In another story that wants to be an editorial, the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Marcia Gelbart is having trouble understanding why Mayor Street got booed at a U2 concert last summer, and contrasts Street’s “velcro” with Ronald Reagan’s “teflon”:
During a U2 concert here last month, lead singer Bono gave a shout-out to Mayor Street, thanking him for allowing the city to host Live 8 in July. The crowd booed.
“Am I missing something?” Bono asked.
Perhaps it’s the mayor who’s missing something: credit for the way the city has changed over the last six years.
Though the federal corruption probe of City Hall has drawn headlines, as has the city’s growing homicide rate, Philadelphia has progressed under Street’s tenure.
Since his 1999 election, Philadelphia’s housing market has soared, while population loss has slowed to a trickle. Public school funding has gone up, as have student test scores. Two new sports stadiums have debuted. Two skyscrapers are on the way.
Last month’s National Geographic Traveler magazine crowned Philadelphia “America’s Next Great City.”
And yet the public seems to make little connection between these strides and the man who occupies Philadelphia’s top political office.
If Ronald Reagan was the Teflon president, Street seems to be the reverse, the Velcro mayor. “All the bad stuff sticks,” said Phil Goldsmith, Street’s former managing director, “and the good stuff doesn’t.”
In a recent interview, Street dismissed his critics, saying they “don’t read.”
Well, some of them read the Inquirer. And while the paper’s archives are only temporary, there’s still plenty of information available on line about the huge scandal known as “pay to play.” There are even web sites like this devoted to stopping it. And blogs like this. And this.
On the inside pages, today’s article mentions the pay-to-play scandal:
Equally as significant, the pay-to-play probe tied Street to an unappetizing crew of defendants. Street’s former city treasurer is in jail. A Muslim cleric who is a longtime supporter of the mayor’s is appealing a seven-year sentence. Nine other people have been convicted.
And although the administration has supported stronger ethics rules, Street hasn’t used his bully pulpit to speak out forcefully and repeatedly against corruption in City Hall, say political observers.
“He’s a mover and shaker for the people we don’t want running this city,” said West Philadelphia resident Kevin Williams, 43, a data-entry manager for a unit of Merck & Co.
The pay-to-play scandal was much bigger than the Inquirer makes it appear now. How it works is explained here:
As a political insider with the ear of the Mayor and officials throughout the Street administration, including City Auditor Corey Kemp, White is accused by the FBI of directing the distribution of these lucrative bond deals to various banks and lenders, notably Commerce Bank. In exchange for political contributions to his PACs, White provided inside information on other contractor?s competitive bids as well as, according to the FBI, directly ordering various members of the Street administration to deliver non-competitive contracts to those lenders and contractors that ?played ball? with White and Kemp. Other financial rewards given to buy White?s influence include extraordinarily generous personal loans to among others Mayor Street, White himself, Kemp and White?s girlfriend, Renee Knight. Lavish meals, junkets to the Super Bowl, and lucrative ?consulting? contracts were among the rewards White is accused of receiving in exchange for city contracts. White is also accused of landing exclusive airport food concessions, service contracts and government printing contracts for his wife, members of his family and Knight.
Lengthy detailed phone tap transcripts from the FBI investigation show White calling among others, Mayor Street, Street personal aide George Burrell, Airport Director Charles Isdell, and Sheriff John Green to remind them of recent political fundraisers and instruct them about who should be hired or contracted for various government deals.
According to the FBI, the number of ways which White manipulated and corrupted the way city of Philadelphia granted contracts are truly Byzantine. See the index of media articles to find more details on the various aspects of the ongoing corruption trials, as well as to read excerpts of the FBI phone taps that are both shocking and at times fairly salacious. White died of fast-moving pancreatic cancer before he himself could be put on trial, but Kemp, Knight and various others are currently on trial as result of the ongoing FBI investigation.
Ron White is dead, and people in the FBI probe are on trial currently. Why can’t we just leave it the way it is now that the “bad guys” got busted?
Because Ron White and the accompanying “hoopla” is just one fish in a big pond. The events that led up to the current probe did not occur in a vacuum but instead in a pervasive political climate where both the Mayor?s office and city council are under constant pressure to deliver financial rewards to their largest campaign contributors instead of serving their constituents full-time every day. The Ron White FBI probe is symptomatic of a larger problem with pay-to-play. According to hallwatch.org, “Last year $2 billion of the City’s $3.4 billion budget went to no-competition contracts–about 2 out of every 3 dollars.”
(More here.) Despite the contention that Street supports ethics reforms, his anti-reform allies on the City Council — a group known as “the Status Quo 5” have been able to defeat pay-to-play reform legislation.
Not only is the name of Ron White left out of today’s puff piece Inquirer article, but the tone would have people forget that the whole idea of pay to play was to keep Street and his buddies in office. The following comes not from a partisan blog or web site, but from an FBI press release:
The indictment rests in part on conversations monitored by the government pursuant to judicial authorization for approximately nine months during 2003. During that time, according to the indictment, White and Kemp openly discussed their criminal scheme, in which Kemp permitted White to take over Kemp?s official decision-making in exchange for benefits from White and others. For example, on February 12, 2003, while discussing the selection of financial services firms favored by White, White stated, ?well, we moving s—, ain’t we Corey? . . . there ain?t nobody in it but me and you now.? Kemp replied, ?That?s it, everybody else out the picture, huh??
During 2003, White occasionally promised Kemp that, if Philadelphia Mayor John F. Street, whom White supported and who employed Kemp, were reelected in November 2003, White would continue to benefit Kemp and Kemp would become financially set. For example, on August 25, 2003, White stated to Kemp, ?the key for us right now, man, is to concentrate on getting John elected, so it gives us four more years to do our thing. If we get four more years, Corey, we should be able to set up, you know, I mean and for you we maybe only talking about only two, you know what I mean?? Kemp said, ?that?s good, that?s good, that?s cool.?
The indictment states further that in permitting White to direct his official actions, Kemp knew his actions not only benefitted White and White?s interests but also the political candidates White supported, including the Mayor. White and Kemp agreed that when White demanded political contributions from financial services firms to the Mayor?s campaign, the firms had to make them or face the loss of the ability to obtain City business. On August 26, 2003, discussing that matter, White said to Kemp, ?either you down or you ain?t with it.? Kemp replied, ?right, cause if they don?t, if they ain?t with us they ain?t gonna get nothing.? White said, ?that?s right.? Kemp said, ?you know, you just hate to say it but that?s the way it is, man, I mean, this is . . . election time, this is time to either get down or lay down, man, I mean, come on, to me, personally it?s not even a hard decision.?
It was fortunate for Mayor Street that his close friend Ron White died of fast moving pancreatic cancer before the trial. But the Inquirer and other local papers covered this scandal extensively. I read about it, and wrote about it extensively in this blog.
And I’d be willing to bet that the nameless little people in the booing crowd had read about it too.
Of course, these days it’s gotten more and more difficult to read about it much less find the details — what with all the disappearing links. (Occasionally, however a cached piece like this will still turn up. . . But the days in the life of a Google cache are numbered, and sooner or later the critics Street says “don’t read” won’t be able to.)
I don’t want to bore my readers, but here’s just one example of a Street tidbit once available on on line at Philly.com, but which can now be found only at blogs like this:
A HIGH-RANKING Commerce Bank official told his boss in 2002 that Mayor Street had approached him after a City Hall meeting and asked about refinancing the mayor’s home mortgage.
The mayor’s personal-loan discussions with the Commerce aide – while the bank was winning millions of dollars in city business – are disclosed in a company memo, one of more than 1,000 bugging transcripts and documents released yesterday in the sweeping federal city corruption probe.
The discussion with Street, who ultimately got two loans from Commerce in 2003, was just one of several examples of public deals and personal loans overlapping.
That’s the sort of thing that might cause a local crowd to boo at a U2 event.
(Even critics who “don’t read” but still have a memory cache. . .)
MORE: While the “Duke” Cunningham scandal also involves a form of “pay-to-play,” it can at least be argued that there seems to be a higher standard at work in Washington. (Occasionally.)
AND MORE: At the risk of being a bore, another example (in another disappeared news story saved here) shows how deep the corruption runs in this city:
In spite of contract language saying that airport-concession opportunities should be spread “to as many different subtenants as possible,” the city allowed the same politically juiced bar-owner, Eric J. Blatstein, a $36,000 contributor to Street, to control eight bars in airport terminals. Blatstein’s partners in the bars included White’s physician-wife, Aruby Odom-White, the wife and daughters of former state Sen. Frank Salvatore, the wife of late South Philadelphia political potentate Henry J. “Buddy” Cianfrani, and a woman identified by federal authorities as Ron White’s paramour, Janice Renee Knight. Isdell has refused to answer questions about the situation.
BTW, the “South Philadelphia political potentate Henry J. “Buddy” Cianfrani” went to prison for corruption in the 1970s. Few remember stuff like that.
Even airport security is alleged to have been corrupted by the scandal:
Robinson contends that she was denied promotion, transferred to a meaningless job, and shunned by her fellow workers and supervisors because she raised questions about the grate at Blatstein’s property – a restaurant known as Cibo in the new international terminal.
Robinson says the FBI told her that her job status was undermined by Blatstein and White, who were picked up on wiretaps discussing the situation.
Two agents who visited her in January, she said, told her of a phone conversation in which Blatstein allegedly called White and complained about her.
White replied, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of it,” the suit alleges.
Robinson said she believed the conversations were picked up on wiretaps that were part of the FBI’s ongoing investigation into the awarding of contracts at the airport.
The FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office have declined to comment about ongoing investigations. White, a top fund-raiser for Mayor Street, was indicted in June with former City Treasurer Corey Kemp in an alleged scheme to steer city financial contracts and bond work to White’s clients.
White’s name has surfaced repeatedly in connection with a separate investigation into the awarding of concessions for stores, shops and restaurants along the various airport terminals.
Blatstein, according to city records, dominates the food and liquor concessions there. Of 16 liquor outlets, his companies run nine. White’s wife, Aruby Odom-White, is a partner in five of those, records show.
Robinson has named White, Blatstein, the City of Philadelphia, and her bosses, airport officials Charles Isdell and James Tyrrell, as defendants in the suit, which she filed herself. (Emphasis added.)
I know how boring this is, but one of my pet peeves is that I hate to see information disappear.
What I really ought to be posting about is the role of bloggers in breaking the corruption scandal which just caused the Canadian government to fall.
If the Canadian government had had its way, few would have known about the scandal, and the no-confidence vote might not have occurred.
(Now, if they’d just been able to get the UN to silence Captain Ed….. )
MORE (12/03/05): There’s some (partial) progress, it seems. The Philadelphia City Council just passed 5 out of 6 ethics reform measures:
Mayor Street said he would sign all of the bills that passed yesterday, which included legislation to ban big donors from receiving city financial assistance worth more than $50,000. Only Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell opposed that measure.
An effort to prohibit the awarding of competitively bid government contracts to big political donors failed. A tie vote of 8-8 means that bill will not become law.
“They penalize people who need a chance to participate,” Blackwell said of the limits on political contributors, which would also require contract bidders and financial-aid recipients to disclose which consultants they hired. She said the paperwork requirements would be particularly hard for small and minority businesses.
Blackwell, however, voted in favor of the bills that would establish and empower the ethics board – a dramatic change for the Council member who has been the loudest foe of the two-year effort to enact new ethics rules after the City Hall corruption scandal. She was the only member of Council to oppose a charter change prohibiting the awarding of “no-bid” city contracts to big political donors, which voters approved by 87 percent in a referendum last month.
I don’t know what accounts for the “dramatic change.”
As to the provision that failed, Street and his allies were against it, and Councilman Michael Nutter illuminates:
Street had criticized the one measure that failed yesterday, an effort to restrict competitively bid contracts, arguing that bans on big donors could effectively eliminate low bidders from some projects and needlessly complicate the procurement process. Those doubts were shared in Council by the six members who traditionally vote with Street – Blackwell, Darrell L. Clarke, Blondell Reynolds Brown, Juan F. Ramos, Rick Mariano, and Donna Reed Miller – as well as two others, W. Wilson Goode Jr. and Marian Tasco.
“We haven’t had any problems with the competitive-bidding process in this city,” Tasco said when asked about her vote.
But Nutter said the federal corruption probe showed that even competitive contracts could be influenced by politics to the detriment of the city.
“It’s clear on the tapes from the corruption investigation that Corey Kemp clearly gave a company certain information to assist them in a competitive-bid process,” he said, referring to the former city treasurer, who received a 10-year sentence for selling his office. “It is also a company that also happened to, either directly or through others in the form of Ron White, make a lot of campaign contributions.”
Having an “independent board” to oversee ethics sounds like a good idea. But then, who decides who gets to sit on the board?