|
|
|
Archive: May, 2011
In a letter obtained by City Paper, District Attorney Seth Williams criticizes Rep. Matt Baker's bill that would regulate abortion clinics — the same bill that women's health and pro-choice advocates say could shut down every clinic in the state because of its allegedly unnecessary (and unnecessarily costly) requirements.
Williams says the bill "goes beyond the scope of the grand jury report."
Baker says the impetus for his bill was the D.A.'s grand jury report on Kermit Gosnell, the West Philly abortion doctor who's been charged with murdering seven babies and one woman. The report argues that clinics should be regulated as outpatient surgical centers (aka "ambulatory surgical facilities") — which is exactly what Baker's bill proposes.
Pro-choice advocates, however, have argued that the D.A.'s report presses for those regulations mostly to make sure that the state's Health Department would inspect abortion clinics annually — not to impose the many other regulations laid out in Baker's bill.
Conversely, Baker says abortion providers care too much about the "bottom line" and that his bill would protect women.
But until now, Williams has not clarified the grand jury's position on the matter.
In the letter to Baker and other legislators, Williams says the grand jury did not recommend that "abortion clinics be singled out for licensure ... simply because they offer abortions. He also says, "The Grand Jurors did not recommend that the Legislature change the definition of an [outpatient] surgical facility to include all abortion clinics." (His italics.)
Williams adds that, "The Grand Jurors were outraged by the fact that the laws that are already on the books gave the Department of Health the authority it needed to license and monitor Gosnell's clinic, but the Department chose not to."
Click below to read Williams' letter. To enlarge, click on the image itself.
The ElectionEar is a good listener; send tips here.
Both the Daily News and the Inquirer have begun making their endorsements for this year's primary election — before, that is, candidates have disclosed basic campaign finance information.
Trying to figure out who's up to what is hard enough as it is: Candidates for city office only file campaign finance reports once before the primary — the last reporting cycle ended on Monday, but reports don't have to be submitted until Friday. That leaves reporters and the public just over a week to review a mountain of information potentially more revealing than any questionnaire or debate.
(The Inquirer, by the way, began making its endorsements even earlier, before its own reporters had had the opportunity to report on several races and before those candidates had had the opportunity to debate in public).
This info is vital to understanding who the candidates are beholden to — and, perhaps, who they'll be inviting into their offices first if elected.
Yet both the Inquirer and Daily News have already made many of their endorsements — sending a mesage to their own reporters, it seems to me, that whatever muckraking, investigative, money-following journalism they might be ready to deploy in that tiny week doesn't matter.
Worse, it sends a message to the public that newspapers — just like unions, PACs, and political kingmakers — are part of the inside game.
Stay tuned, by the way, for City Paper's own endorsement information.
The Daily News' Philly Clout and Inquirer's Heard in the Hall are reporting that lawyer Damon K. Roberts is expected to drop out of the race for the 2nd Council District, currently occupied by Councilwoman Anna Verna, who is retiring.
The 2nd District is roughly split between black and white voters but currently has three black candidates — Tracey Gordon, State Rep. Kenyatta Johnson, and Damon Roberts — and only one white candidate — Barbara Capozzi — in the running.
Roberts' leaving the race will likely tip it farther toward Kenyatta Johnson.
You've heard the Committee of Seventy bag our city's row offices, but do you still have nary a clue what they are — or which row office candidates to vote for in this month's upcoming election?
Then consider going to tonight's forum, aptly titled "What Are These @!#? Offices & Why Do We Vote For Them?" featuring candidates for Sheriff, City Commissioner and Register of Wills. It starts at the Free Library at 6:30, and will be moderated by Ben Waxman, who's written for the Philadelphia Daily News and WHYY.
Two particularly uncoventional Sheriff candidates, John Kromer and Cheri Honkala, have confirmed that they'll be there. Kromer says that upon election, he'd abolish the Sheriff's position altogether. And Honkala, a longtime activist and Green Party candidate, says she'd suspended all sheriff's sales and refuse to evict families from their homes.
ElectionEar's @hollyotterbein will be live-tweeting the event, a-duh — follow along starting at 6:30!
And click below to see which candidates have confirmed attendance for tonight.
This just in: Next week, the state House will vote on Rep. Matt Baker's proposed bill regulating abortion clinics — a bill that some women's health advocates have called an anti-abortion "Trojan horse."
According to the American Civil Liberties Union, the Women's Law Project, the Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates and others, the bill would impose unncessary regulations on clinics — which, they say, could raise the cost of abortions by $1,000 each and likely shut down all 22 clinics in the state.
Baker, however, defends his bill, saying it "will provide the highest possible level of health care and safety for women." It passed out of committee last month.
You can read more about the legislation in a longer article by City Paper here.
Baker's office says a specific date and time for next week's vote have not been set.
In related news, a similar bill by state Sen. Pat Vance — which women's health advocates have called "way better" than Baker's legislation — will go up for vote in the Senate health committee tomorrow. (A few additional bills regulating abortion clinics have been proposed in the Senate.)
Vance's office says her bill has been amended, but won't be posting the amendment online until tomorrow morning.
Why does that matter? Last month, Baker told CP that Sen. Bob Mensch was thinking about penning an amendment that would make the proposed Senate bills look more like Baker's.
Mensch did not respond to requests for comment, however.
CP will post more as it comes.
If you give $500 to Common Pleas judge candidate Jim DiVergilis' campaign in an upcoming fundraiser, you'll get 15 police "courtesy cards" — also known as "get-out-of-jail-free" cards to some. Legend has it that if you flash a courtesy card after getting pulled over by police, you can avoid getting a ticket, so long as you didn't just run over a puppy or do something really egregious.
The courtesy cards are signed by Fraternal Order of Polce (FOP) president John McNesby, according to a letter recently sent out by the FOP, of which City Paper obtained a copy. (The FOP has endorsed DiVergilis.) $500 gets you 15 cards, which are tradtionally given to friends and family of police; $100 gets you 10; and $50 gets you five.
You can read the FOP's letter here.
Last year, the Inquirer ran an article in which McNesby claimed that the cards are basically worthless:
"I think, years ago, if you showed one you might get a free pass from a ticket," [McNesby] said. "But it's an antiquated tradition. These days I think officers use a lot of discretion with people in general. If you get pulled over for something, you have your license, registration, a clean record, the officer might let you go with a warning. That's a courtesy they show to a lot of folks."
But some claim otherwise. Police departments in other cities, like Toledo, Ohio, meanwhile, have done away with the cards because of scandals that broke out about them.
It turns out that DiVergilis isn't the only candidate whose campaign is giving out police courtesy cards: NakedPhilly recently reported that if you give $1,000 to City Council candidate Bobby Henon, you get 15 cards signed by the FOP's McNesby.
Check the ElectionEar for your election newsy needs. Also, the ElectionEar is a good listener: Send tips here.
- ActiVman
- adventures
- Arts
- Ask A Man-About-Town
- Award Tour
- Awards
- Bad Idea Factory
- Beer
- Below the Curve
- Bikes
- Booze
- Brian Hickey
- BRT
- Budget
- Budget Fuss
- Business
- Casinos
- City Council
- City Hall
- CouncilMANIC
- CP Abroad
- CP in the Community
- Criminal Justice System
- Day Tripper
- Death and Taxes
- Delaware River
- Design
- DROP
- Drugs
- Dubious Distinction
- Elections
- End of Days
- Environment
- Fashion
- Film Fest
- Financial Meltdown
- FrackTrack
- Free Library
- Gambling
- Gay Stuff
- Get Lit
- Greenstorming
- guns
- Hall Monitor
- Health
- Health Care
- Hello, Kitty
- Holidays
- Ice Cubes
- Iggles
- Immigration
- In Memoriam
- Labor
- Lawsuits
- Letters
- LGBTQ
- Maps
- Marcellus Shale
- Media
- MMA
- Mummers
- Music
- MUST READ
- Mysterious Mysteries
- Nation
- News
- Non Sequitur
- Opinion
- PA politics 2010
- Parking Wars
- Parks and Recreation
- People Send Us This Stuff
- Philadelphia Police
- Philadelphia Union
- Philaphemera
- Philly From Scratch
- philly madness
- Photos
- Poverty
- PPA
- President Obama
- Print Edition
- Prisons
- Protest
- Readers Write
- Real Estate
- Rock Bottom
- Schools
- Science
- Screwing Philly
- SEPTA
- snow
- So Lush
- Soccer
- Sporting Life
- Sports Complex
- State Politicians
- State Politics
- Street Art
- Strike
- Stuff We Like
- Taxes
- Taxi Drivers
- Tech Fetish
- television
- The Budget Crisis
- The City Paper
- The CLOG
- The Human Condition
- The Mayor
- The Phightin Phils
- The World
- Things that make you go hm
- Tinfoil Hats Off
- Under the Table
- Under the Tables
- Urban Development
- Urban Planning
- urban wildlife
- Video Poker
- We Call Shenanigans
- Weather
- Web Junk
- Weekend Omnibus
- White House
- What We've Found
- Women's Issues
- Flyered Up!
- How 'Bout That Weather?
- it's always sunny in philadelphia
- Stu!
- Shopping
- get out
- 10-track mind
- ArtsFlash
- Bloggity
- Bruce Being Bruce
- Colleges
- Comedy
- Gigantic Surprises
- Hello Canary
- Hello Puppy
- errata
- get lost
- Inside The Fishbowl
- Library Closings
- Local Support
- Movies
- Murder
- Night Moves
- Recycling
- radio
- Scientology
- Sex
- Sixers
- Skeeze Police
- State Politicians Screwing Philly
- That's a cool stencil!
- Theater
- Things We See
- This Week
- This Week in Oates
- University City
- WIN
- What we don't heart
- trailer!
- what we heart
- Feeling Guilty
- Askadelphia.
- Broke in Philly
- Contest
- Dance
- Dear Paper Doll
- Do A Good Thing
- Education
- Film Fest Schism
- G20-20 Vision
- Goodbye
- Gossip
- Great American Heroes
- PATCO
- Pearl Jam Week
- Puppy
- Stars of the Photostream
- sustainability
- Lower Merion Webcam-Gate
- The Cycle
- Equality Forum
- Bureaucrat of the Week
- Animals
- ElectionEar
- Photostream
