnese, of course calls Doc’s charges false and rejects Dicker’s assertion. After all, Abernathy has noted, Farnese entered the race when Fumo was still in it and, by all indication, the front runner despite his legal troubles.

Abernathy also sees the two-front attack as a good, all things considered.

“I’m glad we’re being noticed,” he said.

Translation: The other guys must be worried about something.

A lawyer for Tommie St. Hill, a consultant to electricians union Local 98, told a city judge this afternoon that he was not the owner of a laptop on which he created a flyer attacking Mayor Nutter during last year's mayoral primary race.

So who was? St. Hill wouldn't say. Nor would his lawyer, Lewis Small. "That's something for another day," Small said.

But both men told reporters, after a contentious court hearing, that the laptop also did not belong to anyone affiliated with Local 98. "It has nothing to do with the IBEW," Small said, referring to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98, which is led by state Senate candidate John J. Dougherty.

The ethics board has apparently been looking into whether the union created, produced or generated 125,000 of the flyers, which violated campaign finance law by not stating on them who paid for them.

A city official for nearly 30 years, John F. Street was fond of saying that he never lost an election.

Now he has.

On last Tuesday’s primary ballot, Philadelphia’s former mayor was one of 12 candidates from the First Congressional District vying to be elected as delegates to the Democratic National Convention in August.

Under Democratic Party rules, the district can send just seven delegates to the convention, which will be in Denver.

Officially, those seven may not be confirmed for weeks.

But what’s known now is that at least five of them will be supporters of Barack Obama, based on somewhat complicated arithmetic related to the percentage of the district voting for Obama.
What’s not complicated is that there’s no chance Street will be headed out West this summer.

For one thing, Street ran as a Hillary Rodham Clinton cdelegate in a district heavily backing Obama.

For another, he received 18,980 votes - fewer than any of his 11 competitors.

Translation: Street hasn't grown any more popular out of office than when he was in.

Pennsylvania’s primary election is over, but that doesn’t mean folks have forgotten which candidate Mayor Nutter backed.

When introducing Nutter at a Pennsylvania Bar Association luncheon for minority lawyers on Friday, attorney Jettie Newkirk called him “Philadelphia’s Obama.”

Nutter, of course, is among Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s biggest fans, but he took the joke well.

“I always thought that Senator Obama was the country’s Mike Nutter,” the mayor cracked, as he took the stage.

There were big laughs all around, and the episode seemed to confirm the conventional wisdom on Nutter’s endorsement of Clinton: Plenty of Philadelphians didn’t get why he backed her, but neither did they hold his choice against him.

The Philadelphia Bar Association will partner with the Philadelphia School District in the fall to lead students in discussions about ethics and the justice system. And who better to run the class than a Philadelphia lawyer, who according to Webster's New World Dictionary, is "a clever, shrewd, or tricky lawyer, esp. one skilled in taking advantage of legal technicalities."

Well, hell, all our kids could use a little instruction on that end, couldn't they? The volunteers will include judges, also, and lawyer/City Councilman Bill Green suggested that non-lawyers get involved also. "God knows we've got enough lawyers in Philadelphia," he said.

Cassandra Jones, the district's Chief Academic Officer, seems excited about the Advancing Civics Education program, as a way to help teach students values and conflict resolution.

Local 98 business manager John Dougherty is "absolutely not" stepping down from his seat on the board of the Penn's Landing Corporation, said his spokesman Frank Keel, debunking a rumor floating around City Hall today.

As reported in yesterday's Inquirer, Dougherty is stepping down from his post as chair of the Redevelopment Authority. But that's it, Keel says.