Any participant that does anything in our community must realize that our community is crying for help and we must address that, not just as a business concern, but out of concern as human beings on this planet. That is all I can say. )
Hello. My name is Beverly Bell, and I'm the owner of 61st Street Barbecue Grille, a family run take-out restaurant. My life 91 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 savings, loans, family financial and physical support helped build this business. Prior to SEPTA starting construction, my business was increasing. I expanded my business by purchasing new equipment and also invested in signs to advertise this expansion. SEPTA's construction interfered with customers and deliveries having access to my store. My customers could no longer park near or in the surrounding areas of the restaurant. Traffic was also blocked, which further prevented customers from gaining access to the restaurant. In addition, deliveries to the business also experienced difficulty. I could no longer maintain my business because of the substantial loss in customers. During SEPTA's construction, the fan outside the building was dented when a construction truck backed up into it. Also, the sidewalk alongside of the building and in front of the building has been cracked through the massive weight of the trucks. As a result of SEPTA's construction, my business was forced to close. I would like to know what SEPTA plans to do to assist me in gaining 92 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 my business back and repairing the damages. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you very much, Ms. Bell. We will make a copy of your testimony available to SEPTA so that they can review it. Is there anyone else who wants to testify? (No response.)
What I think we need to do now, if it is acceptable by the majority of the group, is consider all the issues we have on the table. We've already talked about lighting. We talked about parking lots. Someone else suggested 57nd and Ludlow, someone from my staff. We talked about the shuttle service and are happy to talk about that 31 being back on before "Welcome America." We talked about cleaning up the area, and that we'll follow-up on that at our next meeting. 93 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 The business loss fund, I have to follow-up with the Congressman and the US senators. The Parking Authority did agree for no 5 tickets. And we talked about those areas, again, on parking where we can begin now, like 49th, 56th. 52nd is still working. 59th Street, we can use when available, and 45th Street, they want a formal proposal. We've been talking about minority participation, and I hope out of this will come a process where we can work together better. We've also talked about maintaining contact on all other issues that involve the rehabilitation of the area, like trees, curbs and sidewalks, et cetera, et cetera. So what I would like to do now, if we may, is to decide when and where we have a follow-up meeting so that we can conclude the other issues that have not been resolved. So we can follow-up on cleaning and any other issues we need to discuss at that time. Now, would you all like to meet -- today is already the 6th. Would you all like to meet maybe two weeks from now? Again, we've got to 94 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 consider when everybody is in town and when they're out of town. Maybe the week of the 15th or the week of the 20th. If next Friday is the 13th, then that means the following Monday would be the 16th. The following Monday would be the 23rd. So what about maybe the 16th to the 18th?
We're talking about an evening meeting as per your request. I'll ask the community, where would you like it to be and what time? Is 6:00 too early? What about 6:00? And where can we meet? Would you like us to contact White Rock? Since Reverend Barnes is such an integral part of this, why don't we meet at 6014 Market at Reverend Barnes' church at 6:00 on -- what's that Wednesday, the 18th maybe? How is that for you?
Councilwoman, can we go back and get back to you on this to coordinate the schedule with our consultants and all of the staff people? Would that be permissible?
That would be fine with us. 95 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 Reverend Barnes, can we assign you, Mr. English, Ms. McGregor -- if we get in touch with you, can you network to let people know? We will try to make it the week of the 18th. If that's a problem, of course then we will make it when we can, or the following week to follow-up. Pastor Barnes.
The pastor says any day other than a Wednesday night. It's fine with me. Why don't we do a Tuesday or a Thursday, then we don't -- it's summertime -- we don't kind of interfere with everybody's weekend during the summer. So the 17th or the 19th.
At 6:00 at Pastor Barnes' church at 6014 Market. Then we will get in touch with some representatives from the community and we can pass the word. Let me ask my lawyer, for the record, do we need to continue this to a date certain? What we will do is we will adjourn 96 06/06/03 - FINANCE & TRANSPORTATION - RES. 020607 subject to the call of the Chair, which means we'll have to re-advertise. So if we don't adjourn to a date certain, then we will have to re-advertise, which means we have to know about days in 6 advance, if we don't do to a date certain. Which is 7 fine. We're going to meet in between then anyway. 8 So we will recess our hearing subject to 9 the call of the Chair, and we will be in touch with 10 you about the community meeting, hopefully on the 17th or 19th. Thank you all. I think we're doing well. (Council adjourned at 12:20 p.m.) - - - 97 ¡›î› C E R T I F I C A T I O N I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of June 6, 2003, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of the same. RE: COMMITTEE ON FINANCE and TRANSPORTATION ___________________________ Lisa C. Bradley, RPR and Notary Public