So yesterday, in a federal courtroom in Philadelphia, at the opening of a trial of South Philly mogul pol Pa. State Sen. Vince Fumo, naturally, much of the discussion centered around Ventnor and Margate, the center of all universes. (I keep driving to Philly for stories, and then it's all about the Jersey shore. Last time, I drove to Haverford to meet with John McCain Philly best pal Connie Cunningham Bookbinder, and it turns out, she's up there reading the Atlantic City Press, a Margate girl whose dad used to be DIrector of Public Relations for the city of Atlantic City, back in the day when that position was like being Sectretary of State. But I digress.)

Anyway, at opening statements yesterday, we learned that prosecutors think Fumo used his staff and non-profit organization improperly to do things like, go down the shore in a minivan to fix the hot tub, scrub the deck, buy tiki torches and bubbler hoses, and go to Sam's Club in Pleasantville to buy hamburger buns, toilet paper, turkey sausage and ravioli (hey, I have that same oversized bag of frozen ravioli still in my freezer from Sam's too!), and pick up the trash to bring back to Philly (thanks!). We learned Vince had a little Fumo fender-bender with a cement truck as he backed out of his driveway on Kenyon Ave. in Margate in his supposedly tricked-up Chrysler Town and Country Minivan paid for by his Citizens' Alliance for Better Neighborhoods non-profit (which prosecutors say paid for the Sam's Club bill as well). The minivan was Vince's go-to shore vehicle, though he had a Jeep at his disposal too. Citizens' Alliance also sunk $70,000 into a failed effort to block the Army Corp from building a big dune that Philly people with beach houses feared would block their views. (There's Vince's view, above, from in front of his three story house in the middle of the beach block on Kenyon Ave.) At the time, those fighting for the dune grumbled about how Fumo was behind the opposition. And there you go. Anyway, the effort failed, and the dune was built in Ventnor, though not in Margate. (And, contrary to attorney Ed Jacobs' assertion that the dune was washed away in the first storm, only MOST of it has been washed away. Some of it, toward the Atlantic CIty end of town, has held up nicely, actually. But most views have been preserved).
Another time, prosecutors said, when Fumo was mad at Ed Rendell, he sent one of his trusty helpers to try to dig up some dirt on Rendell's Ocean City property.
Anyway, Fumo's people also liked to hang out at his condo on Monmouth Avenue in Ventnor, with a nice view of the bay. When I got back from Philly last night at dusk, I went looking for the condo and wondered if I'd be able to find where Fumo liked to park his Town and Country. Turns out, it wasn't hard to find:

As defense attorney Dennis Cogan asserted, there is much that is done with transparency in the life and times of Sen. Fumo.