After many months of politicking, and many millions in political spending, Philadelphia has its mayor-elect: Michael Nutter.
Even though that result has been 100 percent predictable for more than five months, Tuesday made if official - and that's a notable milestone.
Political junkies were bored by the fall election; they thought the May Democratic primary was the interesting part.
But for people who care about issues, who live the issues at rowhouse level, the really interesting, the really important, the really exciting part begins right now. The part where the people they elected get a chance to work on addressing the city's ills and realizing its promise. To all but the political junkie, that's what really matters.
For the citizens who have given their time, their ideas and their passion to this Great Expectations project, Nutter's election is a hopeful moment.
He's a guy who has shown he cares about and "gets" a much broader range of issues than the ones that used to dominate city politics. For that, he used to get called a "wonk." Now, he gets to be called "Mr. Mayor."
That marks a watershed for the city, a man wining a mayoral election in large part because he understood and advocated on issues such as smart planning, green building, parks reform and ethics reform.
In the Challenges Ahead series just concluded in The Inquirer, we looked in-depth at 13 issues that citizens told us mattered to them: education, environment, crime, city services, taxes and spending, neighborhoods in flux, SEPTA, arts and culture, government reform, planning and zoning, leadership, poverty, and the knowledge economy.
In years past, a lot of mayoral candidates would have listened to that list of issues with a blank expression, rolled their eyes, then hustled off to their next meeting with ward leaders. During this campaign, Nutter has talked about and made reasoned proposals on each of them.
(By the way, let's pause for a moment to thank and praise the Republican candidate, Al Taubenberger, for running a consistently classy, upbeat and dogged campaign against hopeless odds. He did because he believes in the ideal of democratic (small d) choice, and that deserves our respect.)
In Nov. 25-30 in the paper, the Great Expectations Agenda for the Next Great City, dealing with each of those issues, will be rolled out. On Sunday, Dec. 2, at the Convention Center, you have the chance to join with citizens in discussing and critiquing that agenda, to whip it into shape to be presented to Nutter and the new City Council next year.
Nutter will give the keynote at the convention. That's one sign of how seriously he takes all the effort that citizens have put into Great Expectations, and all the issues they have said matter to them.
"It's a new day," Nutter chanted at his victory celebration last night. A new day doesn't wipe away all the problems, challenges and woes that have weighed upon this city. It doesn't change that on the day after electing a new mayor, the city mourned at the funeral of a police officer who was killed for no reason, but because of some all-too-familiar pathologies. It doesn't give the mayor-elect a magic wand. It only gives him a chance to succeed where others have faltered.
Still, the idea of a new day doesn't sound bad. A new day sounds like a good time to start moving towards some Great Expectations.
Chris Satullo
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