Philadelphia Voters To Fill Vacant City Council Seat
In Philadelphia today, three candidates are vying to fill the City Council seat made vacant when at-large Councilman Bill Green resigned to become chairman of the School Reform Commission.
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In Philadelphia today, three candidates are vying to fill the City Council seat made vacant when at-large Councilman Bill Green resigned to become chairman of the School Reform Commission.
The Philadelphia school funding crisis was coming to a head in City Council as the Council president introduced a bailout plan that neither the mayor, state lawmakers, nor school advocates are likely to embrace.
City councilman Wilson Goode Jr. is accusing the Nutter administration of ignoring the needs of the school district by opposing his plan to scale back the city's ten-year property tax abatement.
A new agency is hoping to do for North Broad Street what the "Avenue of the Arts" has done for South Broad, according to City Council president Darrell Clarke.
Man's best friend is getting some new protection in Philadelphia.
Teachers' union president Jerry Jordan called on City Council to allocate all $120 million from a city sales tax extension to schools.
The district is already counting on City Council to provide $120 million more for next year by extending the one-percent city sales tax hike. But that's far from a done deal. And it says it wants $96 million beyond that.
Mike Resnick, the mayor's public safety director, says overtime savings in other areas within the fire department may allow them to either reduce brownouts or end them outright.
City Council's Streets and Services Committee okayed a rate change for all 8,000 meters in Philadelphia, from 50 cents an hour to $1.00 an hour.
The city charter requires that departmental regulations and notices of meetings be published in local newspapers. That charter dates from the early 1950s, so of course there's no mention of the Internet.
BRT executive director Carla Pagan confirmed that the measure approved last month by Council to give board members a pay raise had its intended effect: the BRT has now greatly increased the number of appeals it is hearing.
Chris discussed the demise of the Paycheck Fairness Act in the Senate, testimony in Congress on the Comcast merger with Time Warner, and Philadelphia's ban on e-cigarettes. He talks to comedian Jon Lovitz and Greg Conley from the Heartland Institute.
Chris discusses University of Connecticut basketball player Shabazz Napier's assertion that athletes often go to bed hungry and Allyson Schwartz kicking off her ad campaign for Governor. He talks to Matthew Continetti from the Washington Free Beacon and filmmaker Phelim McAleer.
Students at the Community College of Philadelphia face a possible tuition increase next fall unless the city and the state chip in more.
Councilman Jim Kenney was among those questioning deputy maoyr Alan Greenberger about the value of Mayor Nutter's taxpayer-funded overseas trips.
Police have made an arrest in connection with the fire at a home owned by a Philadelphia city councilwoman, as well as found some of the stolen goods.
"Schools are not okay the way they are," says Cindy Farlino, principal of the Meredith School, in Queen Village. "They opened, and our kids came, but they are not okay."
Ignoring the pleas of e-cigarette users, City Council has unanimously approved a measure that bans the devices from public spaces in Philadelphia.
City Council today is expected to cast a final vote on a bill that would add electronic cigarettes to the city's existing ban on smoking in public
The emergency medical technicians would have less training and be paid less that paramedics operating Philadelphia Fire Department medic units.
Mayor Nutter says the Salvation Army has offered to donate the site of last year's collapse, at 22nd and Market Streets, for a memorial to the six people killed.
None of this affects the core of center city and University City, where multi-space kiosks are used rather than the old-style meters.
City Council president Darrell Clarke and six other district councilmembers are proposing that the city government borrow $100 million to finance construction of 1,500 new, affordable properties over the next three or four years, mainly in gentrifying neighborhoods.
Pay raises for members of the Board of Revision of Taxes could be delayed by a previous court ruling, even though City Council voted to raise their pay in an effort to break a logjam of cases.
The city's health commissioner, Dr. Donald Schwarz, said he supports the Council measure which would prohibit e-cigarettes in public spaces.
