COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA JOINT PUBLIC HEARING OF COMMITTEES ON LICENSE & INSPECTIONS and PUBLIC SAFETY City Hall, Room 400 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Monday, March 31, 2025 10:00 a.m. PRESENT: CHAIRMAN MICHAEL DRISCOLL CHAIRMAN CURTIS J. JONES, JR. COUNCILWOMAN NINA AHMAD COUNCILWOMAN KENDRA BROOKS COUNCILWOMAN JAMIE GAUTHIER COUNCILWOMAN KATHERINE GILMORE RICHARDSON COUNCILMAN JIM HARRITY COUNCILWOMAN QUETCY M. LOZADA COUNCILMAN NICOLAS O'ROURKE COUNCILMAN JEFFREY YOUNG, JR. MS. MCDONALD, CLERK - - - CHAIR DRISCOLL: Good morning, colleagues. And good morning, everyone. I now note that the hour has come. Ms. McDonald, will you please call the roll to take attendance. Members that are in attendance will please indicate that you are present when your name is called.
Chair Driscoll? CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Present. Thank you. A quorum of the committee is present and this hearing is now called to order. This is the joint public hearing of the Committees on Licensing & Inspection and Public Safety regarding resolution No. 15 250052. Ms. McDonald, will you please read the title of the resolution.
Resolution No. 20 250052, authorizing the Committee on Licenses & Inspections and the Committee on Public Safety to hold hearings on enforcement against drug paraphernalia in stores. CHAIRPERSON: Before I ask the clerk to call the first panel, I would like to recognize the sponsor of the resolution, our Council Majority Leader Katherine Gilmore- Richardson.
Thank you. Thank you very much, Chair, and thank you so much to Chairman Driscoll and Chairman Jones, and all of the colleagues present here today for joining us regarding this really important issue across the entire city of Philadelphia. We are continuing to see grocery and convenience stores pop up in our neighborhoods with the promise to sell food. However, the majority of items that these stores sell are drug paraphernalia. Even more troubling is the fact that many of these convenience stores are not properly zoned or licensed to sell drug paraphernalia and lack community approval. Not only are they breaking the law, but they often serve as hubs of illegal activity and crime. Throughout my time here as a member of this legislative body I have worked to address quality of life issues in nuisance businesses. And I want to take the moment to thank Councilmembers Bass and Phillips for their continued work on this issue as well. In 2021, I passed legislation, Bill No. 210059, that updated the definition of drug paraphernalia in our code for the first time in more than 40 years. This legislation empowered the City's Law Department, Licenses & Inspections and other departments to adequately enforce against the law and hold these nuisance businesses accountable. In 2023, I passed Bill No. 2 230569 to strengthen the city's nuisance abatement plan so we can have more leverage to cease business operations and to establish stronger cases if cease operation orders are challenged in court. However, as I've mentioned before, the more we try to hold these bad actors accountable, the more creative they get in circumventing the law. Additionally, I have done tours across our city with my colleagues and our partners in the administration, including License & Inspection, the Health Department, the Law Department and our Philadelphia Police Department. And we have seen firsthand the lengths that some of these businesses will go through to circumvent the law. In fact, we all have seen it in our communities. So many of our colleagues here today have introduced or supported legislation to hold these bad actors accountable. And that's why today's joint hearing between Council's Committees on Licenses & Inspections and Public Safety is so important. I look forward to hearing from our partners in the administration on what is currently being done and I'm eager to hear from the community to learn more about how these nuisance businesses are impacting the lives of everyday Philadelphians. However, there is one thing that I know for sure. Upon the conclusion of today's hearing, we must address this issue once and for all. Thank you. CHAIRPERSON: Leader Gilmore-Richardson, thank you for your leadership on this. I remember when I was in the House of Representatives, you and I toured Frankfort Avenue and Torresdale Avenue and Cottman Avenue in Northeast Philadelphia. And you know you were very aggressive then and you haven't given up on this, so, you know, I just want to commend you for sticking with this such important issue. And before we move on, I want to recognize Chairman Jones, our Public Safety Chairman. Chairman Jones?
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I want to thank publicly the author of the legislation Member Gilmore- Richardson. It wasn't that long ago that you and I walked up 54th Street with Dee Dukes and others and walked into one of the local establishments. And I said, well, what is that? And it was a gambling machine. And that was the first time I ever saw one of those gambling machines and was taken aback as to, well, who are they licensed by and who actually keeps account of the payouts and who keeps track of where they're located. And the answer to all of that was nobody. But as you mentioned, member that's when Cindy Bass introduced legislation about Liquor- by-the-Drink, when many of us have had to deal with Lucy cigarette sales, when many of us have had paraphernalia in stores and drugs actually sold behind counters. These things create what I think is a watering hole effect. A watering hole effect. When you look at some of the nature shows and the gazelle creeps down to get water that it needs, right? It's the lions hiding in the tall grass to snatch them up. Well, when you put all of these toxic elements in one store, a location, it creates that watering hole effect and predators looking at that as an opportunity to take advantage of people. Now, I admire what -- the work that the Nuisance Business Task Force done -- does, but I need to get more clarification as to when a business along with paraphernalia, along with Lucys, along with illegal drinking becomes that nuisance and what the progressive steps we can take to shut them down because it's not one thing, it's many things. It's does the Health Department come in and get the back of L&I? And in that task force approach, they know that you're not going to get away with just any old thing in our neighborhoods. And so I look forward, Mr. Chairman, I look forward, members of the committee to seeing what some of those answers are. Thank you so much. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Well, thank you, Chairman. And I'm glad we're working together, our both committees here, because it's that important. Member Harrity?
I just want to thank everybody for having this hearing and coming. I would like to know out of this how do we fix it, like everybody else. I, too, I spent six years as Chief of Staff to Senator Street, we passed numerous bipartisan legislation because the takeout stores were so bad everywhere. It wasn't just a Philadelphia thing. We were able to get everybody to agree to pass this stuff, and I thought that was going to change the narrative of how we were able to enforce and shut down these nuisance establishments. But apparently it's not working because we still have them everywhere. I mean, in my neighborhood and almost every neighborhood I travel to. I've been all over the city this weekend alone and these places are everywhere. The paraphernalia stores are just disgraceful. And, you know, I don't even want to get into the stores that we have in our neighborhood where they have about five bottles of soda and six bags of chips and they're supposed to be a grocery store. And you got six guys in there selling other stuff rather than groceries. So I thank Kathy Gilmore for, our leader, for bringing this subject to the forefront. And I look forward to getting some answers on how we can make it easier to enforce these type of things. Thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Thank you, Member Harrity. Ms. McDonald, will you please call the first panel we have to testify on resolution No. 250052.
Bridget Collins-Greenwald. Available for questions are representatives from the Philadelphia Police Department and the Department of Health. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Good afternoon, Commissioner. Just please state your name, for the record, and begin your testimony. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: You're ahead of me because I'm still in morning time, Councilmember. Good morning, Chairperson Driscoll, Chairperson Jones and members of the License & Inspections and Public Safety Committees. My name is Bridget Collins-Greenwald and I serve as the commissioner of Licenses & Inspections quality of life. I appreciate the opportunity to testify today on resolution No. 250052 introduced by Councilmember Gilmore-Richardson, which authorizes the committee on L&I to hold public hearings on enforcement against illegal drug paraphernalia stores. I'm joined here today by my colleague Renee Reinhardt, the newly appointed, permanently, Director of Code Enforcement and ex -- yes, right, it's so exciting. An expert on all things zoning, drug paraphernalia and licensing. The drug paraphernalia enforcement program was launched in 2021 after Bill No. 210159 became law. It is a city-wide initiative designed to address the illegal sale of drug paraphernalia by local businesses. This program is not only a regulatory measure, but a vital public safety effort aimed at reducing crime and improving the quality of life of our communities. Since the exception of this program L&I has conducted hundreds of thorough investigations and inspections in collaboration with our city partners in the Police Department and the Department of Health. These efforts have resulted in the issuances of notices of violation and full or partial cease operations orders. We have found that in many cases store owners are willing to comply and were previously unaware of the city's regulations. In these instances stores remove the drug paraphernalia and remain open and operational. We remain committed to working closely with the City Council, the Department of Public Health, the Philadelphia Police Department and the community to address these challenges and ensure the continued success of our enforcement program. We are also eager to work on increasing public awareness of these laws to reduce misunderstandings and help store owners avoid unknowingly operating in violation. Thank you once again for the opportunity to testify today. We welcome any questions you may have and look forward to collaborating further in our shared mission to make Philadelphia safer and healthier. Thank you. She's not reading read testimony, just for -- CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: That's a joint testimony there. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Yes, is that okay? CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Very good. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Unless you want introduce yourself. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Very good. Yeah. So we'll get right into questions. And let me start with our leader first Katherine Gilmore-Richardson.
Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and thank you very much commissioner. And it's good to see Renee and congratulations on the new role. And I just want to thank the Nuisance Business Task Force for all the work that you all have done over the last three-and-a-half, four years now. And especially thankful for all of the tours that we've gone on together. As the Chairman mentioned previously, I remember in the last term we had one tour in particular, and I think that was in now Councilman Young's district, before you were the council person, where the folks who were selling additional illegal things surrounded us outside of that store that had no 9 life licensing at all. And that was one of the most prolific examples of why we need to continue to address this issue. So I wanted to just ask a couple of questions regarding the process, you know, so that we can get it on the record. If you could just walk us through what happens when a business is caught selling illegal paraphernalia. And then typically how do we -- is it that we receive the complaint regarding the business, and then that's the trigger for L&I to then go out and initiate the inspection. And then what happens from there?
Yes, all of our complaints. Well, the majority of our complaints come via 311. Once we -- CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: I'm sorry, just state your name for the record. That's all.
Yes, Renee Reinhardt. We received most of our complaints via 311. Once the inspector receives the complaint they will research the location before going out to see what their legal zoning is. They'll do a physical inspection. If they identify that the business is selling drug paraphernalia, they will have a conversation with the operator or whomever is on site identifying the items that are paraphernalia, and telling them that they are not allowed to sell them without a zoning permit. And then immediate cease operations will be issued for the sale of the paraphernalia, only if the store has some other legal operation. And it's usually retail sales of consumer goods or food, beverages and groceries. So the store will be able to continue to operate.
So the store will be able to continue to operate as long as they remove the drug paraphernalia while the inspector's on site?
Not necessarily. So they'll issue the cease operations and they'll be told that they have to immediately stop selling the paraphernalia. It is not always the case that they'll remove it right on the spot. The inspector will return within 30 days to make sure that the paraphernalia is removed and the cease operations.
Okay. And lifting of the cease operation only occurs if in the second inspection the drug paraphernalia has been removed.
Okay. And then to that effect, what are we doing with the repeat offenders? As an example, the same instance that I referred to previously, we had the same business owner. And so at the point we were on our way to the next store, which happened to be on North Broad Street, they had already called the store from the last store. They had no licensing at all. Like the first store had no 23 licensing whatsoever to operate. They were selling food, they didn't have a health license. They had nothing. And so they were issued a cease operation on the spot because they had no licensing to even operate as a store. But because the same individual owned or ran multiple locations in that community, at the point when we got to the next location they had already tipped them off, and then they had removed -- you could tell they have removed like all of the drug paraphernalia. How are we dealing with the folks who are repeat offenders that, you know, they'll open a LLC under one name and then open another LLC under another name? How are we dealing with those folks?
So we've found that during the course of the program, we've had 30 repeat offenders. And the repeated offense was at least three months or more between the previous inspection and the new one, so the process starts over. So we will keep track of the fact that this store is selling drug paraphernalia again, but at that point it's not it doesn't escalate to us sending you to court because you're selling paraphernalia again.
Under a new -- because it's under a new name, but it's the same location.
So that for me, I look at that as a legislative opportunity for Council for us to address in further legislation how to deal with a location versus dealing with just the name of the said business. Because we know it's the same location and 9 times out of 10 it's the same people. So if we deal with a location versus dealing with just the business name that could give us additional leverage. So I'm looking at that as a legislative opportunity for follow-up for my team and I. And then lastly is -- I know my colleagues have a ton of questions. Are we still keeping track of the Google Drive that we have? Can we still add businesses and business complaints to that drive when we receive them in Council?
Okay. Okay. And then could we give access to all of the offices to the drive or how do you want us to do that? I think it was -- right, can we give access?
Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll come back around. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: I'd like to recognize Chairman Curtis Jones.
Thank you so much and very good inquiries Majority Leader. I mentioned the water hole effect. Do we keep track of and how do we keep track of that all of these preponderance of issues, whether it's Liquor-by-the-Drink, drug paraphernalia, all of that stuff, is there a correlation to what happens when crimes happen at these same locations? And that, you know, with all of that going on, is that something that we can add to the matrix of evaluation as to this location being a dangerous watering hole. And that for a period of time unless certain things happen and ownership changes and things like that, that we need to hold back their licenses because people's lives are in danger. There are sites and we started keeping track of it with the gambling machines where, you know, the correlation of somebody was shot, but there was a gambling machine inside that they were -- and we're talking about from police officers to victims to that there is a correlation with these bad activities that go on at a location that attract the predatory response of crime. And do we manage that in our expectation of a nuisance business? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: We do. We're collaborating with the Nuisance Unit of the Police Department, we go hand in hand. We're out with them all the time on these different various topics that you're talking about. The drug paraphernalia, the machines, all of them. So when we have a nuisance business, we go out full force hand in hand, so yes, we do coordinate with that.
So what is the tipping point of how many shootings have to happen at a place or robberies have to happen at a place before us to say, oh, my goodness, it might be the location. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: I'm going to ask Deputy Commissioner Healy of the PPD to come up. I don't want to speak for the Police Department so.
Deputy Commissioner, how are you? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Good morning. Deputy Commissioner of Philadelphia Police Department.
Pull that mic a little closer. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Testing.
It's that wire you got on. Deputy Commissioner, take that wire off. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Try again. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Good morning. Frank Healy, Deputy Commissioner of Philadelphia Police Department. To answer your question as to the number of shootings. If you're called under 94400, it was recently amended actually to carve out critical nuisances versus chronic nuisances. Critical nuisances, any single incident of act of violence shooting, homicide or rape, anything along those lines automatically creates a critical nuisance. A nuisance -- and what that triggers is it triggers a preliminary investigation by our nuisance -- neighborhood nuisance enforcement unit. That unit will go out to determine whether or not the business had any nexus or connection with the incident that happened. Either doing something illegal or not illegal, but whatever it may be. But they take an overall view to see whether or not, No. 1, the business own is cooperative with police, whether or not there's poor lighting, whether or not they contributed to the crowd or anything along that that may have actually precipitated the violence. If that's the case, then that case will follow the course of a critical nuisance, and an immediate notice of intent to decease operations will occur. All other incidents are considered chronic nuisances. That would be repeated acts of city -- of any city code violation would be one of them, also public disorderly conduct, any of those, includes crowds. It's three incidents within a year would classify it as a chronic nuisance. And the chronic nuisance would then be elevated to once you hit the third violation within a year you'd be subject to a notice of intent violation. That's the premise of 94400.
So -- so is there room based on member Richardson's idea that not just to the license, but to the location and that we put a freeze on that type of location for a period of time to kind of in effect cool things down in the neighborhood that, okay, if we working together and, okay, my license got stopped, I just open up in your license and we're back in operation within a couple of weeks. Can we say this location needs to be looked at for factors that are contributing to the water hole effect of crime? And I just think that, you know, there's a geography of crime that where things happen is not just what happens there, it's where they happen. And there's a preponderance of opportunity when you create this watering hole. And so there's -- not to go in my soap box, but there's a senior citizens facility out at 56th and I'm going to say Arch. And they won't go to a corner store because they're aware of the water hole effect and that during any time, not just at night, during anytime they are vulnerable because of that location, so they have to steer away from that area because of the actors. And the case where we were at 54th Street, you'll probably hear from later testimony, that is the hangout, that is the spot now, and that is the central headquarters for bad things to happen. And so locations, as well as licenses should be considered is my point. What do you think? You got a mic. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: I think -- I think, well, in the a bigger context of how businesses elude their responsibilities are how they change ownership. The issue is LLC, one, LLC is considered a person legally. And when they close that corporation and open a new one, it's a brand new organization technically. So the issue is if you -- I think -- I think -- and that's the game they play. They play this with the liquor code all the time. The same thing with liquor license establishments changing. The primary people just get a new LLC, but it's the same people basically running it, but it's under a new name. I think if you want to get to that you probably have to get into something along the lines of like what IRS regulations have. Where they're tracking -- you're tracking ownership. The issue is if it's substantial number of the same people own the next company, then for all intent and purposes it's the same company and all penalties and fines should apply to that new company as well. I mean, that may be something to consider to avoid the shell game is really what they do. Trying to figure out how to avoid them from playing that shell game is as I said, like if I have one LLC and it's you know party A, B and C. And the next shell game because they've got all these notice of intent to cease, they've all these fines against them, they suddenly close, go out of business, and then they open and sell the business to the next corporation and have the same players that own it. That's effectively the same company and all they're doing is playing a shell game. So I think you would figure out how to how -- how to -- how do we do tax or tack the violations from one corporation onto the next corporation, and that would be something that would probably address what you're talking about. Because that's what happens, it's the same corners, but different businesses doing the same thing.
I'm familiar with that approach and want to explore that. What I am talking about, there used to be a notorious bar called Long Acres. You got to be a certain age to know what that is. And that's where all of the young guys used to that -- underage drinkers used to get the old heads to go in and buy their -- you don't know what I'm talking about. All right. But anyway, this -- Jimmy does, right? But this was that spot and from time-to-time people would get murdered there and people would get shot there and people would get robbed there. At some point you got to say no matter who owns this, this location is toxic it. It's a problem. And so I would love to have us look at location based activities that might come into our view that says, no, this is just a bad place for a bar and let us look at it. So I appreciate your answer, but we're going to try to find some other relief from this. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Thank you, Deputy Commissioner, too. Member Jimmy Harrity and then Member Lozada.
I'm far away over here. I'll move up. How's that? All right. Commissioner, we have found that in many cases store owners are willing to comply and were previously unaware of the city regulations. In these instances stores removed the drug paraphernalia and remain open and operational. How can we, A, better publicize what is allowed and what isn't allowed, and in that same thing, how do we distinguish between the actors, so you know what I'm saying? So basically how do we help you do your job better? So that we can get rid of the businesses that are not -- and listen, to be honest, I see it everyday. You know, businesses don't just open up like in cases of my neighborhood. They have good intentions, but then they have to deal with, like the councilman said, the area. You know, we and right on my block on the top of my street, I have more than a few stores within a block radius including a takeout beer store. One, two, three, four grocery stores within a one block area of each other all of which have some very unsavory characters hanging outside that, quite frankly, you know, would scare most people especially store owners, you know what I'm saying? These guys especially where -- because I agree with Councilman Jones, sometimes it's just that area. You know, there's multiple shootings on that block out front of these places on regular occasions. So my thing is how do we rectify this situation so that we can -- I just don't get why it takes so long to get rid of a bad actor, you know what I'm saying? So can you just like walk us through that, and then just try to tell us how you think that we can improve it by legislation. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: I'm going to go back to your first question about how do we get the information out there. So we do have a program which we call our BEE program, it's Business, Education and Enforcement. And actually a lot of you are district councilmembers up here. So we had met with each councilmember and said where are the areas that are really giving you the biggest pain point, right? Where are they? Ten out of 10 identified a commercial corridor in their district that said this is where a lot of the stuff is happening. So what we have done is we've -- we've gone to those corridors, we've given some education so to let people know this is what you can and cannot do. We've recently discussed we give like a general information packet. It's in multiple languages, but it's like it's very, very clearcut, pictures, graphics. Do this, yes; can't do this, slashes through them. We recently discussed we have a pamphlet on drug paraphernalia what you can and cannot do. We're going to start handing that out on the corridors as well. That would get the information piece out. I'm sure working with all your offices, too, giving you that information piece so, you know, when you have meetings or community meetings or whenever you're down, like maybe getting that information out. I think that would help us. I think a lot of times we are seeing we go into places for a myriad of different issues and when we go in the business owner just doesn't know that what they're supposed to do to be in compliance. So we go with them, we sit with them, we talk them through everything, we do that. So that I think would be helpful to your first question. I think your second question was the same as Councilmember Jones is like how do we go about picking something up from our location base. Was that what your second question was? Yeah. Yep. So I think to DC Healy's point, I think we'd have to look into that. We'd have to work with your offices. I think we'd have to talk to the Law Department to see how that's possible. We all know the same thing about the shell game that's going on, so how do we stop that? So that I do not know the actual answer to. I think we could work with the Law Department to see if it's legal.
I think it's very simple to say, yup, we know this location it's been owned by A, B, C, D, goes down the line and it's always, you know, a bad location. What do we do about making sure that it doesn't stay open or reopen or whatever it is? But I don't know if you have anything to add, but I feel like you covered -- DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: No, I would agree. I mean the issue is I hear you when you talk about place-based issues and trying to identify them. In that discussion we definitely need to include the Law Department because the issue of due -- and this is where the length comes into play. When we start the enforcement action they have rights to appeal, then they delay the appeals and things get drug out. And then suddenly in the middle of the appeal the business is sold and everything changes. It's a game they play. If we can somehow impact how they play that game to stop them from being able to transfer the ownership and avoid all the liabilities and accountability, that would be a first step. I mean, there are things like I said -- I'm vaguely familiar with the old IRS rights, but there was a way that the IRS would tack one business to another to avoid this type of stuff. Maybe that's something we would like to take a look at and model to avoid these people playing these shell games within Philadelphia. Because that's exactly what they're doing and they're doing it in those areas where there is a historical problem, so they do it on purpose. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: The Chair recognizes Councilmember Quetcy Lozada.
Thank you for being with us this morning. A few questions because I think that over the last few weeks we've been talking a lot about businesses. And people are like, well, we're open for business, but you guys are putting all of these barriers in place for businesses to exist. And I want to make sure that people understand that that's not the case, right? I think for a really long time folks got accustomed to whether it be because of COVID or whether it be because of a lack of staff, we weren't enforcing the laws that are in place. Right? You know, L&I and the Health Department both went out with me multiple times into the 7th District to do all of these education campaigns. So for people to say that they don't know or they don't understand, I think that's BS, right? People have gotten accustomed to doing things the way they want to do them and we are -- we are witnessing in our city the results of that. Right? The result of people just being able to do whatever the heck it was they wanted to do in their business. We went into business where a woman had not had her permits or her licenses in place and an inspector had not visited her for eight years, and she's serving food. And so this is -- this is a problem. We walked into convenience stores where they're selling needles right above candy. This is a problem. Right? And so we need to figure out how we hold that location accountable, but also the individual who's running that business. Because if he's a problem on the 3100 block of Kensington Avenue and he moves his -- he moves his business to the 3500 block, or he moves to West Philly, he's going to be a problem because he knows the system. Right? He knows the system so regardless of where he goes, he's going to be a a problem business person. And so how do we -- I want to figure out how do we -- how do we tighten up the process in a way that's going to hold people accountable. That if you're not a good business person, then you shouldn't be conducting business in our city, at least not in my neighborhood, right? I'm sure my colleagues will feel the same way. They don't want this nonsense in their neighborhoods either. But I Councilmembers Squilla and I were we having a conversation. Is it a fact that you all don't confiscate the materials or the product, you have them take it down? And so how is that solving anything? You're taking it down, he's putting it in the back, right, and the minute you all walk away, who's to say that he's not going to take it back out? I mean, it doesn't make any sense. And so how do we become a common sense government that will allow us to continue to enforce and protect neighborhoods. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So to answer your first question. No, we do not confiscate the materials. We do go back for reinspection. As Renee had said, we found like the ones that are on our radar that we went back, only for 14% of them have been a repeat offender. The ones that we've seen. I'm not saying it doesn't exist out there. So the other ones are in compliance when we go back the paraphernalia is removed. So whether we can confiscate or not, we're told legally we cannot. I mean, it's a discussion we can have with the Law Department, but I know that's something we've been told. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Well, that's a -- that's a question. So I know when, you know, when the sports teams do well and there's these pop-up businesses, we do confiscate. Is that because they don't have a business privilege license or a vendor license? I mean, what's the difference between confiscating there and not confiscating something illegal here.
So I can't say what the difference is right at the moment. But some of the items that people are selling at the vending locations may be counterfeit and we are allowed to confiscate those items. However, a brick and mortar store, we're not allowed to just go in and remove their items. And that is a direction from the Law Department. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: So that's something, Leader, that we might want to look at. You know, the difference between a brick and mortar and a pop-up per se. Maybe there's something we can figure out, Deputy Commissioner, in the legal language, I don't know, just spit balling, but, you know, that's what this hearing is for is to try and come up with some ideas. Member Brooks?
Okay. So my questions are kind of on the same line. So do you guys track like zip code distribution where you see these things popping up or do you see like an influx of these type of establishments in certain areas based on social economic status? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So -- so we've been working with the overall Nuisance Business Committee in the city so they're tracking things. It's actually being tracked with the Philly Stat 360 program. So we are actually tracking what's going on. There's overlays of what goes on in each area from all different departments, us, the Police Department, the Health Department and I'm not even actually sure exactly who else, but they have all kinds of information they overlay into these maps.
Okay. And then you mentioned that -- just for clarity, I know the LLCs, they switch up. But the business license, isn't it the same person connected to the business license? Like is there any way we can like single out -- and I'm just -- I don't really understand it around drug paraphernalia. But I know it was a bar at the corner of my block, someone got killed there many years ago. And every time they think they're about to pull that L&I sign and take that door down, I'm on the phone, like this can't happen. And I found out from the Police Department, they did open it up a legally like a summer or two ago, but they were able to track the person down to multiple bars and businesses that they owned. I don't know what happened after that or how the fining works. But his business license, he had owned multiple businesses bars and they were able to attack him that way. Is that the same type of thing that we can do around drug paraphernalia? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: That's exactly what we're talking about with that nuisance committee doing that linking everything together to like one entity as you said.
Okay. Thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Member Gauthier and then we're going to go to Member O'Rourke.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning. I just wanted to comment and I know that we're in the midst of the budget cycle, but one issue at least to me seems to be around capacity. We know and the community members know where these nuisance establishments are. It takes way too long to get action in terms of inspections once we reach out to L&I. And then we've also run into an issue where some of these places don't open until late and I've been told, oh, we don't have anybody. We would have to assign overtime to get an inspector to go out after 4:00. Right? And so some of this seems to be about capacity. If there are nuisance establishments operating all night long on commercial corridors and bringing a nuisance, then we have to be prepared to be able to inspect them when they are open. And so I would -- I'd love to hear your response to that. But I would also encourage us this budget season to change that dynamic. Thank you. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Sure. So we do have a nuisance property unit that does go out. It goes out on the weekend, it goes out at night, so it goes out when these establishments are operating. We go out with the Police Department and we go out at night. Every weekend we're out there.
I'm not sure what's going on, but I definitely was given a response that we don't we need to find someone to go out for an establishment that opens after 4:00. I can show you that communication. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Please do because that that absolutely we do have a dedicated nuisance property unit that has a supervisor and five or six inspectors that go out, so they're out there yeah. So please, if you could share that with me I'd really appreciate that.
Absolutely. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Chair recognizes Councilmember Nicholas O'Rourke.
Thank you, brother Chair. Good morning, Commissioner. Good morning to all. Always nice to see folks. Can you walk us -- and I apologize if some of this has already been shared through other questions that have been asked. But could you just walk us through the differences in law or in practice that determine whether a business receives a full or partial cease operations order. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: I'll let you do it, you're the expert.
So we would issue a partial cease operations if the business has their business licenses and their zoning is appropriate for retail sales of consumer goods or food, beverages and groceries. That would be a partial cease for the sale of the drug paraphernalia only. A full cease operations mean that the business cannot operate until they correct certain violations. So the store would be closed until they repair their fire alarm or if we go for the second time for a drug paraphernalia inspection and they're still selling it, then we would cease the business until they remove and stop selling the paraphernalia.
Okay. And does the -- the question has come up because there's been a lot of focuses around location. Does the department track these complaints and investigations by council district? I'm at large, but I'm sure the district folks probably would benefit from knowing that.
Okay. That would be helpful I think if we could have that information. That's all. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Okay. Chair recognizes Member Jeffrey J. Young.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning. My office gets complaints often about stores that not only just sell the drug paraphernalia, but actually are selling drugs. I've witnessed myself going into stores where people are buying weed because when I'm not dressed like this, you know, they don't know who I am. Right? I've seen stores selling marijuana, I've seen stores selling tobacco products to kids, 11-year- olds literally. I had a conversation with 11-year-olds outside of a store one day. And also in my district the stores, most of the stores have all their windows covered, right? We know that's a violation of our city code as well. So these things seem to be pervasive in my district and we just, you know, what can we do -- when we get complaints at a store selling marijuana, what are the options for the community? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: We've had multiple times where that's occurred and that's on the police. I mean, if we make an arrest in that store and there's a nexus between the either the clerk or the owner with that store. Okay. That's a 19261 violation. So we go after the -- not me, but the Philadelphia Police Department will take the actions to our Nuisance Unit direct with L&I directly and the Law Department. Because that's a whole different issue. If you're selling, we have the nexus now. If they're -- if they're not the owner or they don't operate the store, we'll make the arrest of the individuals, but then we'll try to get them under a nuisance 9-44. If the business is allowing this type of stuff to happen even though they're not the owner or manager of the store, they can still be held accountable, but not as a direct arrest for the narcotics. We'll lock up the sellers, et cetera. But the store itself if I can't find that nexus between the two, then we have to go through the 9-4400 process to go after the store. But if they're -- if the store is, in fact, selling stuff and we catch them, we've done that. And in -- we had -- in South Philly we had a case where actually it was a robbery. The individual got -- the clerk got robbed in the store and when the captain was going through the video realized that he was selling drugs. The reason he got robbed is because he was selling drugs in the store. We took that, narcotics went did a couple buys in the store and we worked together and we got the store shut down.
So you said they did a couple buys. So when we get these complaints, like who can we give that information to so the police can go out and do these undercover investigations to do the buys, right? Because that's how you catch the stores, you have to go in there and buy the product from them. So who do we give that information to? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Yeah. I would use -- I would use the inspector for our nuisance Neighborhood Nuisance Unit, Inspector Michael O'Donnell. He'll be the conduit and coordinate everything with narcotics and with everything else in the Police Department.
Thank you. And just for clarity, there are no Step Up penalties for repeat offenders of violations for like selling drug paraphernalia? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So in Step Up, so we go back to a property and re-inspect and they're still doing it, we can issue the cease. We can also -- we have court as an option as well, send things into court, which we do often for a lot of our violations. So that is the next step, the cease, and then we could do court as well.
And when you -- say you issue your cease, your partial cease ops for the drug paraphernalia, do the store owners know when you're coming back out to re-inspect? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Don't know exactly when we're coming back. They know that we'll be there within a certain amount of time.
Okay. Within a certain amount. So they know within that time don't sell these products within that time. Okay. And when there are -- so what are some of the impediments? I know one of my colleagues asked about this earlier, the confiscation of these illegal items, essentially, they don't have a permit for them, they're illegal. So tell us or can you talk us about what are some of the impediments that you all have from confiscating these items? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So we don't confiscate these types of items. The items that we do confiscate to Councilmember Driscoll's point was -- his statement was when we do work something like down at the stadiums or we're doing like vendor stuff. We can confiscate those, we have a warehouse where we put that stuff so we store that. The person has the opportunity at certain points if it's their merchandise to come back to that warehouse and get it. That's a whole process as well. If not, we just dispose of the items.
Yeah. So the question is I mean, I guess, well, why? Right? Why we can confiscate from the small vendors, why are we not confiscating an illegal item that we know is being sold illegally in the brick and mortar store as well? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: According to the ordinance, technically they're not illegal items. They're illegal to sell. So the owner can have them, but you can't sell them.
So, but even with the vendors, they're not illegal item necessarily, they're illegal to sell them, right? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: But I believe they don't have a license to sell anything. And also the other side of that is the counterfeit merchandise gets seized. So it's distinguishable, but I do believe the Law Department chimed in when the ordinance was passed as to the Possession versus the sale.
All right. So I think for us as legislators we have to change that in our code then.
And a point of clarification, some of the drug paraphernalia is kind of hidden in other stuff. So like if you go into the gas stations and you see little glass tubes with the roses in them, they're straits for smoking crack. But they put the little rose in them and it becomes a little thing, but they're using them to smoke crack. That's what they're for.
Mr. Chair, I have one more question. No, you're good. You're good. You're good. I mean, this is -- we need this information. And I looked at chapter 8 9-4400 that talks about the chronic and nuisance businesses. And the code says, I think this is something that us as legislators need to work on as well. But the code says that repeated or continuing violations could count toward being a chronic and nuisance business. But is it possible I guess for us as legislators like what or what can we get your opinion on it, if one violation could count toward the three that's necessary to deem a business a chronic nuisance business within that 12-month period? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Yes. And that was actually one of the main reasons why 944 was amended, I think two years ago, to actually broaden the scope of its power. The issue is like we identified certain violations within this code for the first three hits, three strikes and you're out, understanding that this is much broader, that there's a lot of other type of violations that could go on, and otherwise the statute would be pages long. 13 Actually I believe Kristen 14 Bray was the one that that designed the actual amendments that you know repeated of any offense. So we identify repeated offenses of any violation of the code. It can fall under 9-4400, and we have been using that, yes.
Yeah. That says repeated, I mean I think that's -- but it still only counts -- repeated only counts will then count as that one instance for the three. So what I'm suggesting is that maybe that not a repeated or continued violations, that the actual violation itself can count toward the one of the three that's necessary to be deemed a chronic business. The code says repeated, so for me as a lawyer, I say repeated, I can get away with this multiple times before we count as a strike to against me. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Well, I'll be very honest we've interpreted that rather liberally. So if you have one or if you have two or more of the other code violations, we're using that and taking action against you in the Nuisance Unit. So we are using it liberally, aggressively, I don't know how you want to say it. But we are we have interpreted it to mean if you do two strikes we're using you at that level. And say you've had repeated violations of X, Y and Z, and we're moving forward under the 9-4400. Because it's kind of a catchall provision in the code and we use it rather liberally.
Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Chair recognizes Vice Chair Mark Squilla.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm just going to follow-up on Councilmember Young's questioning. Because we do have the multiple violations for a nuisance business. But what happens after somebody complies? So you have a violation, you comply, you go back for a follow-up visit, there's nothing there. Right? But then six months later you go back and there's another violation. Does that count as two violations? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: It would under us for 9-4400, yes.
So then they -- so then that would count those if there was a third violation in that period. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Correct. And in the process, if you recall, there's -- we put out warning letters. By the statute or by the ordinance we're required to put out warning letters to the business owner. A lot of times the business owner may be vacant or not vacant, but not on premises. But we send letters out to anybody of record that owns or manages that location saying be advised you've had nuisance behavior. If you continue this course blah, blah, blah. We give out one letter, two letters, and then after the third letter, you also get the notice of violation at that point in time.
But there is still an appeal process after that, right? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: They can appeal, yes.
And then during that appeal process can go on for the quite some time. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: The only good thing I have to say is the warning letters have been very successful. A lot of places have not realized what's going on in their shops and they've actually taken actions to fix what they're doing. And they enter into what's called an abatement agreement with the Police Department and L&I to make sure that they, you know, if it's lighting issues, trash issues, whatever it may be, the Law Department helps us negotiate agreements with these businesses so they stay on the straight and narrow. And if they don't, then they get right back into the hopper.
But we also see it where some companies or businesses would operate, get that notice, and then at the end of the day figure. All right. I'm moving to a new location so then they just close up shop, closed up, and now they open up somewhere else under a different name. What do we do in that case? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Well, if they -- two issues there, they open up in a different shop. Now here you have to understand with the business, correct me if I'm wrong, the business license allows me to have as many businesses as I want. It's one license, I can have different locations. So I can close up the shop at K&A and just open up another shop under my same license, but I'm still accountable --
No, 9 new license. 10 DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: 11 No, no, that's where I'm getting at. 12 So you can -- that's step one, I can 13 do that, but all that information 14 from that old place still attaches 15 to me because I have the license. But the issue is what they know that's not going to work for them. So what they'll do is they'll get another business. The business is a separate legal entity so regardless who owns it or like who's the manager or the owner of the corporation, the shareholders, it's considered by law a separate legal entity. So they open a new LLC, which can be done overnight. They got a new business, they file for a new license and it's basically a clean slate. And that's what we're talking about earlier, that's the shell game they play. So they'll rack up all these penalties, all these violations and just before they have to go to court if they're going to lose their license, they go and pop up a new one, and then basically that company then sells it to this one, and then we start the whole process over again. And then legally, we have to go through the same things all over again. So if that's an area to look at, that's something I think we should look at to avoid that shell game. How to -- how to -- how to impact that and how to stop that because that way there that person when he applies for the next license he should be still accountable for all the other -- all the issues he has under the old license. But like I said, it's not a person, these are -- these are corporations.
Would that be done legislatively? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: I think we'd have to look -- take a look at that. I'm not really sure. I think we could to work it out. The issue is, I mean, the Law Department definitely has to be involved because these are separate legal entities under law. So assigning responsibility and liability for a new corporation -- an old corporation to a new corporation, like I said, I know the IRS says it in certain circumstances so it's feasible. The concept is out there so I just don't know whether the Law Department will be on board. But the idea is they're trying to attack a new corporation and how can we assign all the liabilities and responsibilities that they owe to this new corporation. Possibly if they have, you know, substantial number of same shareholders or coming up with a formula. If you have 80 or 90% more of your other shareholders, you are effectively the same corporation with a new name and maybe that's some way to take a look at this. But I think it would take, you know, some people from the Law Department and some other people to figure out how we can overcome that hurdle.
Thank you. Just a point of information, Mr. Chair. So I do know that when we have, let's say, someone is fined for like garbage, right, or grass or some of these other nuisance violations that some of those violations can actually stay with the property. Like a water bill, right, they stay with the property. And so how we just think we think of ways that we can figure out how to get these types of violations to stay with the property as well. So thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: The Chair recognizes Jamie Gauthier.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just wanted to correct the record from earlier. My exchange was with the Health Department. So it was the Health Department that, you know, there was some difficulty getting inspectors out there and there was more difficulty getting inspectors out there when the establishment was actually open. But, you know, if this is an ecosystem, right, where L&I and Health are working together with PPD on these issues, I do think we have to be prepared to respond. So I hope that that's something that we can look into this budget season. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: The maker of the resolution, Katherine Gilmore-Richardson.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, colleagues. I wanted to get a couple other things on the record as well. One for -- just going back to Councilmember Gauthier's comment, do we have a representative here from the Health Department? Okay. And then as he approaches, I wanted to just ask for clarity with Commissioner Healy, I have a bill here that I'm just waiting to introduce because I wanted to wait until after we have this hearing, so that if we needed to introduce additional legislation we can do that in conjunction with this bill 4 all related to this issue. But I know there are certain parts of the administrative code that have criminal sanctions for some of these businesses, but technically L&I can't give a criminal offense, right, to a business because their Licenses & Inspection, but it is in our administrative code. Can you just talk about that? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Very quickly, our statute or our ordinances are rather old. Okay. So some things on the books where you would be arrested for some of these summary violations and theoretically I think up to a 90-day penalty. That's not applicable any longer, quite frankly, according to the Law Department. I mean, so the issue is when that provision is in a statute or one of our ordinances, it complicates it because the issue of now it proceeds criminal due process rights rather than civil due process rights.
Right. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: So it makes it much cleaner if you just have remove that from these ordinances and we deal with them civilly. That's how we do the short dumping, all the work we do with the short dump, I believe those provisions were removed for that very reason. So now the nuisance -- my Nuisance Unit is going after civilly with the Law Department a lot of these short dumpers as well because you removed that provision. It's actually a hold over, I think from a long time ago.
Right, but that helps us as a city to be able to better enforce during the process for civil sanctions; is that correct? Because I don't want people to think that we are seeking to remove any additional enforcement and/or penalty from these bad business operators, but that it allows us an opportunity to clean up the code, and then ensure that we have them go through the Civil process as quickly as possible, in addition to some of the other changes that we are discussing today. But I wanted to get that on the record while most of my colleagues are here because, like I said, I already have that bill 21 drafted already, it's already been reviewed. And so that'll be a part of the package of bills that I'm intending to introduce to further combat this issue. And I know we've even done the second bill in 2023, to help with the nuisance abatement plans. Because we found after we did the first bill in '21, that they were skirting some of the processes around the abatement plan. So, you know, I've been taking a lot of notes and just taking copious notes, really, about some of the location, specific issues and some of the other challenges that we want to pull altogether with this particular bill that I already have written so that we have a package of bills to address this issue. But I wanted to put that on the record. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER HEALY: Okay. Thank you.
And thank you so much because you all have been great to work with. Particularly Renee for keeping that list that we have. So thank you very much. But I wanted to go back to the Health Department. I know that Councilmember Gauthier brought up the issue regarding inspector availability after hours and on weekends. So if you could just speak to that. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Can you just start by stating your name, for the record.
Good morning. Ben Hartung with the Department of Public Health. Councilmember, I believe that's correct, that there are -- you know, if we're talking tobacco enforcement, I'm not sure specifically about food enforcement, but they usually are the same sanitarians that they don't typically go out at night and weekends, that would be correct.
But that presents a challenge and a lot of these establishments are operating pretty late. And so if -- you know, we can't be closed, if they're not closed. If they're, you know, presenting a nuisance to the community after hours, then how do we address that?
I would have to have Dawn Keys, the director of environmental health services, follow-up with you. I'm not sure who you communicated with, but we'd be happy to talk about how we can work --
I'd love to talk more about that especially as we are in budget season.
Yeah. One of the things that keeps coming back to us is that the punishment often doesn't fit the crime. That businesses know that I rather run the risk of eight years of not being inspected and pay a fine, rather than pay a license. Like I know by the time you get to me, it'll be worth it. And so therefore I'm willing to pay. It goes for taxes, it goes for L&I inspections, it goes for health inspections. It costs more to fix what you're talking about than the fine that you might give me. We have to -- we have to change that balance a bit in order to get people to comply. Second, if I know that you aren't open on the weekends or 5 o'clock you're closed, you know, everything from construction, you know. All right. Let's bring the crew in at o'clock when we know no 4 one is going to come in. And we 5 have to -- we have to outsmart those individuals who are trying to circumvent our process.
Mr. Chair. I mean, I just want to put on a record that there are many like takeout stores in my district that don't open up until 3, 4, 5 o'clock in the afternoon purposely knowing that there won't be folks to come around to give those types of inspection. So, you know, I think that's something that we, as a city, really need to take a look at and how we are enforcing these laws because they really affect the quality of life of the communities. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Member Lozada?
Do we have -- do we have enough staff inspectors to be able to support this type of work? And I'm talking about, you know, during the day, as well as during those hours where we know are problematic? Any -- anybody? You know, and I'm talking about Health inspectors, L&I inspectors, right, you all have to go out together. I know that you all don't have authority over LCE and those folks, but is there -- is there personnel to be able to respond to some of the issues that we have? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: We have a whole entire dedicated unit that goes out for these nuisance properties, so we think we're good there. We do, we think we have enough staff and we have experts in those areas that have been going out. Actually Renee started there. They go out, they figure out the players, they know what, you know, what's going on. They go out with the police, they do. We coordinate with LCE, sometimes we coordinate with Health. But, yeah, we're out there. I believe that we have a good group out there. We're at capacity that we can meet the demand out there for the nuisance and stuff at night.
I asked that question, Mr. Chair, because in the past the excuse has been, you know, we only have one team, right? We don't -- And they have to cover the entire city. And we don't have that team not fully staffed. And so if we -- we're in budget season, right? If we need to look at that, if this has become an increasing problem in our city, if we need to look at that, then it's something that we should consider, right? There shouldn't be -- we're having all of these issues there shouldn't just be one team, right? The task force was created because obviously this was a huge problem and it's only been exasperated as a result of us, kind of, having a hands-off type of approach in our city. And so we should consider looking at how do we budget to create multiple teams or at least another team that can help support the work to address what we're all experiencing across the city of Philadelphia. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Member Gilmore-Richardson.
To Councilmember Lozada's point, I think it would be helpful for budget for Health, for L&I, PPD, if we could receive information regarding staffing needs for inspectors for every tour and that the tour coincides with PPD's tours. So as an example, if they're on day, evening or night, that we have the appropriate amount of inspectors from L&I, from Health, from any other city departments that are represented on the task force to mirror the schedule of PPD. Because I know when we were going out together to do the inspections, as an example, we would typically go out in the evening. And it would be light when we would start, but it'd be dark when we were finished. And they were very, very helpful to the community and 9 times out of 10, almost every location we went to, it would be 80 to 90% of the time, they would be seized on the spot. That would be how bad, you know, it was. Like I said, the one business I remember in particular didn't have any licensing at all. And then as an example, when we went to Councilmember Driscoll's district, you remember we -- everybody went in the store, in the one store and they, oh, we don't have any paraphernalia. They didn't have a cigarette license so it was on Health. And they said no, we don't sell cigarettes. And then remember I found the cigarettes in the trash can. So as we were walking in they must have thrown the cigarette boxes in the trash can with medallions from other states, like I think it was Virginia and North Carolina. And we were ready to leave and something just told me just look in the trash can and I found the cigarette boxes in the trash can. So I think if we mirror the inspector's schedule for each of the teams. Maybe we have three teams instead of one. One team for day shift, one team for evening shift, one team for night shift, and then that gives them the opportunity to you know have more coverage across the city hours a day. 7 CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Thank 8 you, Leader. And seeing no other 9 questions or comments from the 10 panel, I would like to thank you for 11 your testimony today. 12 Ms. McDonald, will you 13 please call the second panel we have 14 to testify this morning on 15 resolution 250052. 16
Kate Allen, Dee 17 Dukes and Susan Bert-Collins. 18 CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Thank 19 you. I don't know what order you 20 want to go with, but whoever wants 21 to start please state your name, for 22 the record, and proceed with your 23 testimony. 24
Can you hear me? CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Pull a little closer.
Okay. Susan Burt-Collins. I'm the president currently for a short time of Society Hill Civic Association. And I would first, because it's Society Hill Civic Association, with a name that immediately makes you go -- I actually looked up the derivation of the name. It was the Society of Traders, and they had a flag that sat on top the hill on Dock Street. And it was the flag of the society on the hill. And so there were tanneries and glass makers and wood workers, and that's what Society Hill originally was. Not the place that we sometimes look askance at, including myself. So I'm here, I thought originally when I got the request and I looked at the bill, I did think it had already been passed which it obviously has been, so I wondered. But anyhow, so what I wrote is perhaps not as relevant because I was very supportive of the bill and saying we need it even in our neighborhood on South Street, on 4th Street on 5th Street. There's even a store that popped up on Walnut Street at 8th, that's a convenience store and it is selling all sorts of drug paraphernalia. It was used to be a jewelry store and now it's, you know, it's right around the corner from Sansom Street. So it is an issue that affects all of us. South Street is really a mecca. It's a mecca for good stuff, it's a mecca for good food, it's a mecca for people all over coming to South Street. It's also a mecca for trouble. And the more of those stores that we have and the more drug paraphernalia we have in the store fronts, the more it is assumed if you're a young person, or like Councilman Jones says, this is a watering hole. I spent my life doing criminal defense in this building, those are watering holes. And those are places where if you're a young kid, you know, I can't do this in my neighborhood because somebody's going to see me, but I can do it here. And you do it here and it affects everybody. It affects the kids and it affects the city of Philadelphia. And those of us in Society Hill, in Queen Village, nobody wants that. That's not what Philadelphia is and it needs to change. But listening to all this, I must say it seems that you got a whack-a-mole problem. So I would look at it a little maybe from 30,000 feet and say, how do we attack it? I would -- I might sit down with the District Attorney which might not be fruitful and Councilman O'Rourke knows my thoughts. But maybe it is because maybe current circumstances being what they are in the country, maybe it is time to look at Philadelphia and let us take the lead both on being progressive in keeping our people safe, happy and healthy, but also addressing the problems as they exist. And so maybe the District Attorney will talk to you, and maybe there is a way to use a little bit of criminal enforcement, a little bit of a stick, but yes, this the civil penalties may be the most significant and also civil -- not criminal contempt -- civil contempt is apparently much more effective and that maybe -- and can't be pardoned. So maybe that is something that you ought to consider. It also seems that perhaps the state ought to be involved, and also maybe all these businesses that open up in one place and then another place, many of them not from Philadelphia, they're looking for opportunities. Maybe it's a stretch, but maybe RICO could be used. I wouldn't rely on the Federal people because I wouldn't rely on them for anything, but I might rely on the State people. You've got a governor who wants to do something more, maybe he could be helpful. And the State AG's Office, maybe, you know, if one organization -- if one business opens up in one place in another place and another place, and they're all selling illegal merchandise, that may, in fact, could be considered a racketeering influenced operation. So I think you need to get more creative than making it a zoning matter. You have the full cooperation and support of the folks in Society Hill for whatever you can do.
And finally, I would point out many of the neighborhoods you talk about, including our neighborhood include South Street and the continuous numbered streets, we have a Business District, a Business Improvement District. What are they doing? Let them call and say, you know, gee, I just noticed this business opened up. We don't know what it is, we don't know what their licensing is. That is their job. It is not the job of me or Kate or anybody else to walk up and down the street and say, oh, gee, never saw them. Let that be the job and you let the Business District know that as their job. I would bet that certainly Old City probably does that, and I think that would to be the job of any business district. Not just to fill the space with whoever will be there, but to fill the space with people that you, City Council, wants to see in our city. And with that, that's all I've got to say. But thank you and thank you for considering this. I really appreciate it. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Next panelist and please state your name, for the record.
So good morning, Chairman, Council, everyone in your respective places. My name is Dee Dukes. I am the RCO leader in the Wynnefield Community. I'm president of the Wynnefield Community Neighborhood Association. I'm the Vice Chairman of the Philadelphia Crosstown Coalition. I'm on the board of the Mastery Charter Schools. And I'm an educator, parent, and just community leader who cares. So I'm here today on behalf of License & Inspections and the Public Safety Committees in support of resolution No. 250052 to speak in support of enforcement against paraphernalia, drug paraphernalia stores. I have observed illegal drug sales in these stores including, but not limited to sales to minors, sales to individuals who are addicts with many years of drug and substance abuse diseases. Daily as a community leader, I have walked the streets. I receive multiple phone calls, email complaints from neighbors about illegal sales. Submitted voluminous amount of Philly 311 reports. Placed multiple roll call complaints and 911 calls in real time to the 19th District for assistance when sales were taking place and public safety incidents were happening. These illegal drug sales in stores continue to present a public safety crisis in our communities and are a detriment to the quality of life, mental, emotional and financial instability in all growing and thriving communities, primarily our black and brown communities. Sadly when illegal drug sales are not enforced, the perpetrator of these offenses are allowed to continue bringing harm to the safety and financial well-being of our friends, neighbors and our loved ones. So in my conclusion and certainly I'm not finished because I have a few more to say, but as a very busy RCO leader volunteering my time daily being here today to advocate and support of this resolution, I please ask that we provide solutions for enforcement of laws that will keep our communities safe and free from drug sales, which harm our communities. So, again, I am a active community leader. I walk the streets, I know these folks who are selling illegal paraphernalia and illegal drugs and whatever else they do. And it is a danger to me as a community leader because I'm targeted. We know Dee knows something about everything, and so that's a target for me. So we need laws that work. We have laws, we just need them enforced. I heard some things here today from L&I about having -- having information displayed. I've never seen information displayed. I've never heard of a business, in my experience, a business being educated about what they should be doing and should not. I've never seen that. So if L&I is doing that I don't know where it is. Perhaps coming out to community organizations and educating community organizations about we what we should be looking for. I've never heard of the rose in the whatever, I don't even know what that is, I don't even know what it looks like. I don't. I need to be educated on what these drugs and types of drugs look like. My middle school kids will tell me different language and I have no clue on what they're talking about, so we need to be educated. Legal businesses we support. And this idea of we can't confiscate, not understanding that. Why? We confiscate bikes. We've written legislation that confiscates bikes. Why can't we confiscate it? So we need to -- we have to do better with finding solutions to solve that problem. Why does it take so long? I'm not understanding that. Why does it take so long to remove bad actors? What is the process? Like are we following along License & Inspection? Are you following along and doing your job in an appropriate time period? The answer can't be yes, because if it was, these things would not be happening. There was a tour and I do have to say thank you to our Council people in our community. Councilman Jones, Councilwoman Katherine Gilmore-Richardson, I have to say thank you to you.
Because there have been stories closed down in our Wynnefield community and it was because of your support and your advocacy and listening to the community that that was able to happen. But my heart goes out to those neighborhoods who that's not happening. I teach in a community where this stuff would not be going on and is not going on. But I come five blocks away in a community where I live and I see trash, I see drugs, I see all night long stores in communities. My heart is hurting because of that. We have to do something together to make this situation to resolve this situation so that we can live the type of quality of life that we want to live. And thank you for the opportunity to speak today. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Thank you and I'd like to thank all three of you for taking time early on a Monday to take your time off and come here and appear in front of us and share your thoughts so that we can get to a better solution. So I'll turn it over to panelist three. Please state your name, for the record, and proceed with your testimony.
Kate Allen. Chairman Jones, Chairman Driscoll, Majority Leader Gilmore-Richardson and members of City Council, my name is Kate Allen and I am the President of the Queen Village Neighbors Association. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak this morning about the negative effects that stores that sell drug paraphernalia are having on our communities. Many of the shops that sell drug paraphernalia also typically sell an assortment of edible or smokeable products. There are 4 such places in Queen Village and 5 Bell Vista, ten of them just on 6 South Street between 2nd and 10th 7 Streets. 8 Why so many of these stores 9 along one commercial corridor? Is 10 it because one smoke shop isn't 11 enough to meet the demands of our 12 neighborhood or four or six or 15? 13 Of course not. It's because most of 14 these establishments are brazen or 15 at best a thinly veiled illegal drug 16 market. There's a concept in law res ipsa loquitur, which means the thing speaks for itself. So if the question is whether these businesses are negatively impacting our neighborhoods, just look at the way they choose to conduct themselves. m. and neighbors often comment that they rarely see anyone inside. So how is it that these places remain open, especially with so much competition? It's because they aren't paying their rent with the legal products on their first floor shelves. The sale of drug paraphernalia is prohibited along most of South Street, but that doesn't mean it's not being sold. A neighbor with a medical marijuana card broke his bong and went to South Street to find another. The first store he went into told him they weren't allowed to sell drug paraphernalia. He tried another, was told the same thing. Since there had been exactly zero other customers in either store, he decided to try one more before giving up. He walked in was once again the only customer and asked the woman behind the counter if she could help. She initially refused, but grabbed him as he turned to leave, she handed him a business card, scribbled something on it and told him to go through the curtain behind the counter. Behind the curtain were stairs leading to a basement full of people and wall-to- wall shelves of products that couldn't legally be sold upstairs. He decided whatever that was wasn't worth it so he turned around and went home, but suddenly learning how that business was able to pay its rent. The business was raided by the State Bureau of Narcotics Investigation shortly afterwards, but yet, is still able to re remain open because of some jurisdictional issue. This store is one of six that is less than two blocks from a Suboxone clinic, a place where those battling substance abuse disorder seek help. If the City's position is that those with this disorder are vulnerable and need to be protected, then not stopping this is counterproductive and increases their risk of harm. If a business is willing to sell illegal products to an adult it's not a stretch that they may also be willing to sell illegal products to children. A friend told me about another smoke shop merely blocked from here that is a known Place among the Central High School students as somewhere where they can buy products underage. She discovered this when she found out that her teenage son had taken THC gummies he bought there. Products that are illegal to sell to anyone under 21. Her biggest concern was that if someone lacked the morals not to sell products like this to minors, how could she trust what was actually in them? So she had them drug tested and found that the gummies were laced with benzodiazepines, prescription medications that can be addictive and fatal. About a week after that incident two teenage girls bought THC gummies from a different smoke shop, also blocks from here. Their gummies were laced with benzos and they became so sick that they had to go to the hospital. There's an affordable housing development in Queen Village often referred to as the Courtyard.
Several parents from there have reached out to me about yet another smoke shop that's been selling products to their children, wanting to know what can be done to stop this. These establishments have demonstrated that they are willing to break the law by selling illegal products, including to kids. So what other laws are they breaking? New York City legalized cannabis in 2021, and since then thousands of smoke shops have popped up around the city. Some legally, thousands not. The city began cracking down on the illegal stores last spring. Alongside illegal cannabis and tobacco products, officials have also found stores selling illegal weapons. Mayor Eric Adams said we want to make it more costly to stop you from opening than allowing you to stay open. I'm often ask how there are so many of these places popping up in our neighborhoods. It's because the business model of many of these places seems to be to open up with no regards to permit or zoning or to lie about their intent and operate until the beleaguered and understaffed departments of L&I, Health and Police are able to inspect these businesses and ultimately cease operations. The only realistic chance we have to combat this strategy and to prevent the sale of harmful and illegal products is to make it much, much harder for these places to open in the first place. I thank Majority Leader Gilmore-Richardson for taking this very necessary step of looking into these businesses and implore Council to make it harder for them to open especially near places like schools, playgrounds and rec centers. Make it easier to inspect anyones that do open and to shut down the ones that are causing so much harm to the people of Philadelphia. Thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Well, you certainly brought some revealing topics to light here. The maker of the resolution 9 Katherine Gilmore-Richardson.
Thank, Chair. And thank you all so much for coming in to testify and really appreciate the continued community advocacy. You know this has been an issue that we've been working on for more than five years at this point. And Dee, I don't know if you remember this, it really started from the tour we did on 54th Street with Councilmember Jones. That was the beginning of this process of the citywide legislation to address drug paraphernalia. And I have to put this on the record because many people probably don't realize this, but we did have one store in Councilmember Jones's District that was raided by the ATF because they were also selling guns as well out of the back of the store, and that was several years ago. And so I want to thank you all for your testimony for the great input that you gave. I was taking copious notes on all the different follow-up steps that you all had and mentioned. And we want to make sure that we get specifically from you, Kate, and from Queen Village Neighbors Association, the addresses and the locations of the stores that you mentioned. Because what I thought about when you were talking about those products was the fact that that means they're counterfeit or synthetic products. And so that will go back to the issue that we talked about earlier regarding confiscation of those products from those stores. And so, if we could get the names and the addresses of those locations, that would be great. And we want to continue to work with the administration and L&I and Health regarding education for the community groups because I heard that part as well. Because we do need to understand exactly how we can get the information to the city so that the city then knows which businesses to inspect. Because I find a lot of times that people think that we just know a business popped up. And that sounds easy, but particularly when, you know, we're traveling all across, you know, for the district members their districts, and then for the at large members, all across the city, it's very, very hard to keep up with. As you stated, since the pandemic it's been thousands of these locations that have popped up across the city of Philadelphia. Many of the owners are not from Philadelphia we've been finding as well. And so we need to try to get a handle on this process. This hearing has really reinvigorated me on this issue. I know it's something that we have been working on over the last four years and to the point where I had to do two bills just for this issue to try to help with the enforcement. And like I said, in the last four years I know Councilmember Phillips and Councilmember Bass also did legislation to help with the enforcement just on this issue. So we are trying to get a handle on this. I heard a lot today that is really going to help us move forward. I do intend to introduce an additional package of bills. Like I said, I already have one bill 6 ready from our administrative code, I think it's title 4 with the city. But at any rate, we're going to do more based on everything we heard here today and introduce a package of bills to further address this issue. And finally, we just again want to thank you all for being the community star wars that you are. And Dee, you forgot one title. 52nd Ward committee person, you didn't mention it.
But Dee is on and in everything and we just -- we thank you and we thank each of you for coming and representing your communities. Thank you. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Public Safety Chairman Curtis Jones.
I just want to echo what Majority Leaders said is thank you guys. What struck me, Dee Dukes, that you said is they know that you're out there and that puts you in jeopardy. And for you to be that courageous, I remember going into that store and you were running around pulling out plugs of the machines. I'm like I don't know if I'm committed to that degree. You know, we are not Eliot Ness. But I do remember that courage and making us as we walked up and down 54th Street looking at the things that were wrong, the things that create a negative commercial environment on our strips that our senior citizens have to navigate through. They got to walk through these little watering holes that we have to kind of be mindful of. Because at the end of the day they can't travel as far from milk, eggs, butter and cheese. And the more milk, egg, butter and cheese that are available in the neighborhood and the less gambling machines, the less drug paraphernalia, these items are competing for shelf space. And, you know, I asked one individual that owned a shop, I said why do you sell this? He said because people buy it. We have to educate. Educate not only the store owners, but the consumers. Don't do it. If you bring this, this is what we get. So thank you, Majority Leader, and thank you, Mr Chairman, for bringing this to our attention again. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Councilmember Jim Harrity.
On the end over here. I just, too, want to thank you both and thank you. I've been with you, too, on numerous occasions. I've also been with Ms. Dukes when, you know, her meetings can get a little vocal in Wynnefield. they know their stuff and they don't play around. So you know I know that. And in Queen Village, of course, in the 2nd Ward where I came from, so I'm very familiar with what you have to deal with over there. South Street's always been a crazy place. But I just wanted to get some clarification. You said that there was a jurisdictional issue that prevented the immediate closure and penalization of the store. Can you elaborate on that?
So from what I understand is that because this particular store was raided by a state agency, the only way that it could be shut down is through the city. And there was some complexity between coordinating a the enforcement between the state and the city law enforcement.
So there's some kind of disconnect I would say. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Sounds like there's some room for coordination here.
Yeah, yeah. Maybe we should reach out to our state partners. All right. Thank you so much. And, again, I thank you for your service. I know this is thankless and it's not paid so we appreciate all the hours and time you put in. So thank you so much. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Councilmember Quetcy Lozada.
Thank you. I just want to reiterate what my colleagues have said, right? Thank you for coming today. Thank you for sharing the information. I think it's extremely important to continue to share information with us as you see it, right? It doesn't matter how active we are in the community, how much we drive around, how many community meetings we get to, sometimes this very important detailed information that can help us bring quality of life into neighborhoods doesn't get to us at those spaces for fear, right, of retaliation or for fear that someone may hear, in that space, what is being discussed. And so I just encourage you to continue to share the information with us as best you can. To me it it's always extremely sad to hear that young people have access as easily as they do to these -- to these things that can destroy their lives, right? Their first use can be their last use. And I think that we don't do enough to have those conversations with young people because access is so easy right now. And so I, you know, I appreciate both Chairmen of these two committees for bringing us together and having this conversation and as a collective working together to figure out how we tighten up our systems, right? And how do we make our government a more common sense government because some of the policies and some of the legislation that's in place seem like it's a little backwards to me, right? Some of these things just seem so obvious we should be able to fix these so quickly, but sometimes there are things that -- or sometimes I believe that we get in our own way. And so how do we looking forward to figure out how we better or streamline our processes to make sure that our young people are the ones that are protected at the end of the day. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Councilmember Nicholas O'Rourke.
Thank you. Looks like you were about to say something, Ms. Dee. Did you want to? Go ahead.
Oh, I just wanted to say I don't know who's responsible, but even the packaging of this illegal drugs or whatever it is. The packaging of it, it looks enticing to our children. I've seen it on the ground as I clean up. Who's responsible for maybe putting some laws that it shouldn't look like candy, that it shouldn't look like enticing to our children. That's another big issue that I think we also -- whoever can address it, I think that really needs to be addressed. How this packaging is looking so enticing to our children.
Thank you. I wanted to say thank you and good morning to all of you. It's good to see you all and, Susan, it's good to see you as well. Yes, indeed. I'm curious in the same spirit of you all telling us so that we can be better legislators on this point. What can you tell us about -- if anything at all, what city departments have told you about what they can actually do in terms of enforcement here?
About their ability to combat these issues in particular.
Yeah. I haven't heard from any city department. The only ones I know that are doing something in my community are the two I just told you about. I call and do the 311 and I don't -- I don't hear anything else besides that. So I really -- i haven't heard from anyone that tells me any process, any -- yeah, no one. Go ahead, Kate.
Okay. We've had a little bit different experience in our -- in our neighborhoods. I can't thank Commissioner Greenwald -- yeah, I can't thank Bridget enough for all of her support for our neighborhoods. L&I have been incredibly responsive with the limited resources that they have. So I understand that everybody wants enforcement hearing from all the district folks about how this is a problem in their neighborhoods as well, but L&I is really short staff, but she's been incredible since taking over so we appreciate that. And then the Police Department, they've also been incredible with everything they've been able to do for our neighborhood so I also want to give them due credit.
So maybe not in Wynnefield, but certainly in Queen Village you're getting some responsiveness. What about you, Susan?
Well, Society Hill, forgive me, I tend to focus more on South Street and 4th Street and 5th Street because that honestly is what, you know, it's our neighborhood. It makes up -- you know, you see kids going down there on Saturday night, you see people looking for a good time, that makes sense, but I also see that South Street is a problem. It's not, as the people at the Business District said, it's family friendly. I don't see it always as family friendly. And what we have found and Kate is always really polite and I'm not as polite, we would ask for enforcement. And we would we would say, you know, there was stores opening up. And we did before Ms. Greenwald was in charge, we did get the answer that, you know, well, we don't go there. You know, we go there at 3:00 and they're closed. Well, like, yeah, they're closed because it's a nighttime establishment. So I think we do -- I think they need more resources, absolutely we need more resources for L&I, but L&I can't simply be, you know, take it off the shelves, put it under the desk and when they walk out the door, put it back. That's absurd. I think the statute that covers L&I needs to change. And that may be -- that's a heavy lift and Law Department needs to get involved and all that. But you can't simply, you know, it's like getting -- it's getting a parking ticket. Come on. You know, like I'm going to park there for 35 minutes and it's minutes, it's 12 okay. We can't do that. This is 13 too serious. 14 This affects who we are as 15 a city. And I just -- I think we 16 need to do better. I think Health 17 Department -- and then we get this 18 mix we've with, well, the Health 19 Department came in, but then L&I, 20 but they couldn't do anything, but then L&I, but then the Health Department had to come back. And no, no, no, this ought to be like a team effort. This is -- and you know, health is affected by what they sell in the stores. There's also an issue that a long time ago I learned apparently tobacco licensing is a state issue. Where how many tobacco licenses can be in one area is based upon population. Well, obviously center City has a lot of people. And so South Street, they all congregate there because we have the most tobacco licenses. Maybe that's a state issue and we need to limit it. So I think there's -- unfortunately it looks like one of those task force things that you really need to look at the whole thing and look at all the pieces because I don't think to simply look at L&I and say where are you, we need more than L&I. And I think we do need the police, and honestly we need to make some examples. We need -- you know, they take people off the street by masked men and, you know, walking down the street in Boston. Maybe they could do that to somebody, you know, on South Street that's selling drugs to kids. And it might have an effect if you, you know, you see honestly a bust happening, those stores might begin to say, you know what, this ain't fun. We don't want to be in this neighborhood anymore.
It is your conviction, though, that as it relates to City Departments in terms of what they can actually do in terms of enforcement, that there should be more staffing as it relates to L&I.
And staffing that includes community leadership. Like I think these task forces that L&I might have, they have to include community leaders to, you know, report what is happening to come up together with ideas about solutions. Even helping with doing whatever work might be necessary. Not doing their jobs, but working along with them to combat the problem. You have legal experience, I do, you know, you have experience. And so those task force working along with L&I need to include community leaders.
Thank you all so much. And again, thank you for your advocacy in your communities for giving voice to these issues. Obviously it helps. As we say in -- as we say in movement -- God bless you, brother. As we say in movement, this is what democracy looks like. So thank you very much for your advocacy. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Councilmember Kendra Brooks.
Thank you. First, I want to say thank you ladies for just being brave advocates, community organizers, gathering all the information and being willing to share and put yourself at risk by doing so. We -- I understand that, I've been there. I appreciate the work that you guys are doing. I also was wondering kind of on the same lines of Councilmember O'Rourke, have you seen any improvements in enforcement since this bill was passed?
So yes, so as Councilmember Gilmore-Richardson was speaking about in 2021-2020, somewhere around that time period, they were able to come in and rally community leaders and we had a tour. And that tour from that time to this time, we have seen two stores in our community shut down. And for whatever those reasons are, they're no longer operating. And they were doing some really, really illegal things. There is still one store that is just, you know, oh, my goodness, is horrifying, that is still open. It's still operating. So we've seen improvement, but our neighbors are still scared to come out, our neighbors are still scared to visit other locations within the community and so we need something done. But yes, improvement has happened, but we still have so long to go. Because they are there 22 hours, trash, illegal activities 23 going on, paraphernalia. You name 24 it, they're doing it. So it's just continuing, but we have seen some improvement.
Thank you. And then my other thought around that, and you ladies can share if you have something, too, before I move on to my next point.
So yes, we have -- sorry, one of these days I'll the hang of how close to get to this. We have seen some improvement. And, again, from the Department of L&I, one quirk that we've seen is that there is a city law that I think was passed around the same time as the other one that prohibited the sale of drug paraphernalia and tobacco within 500 feet of several protected schools, rec centers, daycare centers and houses of worship. And of the 16 smoke shops that are in Queen Village, it seemed like at least 11 of them were issued permits erroneously by the Health Department. So we really appreciate Commissioner Greenwald's leadership and Councilman Squilla has been incredibly helpful on this, with the Police Department trying to clean up what seemed like permits that, at least to us, weren't issued appropriately. And again, they're near places especially our schools where we're all trying to protect our kids and these places that at least a few of them have been marketing to them. So since the leadership that we've been able to work with and these new law changes that are already in the books that we appreciate, we have seen an improvement.
You must have been reading my mind because that was the direction I'm going in. And this is for folks that are on the Education Committee. We get countless reports directly from the School District of children with various taking some kind of drugs or distributing candy or whatever. Is there any way that we can kind of marry these efforts with all of these departments. Because I don't think the School District would necessarily reach out to L&I, that they think they got the kids got the candy or the gummies or whatever they had from one of the neighboring stores, and add that same ordinance. Because in neighborhoods like mine and Jeffrey's and some other folks, there are still like smoke shops on the way to children's schools or they're selling it in a corner store. Even Jimmy -- like some of the -- when I said the more challenged neighborhoods, those things are overlooked. Is there a way that we can work with L&I to enforce those same level of the legislation that Mark's been able to carry out with the schools in the district around the city and connect it to some of these incidents that we get what, every other day, about somebody's kid did something in school?
Point of information, thank you, Councilmember Brooks. L&I and Health are now coordinating. I don't know if L&I wants to come up and state that. But they are now coordinating with the Health Department and it's good to have Health on these conversations also. I know they're not present here today, but -- oh, all right, here you go. I'm sorry. They are now coordinating working together so that Health Department isn't issuing permits for people who do not have zoning. I don't know, does somebody want to just come up and explain what you're doing at this point?
There's a school on the same block as a smoke shop. Smiley's, same block. So, yeah, I'd like to hear that. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Bridget Collins-Greenwald, Department of Licenses & Inspections, Quality of Life. Yes, when this issue first arose we did not realize that there was a contradiction there. Like we were not issuing license -- they were issuing licenses, not permits. We have complete coordination now so this will not happen going forward. So we picked up on that a few months ago. So, yeah, we've been working on that me. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Member Lozada.
Just one question for L&I. We had a hearing the other day and someone mentioned something about the Health Department and L&I. And I just want clarification for future meetings that I'm going to be attending. But they're talking about the sales of some of these items, as well as tobacco, right? And they're saying L&I or the state gives us a permit, Health -- no, the state gives us a license, L&I gives us -- the Health Department gives us the permit, L&I then does some enforcement. Is there -- is there any type of coordination in all of that? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: Yeah, so we coordinate very often with, like I said, earlier the Police Department and the Health Department. That issue is different. We enforce this drug paraphernalia, the Health Department enforces the tobacco. So we refer things to each other so that's where the issue is.
And when you all are doing inspections in these establishments understanding that some of these smoke shops, some of these corner stores there's a language barrier, are there inspectors in each inspection that is able to translate and interpret what is happening or what is going on? COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: We have translation services, we have inspectors that speak multiple languages and all of our information is in practically every language that someone would speak in the city.
Okay. And when a violation is issued in a inspection like this one, are violations issued immediately on location or they then mailed to -- or are they mailed to the person? Because one of the things that we heard was that violations are issued or there's a violation issue that doesn't get to the establishment for months after. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So a violation is one thing that's issued and it does go through the -- so a case is written in our eCLIPSE system and it goes out through the mail. I think it gets emailed as well, I'm pretty sure, but I'd have to double check on that. A site violation notice is issued right on-site.
And again, I just wanted to put this on the record, are we able to continue or restart the tours that we were doing I would say a couple -- I think we lasted them in '23. I know we started, I think in the 4th, in Councilmember Jones's District. But to restart the tours maybe for each District Councilmember, they can identify corridors in their areas and then, you know, that way the community also sees. And that was an opportunity for us to invite the community leaders to the tour. So we had the district council person and all the various leaders from each of the city departments that had the authority to either seize the business or check for the tobacco licensing. And obviously and then I was there as well, because it was the bill that we have been working on together. But it gave us an opportunity to educate the community about how they can report these violations, but also focus on corridors that the District Councilmembers were hearing from their community members were the worst in their district. So I was wondering if we could look at the possibility of doing the tours again, and then maybe get through every single Council District this time. Because I know I think we stopped after that really bad one in the 5th. Because we were surrounded by drug dealers that night. It was dark and they were really angry that we closed their store because the store was where they did all of their business, the one store that didn't have any licensing. And they were really, really upset with us and surrounded us that night. And it was okay because I went complete mom on all of them. And we went back to that location within Council President Clark and did a job fair right on the corner with a bunch of gazebos. But I think we need to do a little bit more of that to ensure that the community has the information necessary to continue to report. So I wanted to put that on the record, too. COMMISSIONER GREENWALD: So we do do tours. So we went to each District Councilperson, starting in June of this summer, we hit every Council District. We asked the District Councilmembers, yep, where was their hot spot and that is where we went. So I believe I know Frankford Avenue, we went to a Councilmember Driscoll, we went to Kensington Avenue and Wyoming Avenue with Councilwoman Lozada. Councilman Jones, I think yours was 59th -- 54th Street, I believe. Yeah. So we went to each individual Councilperson. Some of them came -- you know, some of them came out and walked with us. I think Councilmember Driscoll's we did pick 105 degree weather day and did that, so that was terrible, but we did it. We walked all through Frankford Avenue. But community leadership groups, too. So we've completed 12 already since June. So what we do is we go out, and then we give all the education. And, like I said, it's in the various languages, they're in multiple languages. We speak, we bring the Commerce Department out so the Commerce Department can talk to these businesses and say, hey, the Mayor's Business Action team is available to you. Here's what a facade grant is, here's where we can help you. Then we go back, we L&I, QOL, without Commerce because we're doing the enforcement. And like good cop, bad cop like, kind of, kind of scenario a little bit, and then that's when the enforcement happens. So we've completed to 12 date since June. We are more than willing to, you know, go but add-on. You know what I mean? Some of them -- we've had some businesses that have come in compliance, some that are in court. All of them are in different aspects of where the enforcement effort is now, right? Some came in compliance, some were re inspected some were issued ceases. I think we did about 60, almost 70 ceases like immediately, some intent to cease, things were in court. So things are moving. So we'd absolutely do that, the more -- the more the merrier.
I mean, I just -- I want to support what the Deputy Commissioner just said because, you know, in my district they went out for a few weeks in a row to educate residents and businesses and tell them, we're coming back to do an inspection, right? We're coming back within X period of time and we're coming to do an inspection. I went out with a team that was doing enforcement and when we talked to some of the owners, I asked them were you -- did you receive education information? Did someone visit you to tell you that that enforcement was going to be happening? And many of them were very honest and said, yes, they were here, they did educate us and we weren't ready because we didn't believe they were coming back. Which is the -- which is the conversation that the woman who was operating the restaurant said to us, right? She said I continued to operate. I bought the business and I bought the building off of this person. I didn't feel like I needed to transfer or do anything because L&I and Health Department have never been in here. And so I didn't feel like -- yeah, they said they were going to come back, but they've never come back and so I didn't feel like I needed to do anything or I needed to act. And so just want to say thank you to you all for that increased education that we continue to give some of the businesses in our community. But at some point, you know, we have to do enforcement because the lack of enforcement is costing us more. And it's costing us more than just that dollar amount, right? It's costing quality of life, it's costing some of our children, young people's lives, it's costing some of our senior citizens not to feel like they can come out and visit some of our establishments in our communities, it's costing young people witnessing some of this activity that is occurring in their community. And so at what point do we say that all of those things when compared to that line item, that budget number, when do we say that all of these other things should be prioritized over that budget number, right? We really have to take a serious look at how our city is being operated and how we as government are responsible for ensuring that, yes, we welcome businesses, but businesses that are conducting business appropriately. When are we going to say that our children, you know, are worth more than a government that ignores this type of activity happening in their community. We really have to change how we're prioritizing and how we're conducting business as a government in the city of Philadelphia. It's not that we're not small business supporters. Absolutely not, right? But we have to figure out how do we help those businesses come into compliance in a way where they are contributing to the economy of those neighborhoods and still protecting quality of life. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Okay. Well, I'm very pleased with the content of this hearing today. I think we had a lot of good things on the record. The maker of the resolution, Majority Leader Katherine Gilmore-Richardson, thank you for your continuing efforts. On behalf of Chairman Curtis Thomas and myself, we'd like to thank the panelist -- oh, I'm sorry. That's right, he's playing basketball somewhere -- coaching basketball. Chairman Jones. I would like to thank you, panel, and the earlier panel for this very worthwhile testimony. So thank you. Sure. So hearing no further questions from members for this panel and there being no other panels to testify, we will now transition to our public comment session. Ms. McDonald, will you please call the first person making public comment we have to testify this morning on the bill before this committee today.
There are no names for public comment. CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: There are none?
None. 5 CHAIRMAN DRISCOLL: Okay. 6 Well, thank you, Ms. McDonald. 7 Seeing that there are no 8 other testifiers public comment 9 today I -- all right. Let's see. 10 Well, I'll also ask if 11 there's anyone else present in this 12 hearing whose name we have failed to 13 call or that wishes to offer 14 testimony on the resolution being 15 considered today? 16 Hearing none and there 17 being no further questions from 18 members of the committee, no other 19 witnesses to testify and no further 20 names for public comment, this 21 concludes the business before the 22 joint committees on Licenses & 23 Inspection and Public Safety today. 24 Thank you all very much for your attendance. (Joint committees on License & Inspection and Public Safety concluded at 12:15 p.m.) C E R T I F I C A T I O N I hereby certify that the proceedings and evidence are contained fully and accurately in the notes taken by me of the above case, and this copy is a correct transcript of the same. _______________ Samanda J. Rios