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Philadelphia Magazine just published an article by Robert Huber titled "Being white in Philly: In a city that is largely poor and segregated white people have become afraid to say anything at all about race. Here's what's not being said."
No, it is not an Onion-esque parody of Philadelphia's most white-bread journalistic institution, a magazine that seemingly hired Gene Marks just because he wrote the jaw-droppingly offensive article “If I Were a Poor Black Kid” for Forbes.
But before I continue, I must first disable the story's booby trap, a defense built into its very DNA: the idea that "in so many quarters, simply discussing race is seen as racist."
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Political operative John D. McDaniel's ongoing Philadelphia Board of Ethics saga has centered on Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown's troubling campaign finance practices and wasteful political patronage in the Nutter administration. McDaniel had been Brown's campaign manager, held apparently sole control over a political action committee and held a well-paying job at the airport provided by the mayor himself. Now there's a new twist: McDaniel's Progressive Agenda PAC also funneled $5,900 from Students First PAC, a Pennsylvania group backed by Bala Cynwyd hedge fund managers and wealthy national school voucher advocates, to state House candidate Fatimah Muhammad's 2012 campaign, which was heavily supported by voucher proponents.
McDaniel's transfer of funds, detailed in an Ethics Board settlement released on Monday, was a violation of Philadelphia's Home Rule Charter. But Students First PAC (not to be confused with the ideologically related Michelle Rhee group StudentsFirst) may have also violated state campaign finance law.
"You may not direct another person to give money on your behalf," says Barry Kauffman, director of watchdog Pennsylvania Common Cause. Kauffman points to Section 1634(a) of the state election code, which states that it is "unlawful for any person to make any contribution with funds designated or given to him for the purpose by any other person, firm or corporation. Each person making a contribution shall do so only in his own name."
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John Baer dedicated today's Daily News state politics column to praising Kahlil Byrd, the president of Michelle Rhee's StudentsFirst education reform group and past CEO of something you've never heard of called Americans Elect. (A copy editor apparently missed that "StudentsFirst" does not, contrary to English grammar norms, put a space between what appear to be two words)
As Baer notes, Byrd markets himself to Daily News readers as a master of "disruptive politics" — of an independent, nonpartisan variety. But, as I reported at Salon last year, the vast majority of candidates that the pro-charter and union-busting outfit supports are, surprise, Republicans. StudentsFirst's donors include Mayor Michael Bloomberg, hedge fund managers, and the Walton Family Foundation. In Pennsylvania, StudentsFirst hired Ashley DeMauro, former Department of Education government relations chief under Republican Gov. Tom Corbett.
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The 2010 video went viral on Youtube quickly: Philadelphia Police Officer Jimmy Leocal beating Askia Sabur repeatedly on West Philadelphia's Lansdowne Avenue. In the video, Leocal then pulls his gun on the alarmed crowd.
The beating sparked an uproar, local and national media coverage, and was discussed during City Council hearings on police brutality. But busy reporters moved on, and Sabur spent the last two years in jail awaiting trial for the charge of assaulting Leocal's partner, Officer Donyul Williams.
Today, a jury found Sabur not guilty of aggravated assault, disarming a law enforcement officer, simple assault, recklessly endangering another person and resisting arrest.
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The William Penn Foundation has suspended grant-making to city-related agencies after public education advocates filed a complaint charging that the $2 billion philanthropy violated Philadelphia's new lobbying code when it funded and directed millions of outside dollars to pay the Boston Consulting Group to develop a controversial restructuring plan for the School District of Philadelphia.
"A citizen complaint was recently filed with the Philadelphia Board of Ethics alleging that certain grantmaking activities of the Foundation are regulated by the City’s lobbying registration and reporting ordinance," according to an email from Interim President Helen Davis Picher. "The Foundation wants to ensure our full compliance with the ordinance and is awaiting further clarification with regard to its scope concerning permissible grant activity."
The city says that it received a letter announcing the decision in reference to a grant application seeking funding for Bartram's Mile, a proposed 1.1-mile trail extension linking the east and west sides of the Schuylkill River.
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The Newspaper Guild has reached a tentative two-year contract with Interstate General Media.
The union representing newsroom employees opened their contract early after the newish owners of The Inquirer and Daily News reportedly threatened to liquidate the papers in a week's time. The Guild then protested that the owners were demanding a new performance review to weaken seniority--and potentially push out older reporters.
The proposed contract, according to the Guild e-mail below, includes a performance review with strong worker protections, and guarantees that both papers will be printed as dailies for the duration of the contract. That last point indicates that the owners are considering moving to a few-times-a-week print schedule, a model that has now been implemented at papers like The New Orleans Times-Picayune.
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Republican Gov. Tom Corbett will tomorrow address the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce at the Academy of Natural Sciences. People will, of course, be protesting.
"The last few times the Governor visited Philadelphia, we gave him a great un-welcome, and now it’s time to do it again," according to the Facebook invite.
They will likely protest Corbett's deep cuts to education and services for the poor, prison construction, voter ID, and unregulated and lightly-taxed natural gas drilling. Among other causes.
6 ABC's Matt O’Donnell will ask the governor questions that Chamber members submitted online before hand, "everything from transportation to pension reform to welfare budget," according to the Chamber's Liz Ferry.
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Pennsylvania is one of the "Terrible Ten" states with the most regressive tax structures nationwide, hitting the poor hardest while taking the least from the rich, according to a new report from the liberal Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center (PBPC) and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
"No one would deliberately design a tax system where low-income working families pay the greatest share of their income in taxes, but that is exactly the type of upside-down tax system we have in Pennsylvania,” according to a release from PBPC director Sharon Ward.
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[updated]
Negotations between the union representing Inquirer and Daily News reporters and the owners of Interstate General Media have gotten nasty pretty fast: the union, in an email to members, accuses management of demanding a "poison pill" that would undermine seniority, even after the union had proposed what they describe as significant financial concessions via a buyout package.
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Workers and labor advocates flanked City Council President Darrell Clarke and Councilman Bill Greenlee this morning to support a bill mandating paid-sick leave for workers. Greenlee thinks he has better odds than in 2011, when Mayor Michael Nutter vetoed legislation passed by council.
A representative of Comcast, who has clocked serious time lobbying against the bill, was spotted at the press conference. Greenlee says that he is willing to dialog with business leaders, who contend that the bill will drive up costs.
"But one thing we're not going to do is not do this bill," he said.
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