http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/ The latest Philadelphia politics and policy from the Inquirer's City Hall bureau en Copyright 2012 Fri, 06 Jun 2008 15:42:45 -0500 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://www.HeardInTheHall.com]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/06/heard_in_the_hall_has_moved.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/06/heard_in_the_hall_has_moved.html Fri, 06 Jun 2008 15:42:45 -0500 So far, Mayor Nutter is a pretty popular guy in Philadelphia. But it's looks as though his appeal isn't limited to the city, or even to the region. According to an internal presidential poll obtained by The Inquirer, Nutter has fast become relatively well-known and well-liked on a statewide level. More than 60 percent of respondents statewide were familiar enough with the mayor to have formed an opinion of him, and his favorable-to-unfavorable ratings ratio was almost 3.7 to 1, which is outstanding. "I'm impressed," said Pennsylvania pollster Terry Madonna. "His image is very strong, he's considered kind of an independent reform voice." The poll also offered a close-up of public opinion in a few congressional districts in and near Philadelphia, where Nutter fared even better than he did statewide. That backs up anecdotal evidence suggesting the mayor is wildly popular in the suburbs. And it raises an interesting question for him: What role, if any, will he attempt to play in suburban politics? State Democrats think suburban Republicans are highly vulnerable. Might Nutter fund-raising and campaigning on behalf of some challengers put Democrats on top? The poll's findings should be taken with a few grains of salt. First, the poll is dated. It was conducted in late March. Also, the copy obtained by The Inquirer was heavily redacted, and no sample size was available. Still, internal campaign polls are generally considered to be reasonably accurate. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/pennsylvanias_mayor.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/pennsylvanias_mayor.html Mayor Mon, 12 May 2008 10:25:27 -0500 With team scheduled for Game 1 of it playoffs series with Pittsburgh tonight, 24-year-old Matt Liczbinski asked mourners to perform, in honor of his father, what may have been a first-ever Flyers cheer at Sts. Peter and Paul Basilica. Taking a time out from "all the seriousness," Matt Liczbinski led the congregration in "Let's Go Fly-ers" chant, complete with da-da-dadada clapping. Sports, in life and death. That's Philly, baby.]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/a_true_philly_sports_moment_am.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/a_true_philly_sports_moment_am.html Fri, 09 May 2008 13:42:03 -0500 The Mayor of Iraq's third-largest city was touring city government Thursday, including a stop in City Council, where he received a warm welcome and got to watch a sleepy Council session. Zuhair Mohsin Mohammed Abdulazeez, the mayor of Mosul in northern Iraq, is on a 10-day tour of the states, with stops in Minnesapolic, Philadelphia and New York. Mosul, a city of 2 million, is beset with problems, and Abdulazeez is examing everything from budgeting to cultural funding to solid waste. Councilman Bill Green was his tour guide in council. Below is a briefing on his trip from the International Visitors Council of Philadelphia: http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/from_mosul_to_market_street.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/from_mosul_to_market_street.html Thu, 08 May 2008 16:49:38 -0500 City Council's Public Safety Committee on Wednesday will look at the way the city handles Protection from Abuse Orders. Councilman Bill Green called for hearings to explore why some abuse victims apparently are made responsible for serving protection orders on their abusers. Philadelphia Police believe they should be in charge of delivering such orders, Green said. Nearby counties are expected to testify about how their systems are run. The hearing is 10 a.m. in Council Chambers. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/protection_from_abuse_orders_s.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/protection_from_abuse_orders_s.html Tue, 06 May 2008 17:37:52 -0500 here. Ratcliffe is a former policeman and author of the new book, Intelligence-led Policing. Last August The Inquirer did its own analysis of the city's 18 closed circuit crime cameras, which had been installed a year previously. Crime statistics around the cameras showed two trends: Around highly visible, unmonitored cameras, crime went down; around less visible, constantly monitored cameras, crime went up. Experts suggested that the more visible cameras discouraged crime, while the less-visible, fully monitored cameras may have led to more reported crime because police caught more crime as it was happening. Ratcliffe said some area may not have shown a positive impact on crime stats for this reason. He has submitted his study to the city, which is spending $8.9 million this year to install the new cameras, all of which will be fully monitored and highly visible, combining the best aspects of the two different cameras used in the pilot program. ]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/crime_down_near_cameras.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/crime_down_near_cameras.html Mon, 05 May 2008 17:37:43 -0500 As Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey explained his sweeping reorganization of the Police Department to the media last week, an odd couple stood shoulder to shoulder behind him: Fraternal Order of Police president John McNesby and Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Everett Gillison. McNesby was livid in January, when Nutter named Gillison - a lifelong public defender - his public safety czar. The biggest FOP objection to Gillison's resumé was his representation in 2006 of Solomon Montgomery, who was convicted of killing Police Officer Gary Skerski. McNesby publicly condemned Gillison's appointment in a letter. Later, when McNesby discovered that he and Gillison were booked to appear on the same panel at a Temple Law School forum on gun violence, he refused to share the stage with the deputy mayor and walked out on the event. "That's old news," McNesby said last week, when asked about his feud with Gillison. "We made our point on that and moved forward. We're professionals, we do what's right for the city." Gillison turned the other cheek when McNesby objected to his appointment. In remarks he made to a reporter before Ramsey's news conference, Gillison said he thought he was making progress on winning the police over. He was right about that. It's worth noting that all this happened before Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski was shot and killed by a bank robber on Saturday. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/fop_warming_up_to_gillison.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/fop_warming_up_to_gillison.html Mon, 05 May 2008 14:40:57 -0500 Among the top City Hall brass who Mayor Nutter did away with upon taking office in January was Prisons Commissioner Leon A. King. But a few weeks ago, King resurfaced. His new boss: City Councilman Frank Rizzo. “He’s smart, he knows the people, and he knows his way in and out of the Law Department,” Rizzo said of King, the No. 1 prison official throughout most of former Mayor John Street’s administration. Before that, King worked as a city lawyer on prison issues, and in that role he helped negotiate the end of litigation that kept the prison system under federal court oversight for nearly two decades. Rizzo turned to King after his longtime director of legislation left for a private-sector job. “Our professional relationship is a good one,” the councilman said. How long will King stay? “Who knows,” Rizzo said, acknowledging that King is now making about half of the $128,000 he earned as prisons commissioner. “I’m sure he’ll find a job eventually that will pay him the money he is used to making. But for now, he is doing a valuable service to me.” http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/streets_prisons_commish_now_co.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/streets_prisons_commish_now_co.html City Council Fri, 02 May 2008 13:49:39 -0500 here and here, while the Inquirer report dealt principally with the substance of the meeting. Reporters, who tend for obvious reasons to take an expansive view of state open meetings law, felt that the session (which included well over a quorum of council members) constituted a public meeting under the act. Nutter's administration takes the view that it is free to hold closed informational sessions with council, so long as no work is done on legislation. It isn't a new disagreement. Governments and the press dispute the scope of the law all the time. In December, for instance, City Council held what amounted to an illegal closed meeting to hammer out an agreement on minority inclusion for the Convention Center expansion project. What was new was the tenor of the confrontation between the press and the Nutter administration. It wasn't a friendly disagreement. At one point Councilman Frank Rizzo cracked, "the honeymoon is over." Nutter administration officials are plainly angry about the incident. They say that the administration has so far been remarkably open and transparent. That is absolutely true. Reporters' questions are answered promptly. Facts and figures that in past administration were difficult to obtain without filing an official and time consuming right to know request are now handed over with little to no fuss. And Nutter and his senior staff remain remarkably accessible to the press. But given his campaign commitments to transparency and open government, Nutter is being held to a higher standard. The press isn't alone on this either. It's clear that at least a few council members also felt the meeting should have been open. How else would reporters have known there was a meeting to crash? Bonus reading: a state primer on the open meetings law.]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/access_showdown_at_city_hall.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/05/access_showdown_at_city_hall.html City Council Mayor Fri, 02 May 2008 11:29:23 -0500 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. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/dougherty_keeping_his_penns_la.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/dougherty_keeping_his_penns_la.html Wed, 30 Apr 2008 15:53:00 -0500 Advancing Civics Education program, as a way to help teach students values and conflict resolution. ]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/a_philadelphia_lawyer_for_ever.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/a_philadelphia_lawyer_for_ever.html Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:41:15 -0500 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. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/nutter_tweaked_on_presidential.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/nutter_tweaked_on_presidential.html Mayor Mon, 28 Apr 2008 11:06:58 -0500 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.]]> http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/street_fails_in_election_as_de_1.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/street_fails_in_election_as_de_1.html Politics Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:23:46 -0500 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. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/mystery_whose_laptop_was_used.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/mystery_whose_laptop_was_used.html Politics Mon, 21 Apr 2008 17:30:20 -0500 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. http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/dicker_and_doc_sing_same_song.html http://blogs.phillynews.com/inquirer/heardinthehall/2008/04/dicker_and_doc_sing_same_song.html Politics Mon, 21 Apr 2008 16:33:59 -0500