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Archive: October, 2012
A weekly series of foul-mouthed investigations into empty lots, dead-ass proposals and other design phenomena around Philadelphia. Find more stories like this at Philaphilia.blogspot.com.
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| The only known rendering of what could have been. |
2100 Ben Franklin Parkway -- This is one of the most disappointing Dead-Ass Proposals ever to hit Philadelphia. This project wasn't killed because of NIMBYs, zoning issues, or crooked developers. This one died an agonizing, ass-achingly painful death. People might have been pissed off about the construction of the Barnes Museum, but at least that got built and is kicking ass all over the place -- despite being in a butt-fugly building. This one didn't even get that far.
The Calder Family is forever attached to the city of Philadelphia. The Ben Franklin Parkway touts great works by three generations of Calders. The 250-plus statues on City Hall were conceived by the 26-year-old Alexander Milne Calder, the Logan Circle fountain was created by Alexander Stirling Calder, and the big-ass mobile hanging in the Philadelphia Museum of Art's lobby was the work of Alexander "Sandy" Calder. That's fucking incredible. Are three generations of your family represented on a gigantic Parkway? Didn't think so.
After bandying about the idea for years (some records say it was discussed as early as 1974), Gov. Ed Rendell took the initiative to get a Calder Museum built on the Parkway throughout the late 1990s. In 1996, the Philadelphia Museum of Art conducted a study to see if a Calder Museum would make them the oodles and oodles of dinero they so love. It must have proved profit-worthy, because immediately after that, the PMA went on the warpath to get this thing built.
After more than a year of bouncing around the Pennsylvania House and Senate, a bill clearing the way for municipal land banks had to either pass or die in the Senate yesterday. Well, it passed, meaning that Philly could be one step closer to finally setting up a land bank. Meaning that the problem of Philly sitting on thousands of pieces of property scattered among the Department of Public Property, the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority and the city itself could actually, potentially be solved — with fewer situations like this one. The land bank could be an important companion to the newly improved "front door" the Redevelopment Authority has set up to help sell off city-owned properties in a more orderly fashion. The bill's primary sponsor was Philly-based Rep. John Taylor, a Republican.
Philly City Council members Maria Quinones-Sanchez, Bill Green, Curtis Jones and Bobby Henon introduced legislation on a Philly land bank this February. "Legislation is never perfect, but we are extremely happy and very grateful for Rep. Taylor's and everyone else's efforts tot get this through the finish line," Quinones-Sanchez tells CP.
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Newspaper Guild/Communications Workers of America Local 38010 yesterday filed a grievance over The Philadelphia Inquirer's "irrational and seemingly punitive reassignments of 12 veteran journalists."
As City Paper reported yesterday, Interstate General Media, which owns the Inquirer, Daily News, and Philly.com, is accused of reassigning older reporters to undesirable beats and locations in an effort to force them out. They have confirmed these suspicions over the last two weeks by offering a new round of buyouts and hiring three young reporters.
Veteran mafia reporter George Anastasia (who had not been reassigned) has taken the buyout, as have theater critic Howie Shapiro and science writer Faye Flam (both of whom were reassigned). Multiple sources inside and close to the company tell CP that newsroom morale has hit rock bottom.
Pennsylvania's General Assembly may be wrapping up for the year, but some lawmakers are looking ahead to the coming session. Among them, apparently, is Lancaster County-based Republican Sen. Mike Brubaker, who this fall introduced Pennsylvania's own version of the "ag gag" laws that have been proposed in some 10 states across the country, and passed in Iowa, Utah and Missouri. The legislation would make it a third-degree misdemeanor to videotape or photograph without permission on a farm, and is plainly a response to an investgation by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) into Kreider Egg Farms in Manheim, Pa., released this past April. The investigation had documented "extreme animal abuse," including severe overcrowding, the finding of dead and mummified bird carcasses inside cages with living hens, hens left without water for days and other gory details.
Brubaker, in a statement, said the farm had been "unfairly targeted by activists," and that "this case serves as a startling example of the kind o fdamage that unfounded accusations can create."
Matt Dominguez, an HSUS spokesman, says that he's "very worried" that Brubaker, who is not up for re-election, will re-introduce the bill next session. He's been trying to get the Senator to consider at least consulting with HSUS on any new version of the bill, particularly since he says that the bill, as written, would also make it illegal for whistleblowers to document unsafe working conditions on farms. "While it may not be the intent of the legislation, unfortunately the language is very broad and sweeping." He says that language makes the bill more extreme than "ag gag" laws passed elsewhere, and warns that it may run up against constitutional free-speech protections.
Shortly before Tuesday night's presidential debate began, City Councilwoman Marian Tasco posted a Tweet echoing the sentiment of many Democrats across the county following the initial presidential debate on Oct. 3: "Mr. President, Be yourself."
The message was subsequently retweeted by Council President Darrell Clarke and, after the town-hall-style face-off between President Barack Obama and Gov. Mitt Romney at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y. concluded, the council president Tweeted that he was satisfied with Obama's performance.
"President Barack Obama showed real spine tonight. His vision for our country is the one that will benefit all Americans," Clarke posted.
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Vernon Clark, a city writer at the Philadelphia Inquirer, will now pen obituaries. Meanwhile, obituary writer Walter Naedele is shipping out to report on Chester Country, Pa. Projects editor Kathy Hacker will, well, write obituaries.
Endings seem to be the order of the day at the newspaper, under new ownership since April. Management's dizzying reassignment of a dozen-odd mostly older and thus more expensive newsroom staffers is, according to sources inside the company, a transparent effort to encourage them to quit.
"The company does have a right to reassign reporters or editors to work in different areas or cover different things," says Daily News gossip columnist and Greater Philadelphia Newspaper Guild President Dan Gross. Interstate General Media owns The Inquirer, Daily News and Philly.com. "But the sudden reassignment of this group of people, all of whom are of a certain age and have a certain length of service with the company, raises an eyebrow. And we will monitor the new assignments and the situations, and the demands that are placed on these employees.”
A weekly series of foul-mouthed investigations into empty lots, dead-ass proposals and other design phenomena around Philadelphia. Find more stories like this at Philaphilia.blogspot.com.
Bounded by 18th, 19th and Buttonwood streets, and Baldwin Park -- This right here is a lot with some really shitty luck. Though a surface lot for nearly 40 years, it still hasn't beaten its own record for long-term emptiness. Now that's fucked up. Though there is some hope for the future of this space, it's currently mired in a shitty shituation.
Councilman Bill Green introduced a bill in City Council today that would require all city websites and web applications to be compatible with various Internet browsers.
Currently, some functions on the city's website are accessible only using Internet Explorer — including "Econtracts" the online destination for those who seek to do business with the city, and the Department of Revenue's online system for payment of business income tax.
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Philadelphia Public School sophomore Samantha Pawlucy has received nationwide and even global attention after a teacher allegedly mocked her for wearing a Mitt Romney T-shirt to class. This, if proven true, clearly merits some outrage.
Samantha's father, Richard Pawlucy, has been eager to take the outrage a step further, turning the incident into an indictment of a liberal, and even un-American, school. " Sometimes they don't fly their flags," Pawlucy told the Philadelphia Daily News. "There's nothing in the school, nothing patriotic, at least, though there probably is now. I asked my daughter about the Pledge of Allegiance and she said, 'What's that?'"
Pawlucy has portrayed himself to the media as an apolitical dad pushed into the election-year fracas by his daughter's tormenters. According to The Inquirer's Karen Heller, "he has never voted before, which makes him an improbable participant in a political fight." Indeed, he says that he would have voted for Obama in 2008.
This past summer, City Paper featured a cover story by yours truly about development gone wild in North Central Philly, mostly around Temple University where a veritable gold rush to build student housing has been underway.
Among this reporter's findings were dozens, if not hundreds of instances of blatant violations of construction and other regulations:
Walk in any direction on almost any block between 19th Street and Broad near Temple’s campus and you’ll find plenty more where that came from: sites improperly fenced, dried cement in the gutters, piles of construction debris illegally dumped in city-owned vacant lots, construction sites without posted permits, permits without street accommodations, development without much regard for anyone — including, apparently, for the city’s Department of Licenses and Inspections, which should be issuing violations for all of the above.
The Department of Licenses and Inspections did, at the time, say that it was stepping up enforcement efforts in the area -- but now it looks like there'll be a new fire burning under developers' feet: Today, the office of City Controller Alan Butkovitz announced a press conference set for tomorrow to discuss "a special review of construction activity in North Central Philadelphia, near Temple University."
Given the Controller's job of pointing out inefficiencies, misspending and city snafoos, the review isn't likely to be a "two thumbs up." We'll keep you posted.
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