COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19107 Tuesday, April 3, 2012 10:30 a.m. PRESENT: COUNCIL PRESIDENT DARRELL L. CLARKE COUNCILWOMAN BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN COUNCILMAN WILLIAM K. GREENLEE COUNCILMAN W. WILSON GOODE, JR. COUNCILMAN DAVID OH COUNCILMAN JAMES R. KENNEY COUNCILMAN MARK SQUILLA COUNCILMAN KENYATTA JOHNSON COUNCILWOMAN JANNIE L. BLACKWELL COUNCILWOMAN CINDY BASS COUNCILWOMAN MARIAN B. TASCO BILL 120164 - An ordinance to adopt the Capital Bill for the six Fiscal Years 2013-2013 inclusive. BILL 120165 - An ordinance to adopt the Fiscal Year 2013 Capital Budget. BILL 120166 - An ordinance adopting an operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2013. BILL 120167 - Resolution providing for the approval by the Council of the City of Philadelphia and revised by the yearly Financial Plan... ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 1
Good morning. Regarding bills No. 3 120164, 12165, 12166 and Resolutions No. 120167, Ms. Lewis, please read the titles of the bills and the resolutions.
Bill No. 120164, an ordinance to adopt the Capital Bill 9 for the six fiscal years 2013 to 2018 inclusive. Bill No 120165, an ordinance 12 to adopt the fiscal 2013 Capital Budget. Bill No. 120166, an ordinance adopted an Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2013. Bill No. 120167 a resolution 18 providing for the approval by the Council of the City and revised by the yearly financial plan for the City of Philadelphia covering fiscal years 2013 through 2017 and incorporating proposed changes with respect to Fiscal Year 2012 which is to be ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 3 submitted by the Mayor to the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority, the Authority, pursuant to the Intergovernmental Cooperation Agreement authorized by an ordinance of this Council approved by the Mayor on January 3, 1992, Bill No. 8 1563-A, by and between the City and the Authority.
Thank you. Will the Administration please come forward. Good morning.
Good morning, Council President Clarke and Members of Council. I am Rich Negrin, ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 4 Managing Director and Deputy Mayor for the City of Philadelphia. With me today are Brian Abernathy my chief of staff, and Dave Wilson my first deputy. I'm going to summarize my testimony. You have the written testimony, but I've been asked to shorten that and summarize it, so I'm going to read a shortened version. 2 million in our division of Public Safety, one million of which has been allocated for violence prevention initiatives and 200,000 allocated for witness relocation services. That is an increase of 387,000 in the administrative division which was allocated for additional staff as well as a decrease of 960,000 as a result of transferring tree removal to Parks and Rec. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 5 In addition, there's a decrease of 73,000 in the animal control contract, 33,000 accounts for a decrease in the Mayor's Office of Sustainability. And overall, the fiscal year general fund budget is 23,376,000. That reflects a net increase of 326,000. Over the course of Fiscal Year 12, the Office of the Managing Director has undertaken a series of initiatives. Our office has been able to rework PhillyStat to measure and improve operations through our performance management. That has reported a substantial improvement in operational performance. We have also improved the service of our 3-1-1 call center, which I'm happy to report received its 4 millionth call this fiscal year and has consistently exceeded a 90 percent customer satisfaction rate. We have expanded ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 6 PhillyRising Rising, the Mayor's neighborhood initiative, to improve city services. We've gone from 4 neighborhoods, with a goal of being 5 inside of every police division, 6 to a goal of being in 20 neighborhoods 7 by the end of 2012. 8 In addition to those 9 efforts, with our Special Events and 10 Special Projects Division led by Jazelle Jones, we have organized literally dozens of efforts around special events, even protest parades, including the Occupy Philadelphia Protest which captivated much of our attention this past fall. My office also undersees -- overseas Global Philadelphia which is making government accessible for Philadelphians with limited English proficiency, an issue that is very important to me as you know as a -- as a Spanish speaker. We also undertook this year ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 7 an initiative and created the Animal Care Control Team taking animal control into the city at the request initially of City Counsel to make sure that our animals are treated better in the City of Philadelphia. My chief of staff has led this effort, and we created a City-related nonprofit that assumed animal control operations just this week on April 1st. We've also this year, working in concert with City Council, developed a vacant property strategy that centralizes property disposition and simplifies our land management policies. We're coordinating the Facilities Management Task Force chaired by Tom Knox, under the leadership of Bridget Collins Greenwald, to review City-owned property and assets to provide support to the Office of Public Safety, the police department, the courts, the ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 8 District Attorney's Office, in the development of GunStat. Mike Resnick is here. He's our partner around the GunStat issue. These are really critical to the Mayor as public safety initiatives, so we've worked to maintain service levels for programs such as Youth Violence Reduction and a Community Life Improvement Program, the CLIP Program, and Tommy Conway is here on that issue. The MDO is committed to serving our City's diverse constituency as represented by diversity within our department's contracts. 6 percent participation rate in Fiscal Year 12, up from percent from the 20 previous fiscal year.
21 The participation goal for 22 Fiscal Year '13 has been set at 25 23 percent. The largest contract that will be awarded in Fiscal Year '13 is ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 9 the animal control contract which provides for the comprehensive animal control and care services for the city. This is a renewable contract for the City-created nonprofit. In efforts to increase our DBE participation, the MDO and its divisions work with OEO for any number of our RFP's to ensure DBE participation. I also personally serve on the Economic Opportunity Cabinet that works to increase participation city-wide across departments. To exemplify this commitment internally, the MDO takes an active role in employing a diverse group of people, many of which you see behind me. Approximately 60 percent of the executive-level team in the MDO come from a minority background with 40 percent identifying as African-American, 20 percent ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 10 identifying as Hispanic. In relation to gender, our office equally -- is equally balanced with 50 percent of senior-level staff being women. And finally, to answer a previous question, I believe it was Councilman Kenyatta Johnson who mentioned and asked some questions during the five-year plan around the 1 million dollars that is set aside for violence prevention. We hope to award those dollars through a competitive RFP process building off of PhillyRising's philosophy of providing services and programs identified by communities. Our goal is to fund programs that directly engage individuals who are most impacted by violence in their own neighbors and organizations involved in specific -- specific successful nonviolence programs. These contracts will be ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 11 performance based. It should be built as a collaborative model. The provider community will be engaged in late April through the Mayor's community dialogue, and we hope an RFP will be issued shortly thereafter. That concludes my testimony. Thank you. And I'm happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Negrin. A couple of questions before I turn it over to the members. I'm going to start out on a light note. On page three of your testimony, you talk about the infamous animal control issue, and Mr. Abernathy, I -- I assume you anticipated a question about racoons. Now that you have been documented in the testimony as the person who is in control of this newly-formed entity, can you talk to me about what the policy is on raccoons in the budget ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 12 context?
Certainly. It -- there's two things: One, the racoons, if captured, must be destroyed by state law; two, but because of the limited resources that we -- that we do have in Animal Control, we do have a policy of not actively capturing raccoons that are walking down the street. If that raccoon is entering a property or damaging property, Animal Control will respond. And I -- I have made sure that that -- some calls have been responded to by Animal Control.
So if an individual such as the lady that was here during the testimony on the Bill's passage talked about the raccoon next door that was crawling through the wall and eventually entered her bathroom and she calls, the City will now respond, the newly formed entity, and capture the ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 13 raccoon?
Absolutely. If an animal is within the residence, Animal Control should respond. They should have responded at the time. And I believe that woman's issue was resolved shortly after that hearing.
Okay. So, now, is that only an occupied residence?
We do have a policy, that as a direct result of your legislation in that hearing, Animal Control will not entering into an abandoned building for safety reasons; likewise, L & I will not enter an abandoned --
For -- no. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 14 Rats is Vector Control which is a different issue, and they lay down poison. But because of raccoons, you actually have to -- to set traps to capture the -- they need to have access to the property. I'm working with Commissioner Burns. We have set up a process that when responding to a vacant property Animal Control will enter the premises allow L & I to make sure that both -- both the L & I inspectors, as well as the Animal Control -- the Animal Control officers are -- are equally protected.
Okay. So we do have at least an entity to respond to the numerous requests that I anticipate I'll be getting as we move out into the streets this spring.
And -- and again, Councilman, part of my answer is going to stay the same, and I ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 15 suspect that you're not going to be completely pleased with it.
Resources are -- are limited as well as our ability to deal with raccoons once they're captured. As I mentioned, by state law, raccoons have to be destroyed if they're -- if they're caught and trapped. Generally speaking, if a raccoon is not harming anyone or any property, Animal Control will not respond. Now, I certainly understand raccoons, we're not used to seeing them. We live in an urban environment, folks get scared and make assumptions about their -- their activities, but we haven't received any complaints or any reports of a raccoon attacking anyone or causing any harm to any -- any individual. So educating -- ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 16
So you're saying you haven't received -- you -- I probably should have cut it off a couple of minutes ago. So when you say you haven't received any reports, and I reference that Fox 29 report last year when the raccoon chased a little girl down the street, I don't think they had any reason to lie. So basically your testimony sounds as if you have to wait until somebody actually gets injured before you can say the raccoon is --
I need the state law to the change in order for me to start trapping raccoons on a regular basis. If we begin to trap raccoons, we jeopardize our dog ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 17 license and our animal control authority.
Councilman, one thing to take away there, and I think it's an important message for the folks, is that if there's a legitimate public safety concern and the raccoons are presented to a family, that they can call Animal Control and they will respond to that. Trapping a raccoon who is really walking in the middle of the street is a different scenario where they specifically create a public safety concern, people are not going to turn a blind eye to that.
All right. Whether or not it's of ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 18 concern, it's relative. I mean, the reality is if a person sees a pitbull walking down the middle of the street and that pitbull may not attack that individual, but from their prospective, that pitbull is dangerous just because of this whole notion. And similarly, people who aren't used to seeing raccoons walking down the middle of an urban street probably feel the same.
All right. I won't belabor that. I'll come back on that later. The PhillyRising collaborative, is how highly talented, highly-promoted program by the administration and, you know, I want to thank you all for selecting the Hartranft area for the initial kickoff --
ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 19 -- and it's done some good up in that neighbor particularly when you have good people. Officer Tajohn has been like a godsend up there. Question: In terms of the strategies, which this appears to be relatively short term, to go into a neighborhood and kind of stabilize things, you know, as it relates to crime and cleanliness, has there been any thought, or maybe you have talked about implementing a more longer term strategy because the reality is, in a lot of these neighborhoods you can come in and you can clean up some vacant lots and get the people engaged in, you know, graffiti removal and the whole nine yards, but the reality is there's a systemic problem as it relates to the properties and vacant land and that you don't have a longer term strategy, and then ultimately the next season you'll be right back to where you were. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 20 Is there some thought about, you know, maybe having City Planning and the Office of Housing or some of the other agencies that can bring us some more longer term resources to the table?
Yes. I can shed some light on that; in fact, the program in its mission, in and of itself, has never left Hartranft. So when myself and Everett Gilson and Mike Resnick and John Farrell who are in the room met around -- in my office talking about how we can create this program and make it sustainable over time, we wanted to distinguish it from programs in the past like, you know, the long-term programs, who went into an area with a lot of overtime, brought the level of quality of life up to a certain level, and then couldn't sustain that model because it was too expensive. So -- and what happens over ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 21 the long term is, when you eventually have to leave, slowly that neighbor starts to deteriorate and goes back to some of the areas where -- some the challenges that it had before. The beauty of the PhillyRising model is it's not putting a huge infusion of overtime or City dollars in a neighbor. It's a slower community-based incremental progress that stays, so we never leave. So we're in Hartranft today. There's a monthly meeting in Hartranft. There are ongoing efforts in Hartranft today. There are ongoing sustainable efforts in every PhillyRising neighborhood. So the model in, and of itself, is different for that reason, that when we tell folks that you have confidence in the City serves -- again, working with City Council. We just opened up a new PhillyRising hood -- neighborhood with ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 22 Councilwoman Tasco and -- and I wasn't there, but I heard she gave an intro that -- that was better than many of my PhillyRising folks about how affective this program could -- could be. The goal is to come into a neighborhood, identify the problems as they're identified by the folks in the community, engage and empower them, and then never leave. So even though a lot of the -- the sort of publicity and PR, and sort of a positive impact happens early on because you're actually bringing it up to certain a level, it dies down a little bit after that, but it doesn't mean we're not there. So one of our representatives is in that neighbor every single month.
Okay. I hear your response, but what I'm talking about is a little more detailed in terms of what resources ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 23 you bring to the table. As an example, in the Hart -- the earlier referenced Hartranft area, Ms. Bridges who is -- basically, she's been doing PhillyRising on her own for the last years -- 7
9 -- and didn't have all of the 10 appropriate resources. She was -- 11 one of her issues was, as you know, 12 we were trying to have an office, an 13 Hartranft building, and it was owned 14 by the School District, and they had 15 policies that prohibited a number of 16 people. If you ever had a record 30 17 years ago, you couldn't be in the 18 building, so she didn't have a base 19 of operation. She needed -- she was 20 trying to get a location where she can have an office to do great work and have some sort of symbol of this is where you come to move the neighborhood forth. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 24 So she approached the City, and the City put her through like 9 million pieces of red tape to get a vacant building that was owned by the City forever, and that's the kind of thing that, from a long-term prospective, and I'm getting engaged, which it's my responsibility but, you know, given that that was a focus that we could have longer support on those type of things, real tangible things, getting her that vacant building and putting her in a position to apply for grants so that facility can now be up and operating and be in a position to apply for a NAT contract. So now as we talk about the planning for Germantown Avenue, the infrastructure, and hopefully I think we're supposed to be getting some commercial corridor dollars, talking to the business people on the corridor to get them to sign the waiver sheets ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES to do the mural arts, I mean, those type of things, so you bring the quality of life, as you said, on a sustainable basis. So that's what I'm talking about.
The School District -- I mean, in a lot of these neighborhoods there are individuals who have records. They have a prohibition on anybody being in their building who had a record. I mean, I don't think that makes a lot of sense but, you know, it's their building and their rule. So as a result of that we lost a lot of people who were volunteering, and one in ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES particular, the guys that had the baseball team over there, so now they didn't have a place to have an office off hours but -- you know. So that's what I'm saying: If you have a longer term strategy, you know, somebody from BPRC, working with them, working with the Redevelopment Authority, working with OACD to start that process to develop, and then ultimately getting some additional development on the corridor and then subsequently some housing in the neighborhood, that kind of thing.
Yeah. A great idea. I'd be happy to look into that. I wasn't aware of her scenario. And as you know, we have limited --
I'm just saying generally. That's ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 27 just an example for me.
No. I've seen -- to your point, I've seen Diane Bridges holding court on her front step.
I'm happy to see if we can figure out a way to utilize either a vacant property or some other scenario, whether it's a community or a rec center, where she can do some of that work. I'm happy to look into that.
All right. Thank you. Real quick, on the tree removal, we're transferring that to Parks and Recs?
Will that enable us to do a better job? What -- talk to me about that.
The money ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 28 had always been managed by Parks and Recreation. For whatever reason, the money lived in our budget. This was purely administrative, and I would refer to Parks to actually answer the tree removal question if you had specific questions.
And one last question, and I promise I will turn it over to my colleagues. Vacant lots, are we seeing any changes, a decrease, an increase, the funding for vacant lot cleaning?
The CLIP has been maintained in its entirety. There's been no changes.
I don't have CLIP in my neighbor or did we change the name? Did we --
We changed -- we're still talking about the still vacant lot cleanup. Tom Conway's services will still be ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 29 provided at full. He has not received any -- any reduction or increase.
Yeah. Given -- given some of the cuts that our budget has, I was -- I was quite happy to see -- to see his levels maintained.
Councilman, you can ask Tommy directly, but I know there's a significant percentage of the work that he does that is in North Philadelphia as well, so I do believe he is doing a lot of work in your area.
Yeah. I mean, because unfortunately ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 30 we have the bulk of Vacant Lots hanging around out in North Philly all the time.
All right. Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Goode.
That's an interesting question. Directly from an operational prospective it's really seven. The administrative core and sort of key infrastructure departments, they're sort of a backbone of what we do as a city. So whether it's Public Property, whether it's Procurement, whether it's HR, whether it's 3-1-1, whether it's ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 31 Fleet, whether it's Records, those are -- all have a direct operational influence under -- under David Wilson within my office. And then I have sort of what the Mayor calls the T of responsibility which is -- which is sort of the influence across the coordinating part of my job around significant projects that sort of go across all other --
Is that more than anyone else? ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 32
Okay. How do those departments perform relating to diversity goals?
I was asking you specifically how each department performs. For instance, what's the best department?
Yeah. We'll get that for you. It's Public Property, which I want to say has --
You don't ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 33 know off the top of your head?
Well, I know Records has probably the highest overall performance goal which I think it was in excess of --
Of the departments you oversee which are the worst? You don't know off the top of your head?
Records is doing well. Public property is doing well. Fleet Management is doing well. The Commission of Technology is doing okay. Human Resources is not doing well. And Procurement, if you look at the city-wide buy in terms of supplies, services and equipment, is not necessarily doing well, and so they vary. But you don't know that ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 34 off the top of your head, right?
Okay. So what role do you play in making them better or worse in terms of meeting their diversity goals?
I play an important role. I mean, we talk about diversity importantly in my -- in my meetings. So when I have the administrative group meetings, which include the leaders of all of those meetings, we talk about our diversity goals.
So how often do you speak with department heads about diversity goals?
How often? We do it every time we have a PhillyStat session. So every single one of those departments comes and reports in front of me through PhillyStat ops, which is quarterly.
Is that ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 35 your only form of process?
It is not. So we have administrative meetings where I meet with the heads of those departments. We talk about our key diversity issues then. We track sort of how we're doing and have those conversations and talk about the emphasis.
How have you helped improve any department's performance?
Well, I -- I do it in a number of ways. First, I demonstrate and then --
Give me an example of a department; in fact, let's use the city-wide buy in terms of service, supplies and equipment. How have you helped improve that goal?
Well, it -- it -- Councilman, it's called leadership, right? So first I ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 36 demonstrate leadership in the area of those goals. I not only talk about the importance of those diversity goals, but I -- it's reflected inside of my department, inside of my staff, in how we conduct our business, then we identify it as a core value.
That's that's not really a direct answer. I'm asking: How do you move the needle in terms of the city-wide buy in making sure the diversity goals are met?
I'm going to ask him -- ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 37
Great. Well, first of all, we identified diversity participation as a core value within my office. So we talk about the fact that it's a core value, we talk about and monitor the actual score, at least, on a quarterly basis. We talk about it in PhillyStat Ops. You can see that on Channel 64. It's one of our priorities. One of the things I did this year which was different which we'd never done before is, we actually made recognition and provided awards around our core values. So diversity --
I'm asking specifically about the -- city-wide of services, supplies and equipment. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 38 How have you moved the needle on that in terms of creating great diversity? It's a direct question.
Procurement is going to do that. They're going to do it directly. I'm going to do it indirectly by setting a division, setting our priorities, establishing our core value --
So you have not done anything directly to impact diversity in terms of that city-wide buy?
Other than monitoring what they do on a day-to-day basis, which is their job, I provide the leadership.
What did they achieve last year, the last fiscal year, in terms of diversity, the participation rate?
Yeah. We can provide those numbers. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 39
I have the numbers right here. You don't have the numbers right here, but I have the numbers right here.
We have them if you want me to pull them up and -- and give them to you.
It's about percent. Is 10 percent a 10 good number or a bad number?
I don't think it's a good number. I think it can get a lot better.
Mr. Negrin, yesterday there was a -- I ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 40 think it was yesterday, there was a story in the paper about the 3-1-1 versus the 9-1-1 calls and emergency calls. I'm not going to get into the dispute on the numbers, but I guess just a general question: How do you see -- it does seem like the numbers are getting better and more people are calling nonemergency calls into 3-1-1. How do you see that number even getting better as far as like informing the public of when and how they should call 3-1-1 in certain cases?
Yeah. I think there's a few things that we can do. And I think, first of all, I -- I think it's a good story. We've made a lot of progress, right, so -- in the last two years without an advertising campaign of any kind. So when we started 3-1-1 we started off with a 4 million dollar budget. When -- when the economic ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 41 Tsunami hit the city, which you guys are all way too familiar with, we cut that budget in half, right, so we started with 2 million. That budget has never increased more than 2.6 million in the -- in the last three years. During that time the calls that went to 9-1-1 that should have gone to 3-1-1 have been cut in half. The numbers on that we report are still relatively small. So just this past year the number of calls that went to 9-1-1 that should have been to 3-1-1 there were only 2200. When you consider 2200 calls out of a million calls a year, we roughly estimate -- you know, average about a million calls a year. That's a pretty small percentage. I think one call is too many. And we're going to keep -- continue to push that. I think stories like yesterday that talk about the issue ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 42 and give us free media around 3-1-1 are an important part of that. That's why we talk about 3-1-1 on a regular basis. I think Rosetta Lu who is not here because -- because -- for personal reasons has done a phenomenal job of reaching out to the community directly through her neighborhood liaison program, but I'm not satisfied with the fact that everybody in Philadelphia is aware of calling 3-1-1. So I think it's a combination of the longer it's there the -- the ability that we have to get the word out. We've done some PSA's in the past. We're talking about doing more things like that with -- with Comcast and others to get the word out around 3-1-1. Part of the silver lining around the crises that we had last year around not just the hurricanes, the earthquake and occupy, is that ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 43 every time there's a situation where people are alert to the city and what's happening, we talk about and emphasis 3-1-1, and our calls go up like every time we have a press conference and we talk about 3-1-1. So that's part of the silver lining. So my hope is that in the future we'll be in a better financial position to do some advertising and get the word out --
The word out better. Okay. Thank you. I guess this one is for Mr. Abernathy. On the animal care and control, I have more of a general question than the President. How do you see, and I know it just -- you just took over on April 1st, so this might be a little unfair question -- how do you see this being better than what was there before just generally? What would you say your ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 44 goals are again?
Well, I -- I -- I think it should be -- we should be clear. We didn't -- we didn't create the Animal Care and Control Team because the PSCA was failing in it's duties.
The SPCA actually ran -- ran the animal shelter well over the last number of years after the initial transition.
You know, I think especially when Sue Crosby became president of the SPCA, she's now the executive director of Animal Care and Control, she's been able to provide some solid leadership in a place that we haven't had a -- had a lot of leadership. You know, the recent transition has gone very smoothly. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 45 The average shouldn't see any -- see any difference in the services that they received last week as they do this week, which is different than any transition over the last ten years. You know, we're talking four significant transitions in a 10-year time frame. I think the way we've structured this board is to make sure that it's sustainable. It's not -- it is City related, but it's not only City driven. It has a significant animal efficacy voice, but at the same time has a very clear mission to represent the City's interest which I think is -- we've swung the pendulum one way or the other for the last number of years. I think we're -- I think we're starting to find of sweet spot.
And I agree. I mean, it's been better over the last few years. You know, for a while, ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 46 probably disaster is not an unfair term, or close to it. But I appreciate that because, as you know, with Councilman Kelly leaving now I think I'm the unofficial guy here, so I know we'll be talking some more.
And I know sometimes as the -- your staff come in here, they march in here with a sense of sadness, but for a few seconds I'd like to talk about some of the great things that you have done, particularly in my district working with alleyways. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 47 I cannot tell you what the CLIP a/k/a Alley Clean Program has done for the quality of life of everyday citizens that don't understand the big issues of a multilayered government, but they dog on sure understand what it means to walk through a clean environment in the back of their homes even though it is a private alley, but it's a first responder public safety issue, so I want to say thank you for that. The other thing I want to say thank you for is how you handled Occupied. We could have gotten a black eye internationally, not just national, internationally, and it was a difficult multilayered issue dealing with issues of the First Amendment right to speak that you handled gracefully. And even though some of some the occupiers didn't handle it as gracefully, you maintained your poise. So i want to say those things ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 48 publicly on the record and say some of the things that you do well.
All right. So now let's shift to some of the things we need to do better.
Can I say something briefly? I want to say something briefly.
If I could say something briefly about the occupied piece because I think it's important, I think it was a credit to our entire city, not just the administration and City Council. I think obviously the police showed the greatest restraint I think. There -- there's a great picture that I received seen of three or four protesters standing about an inch away from an officer's face, you ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 49 know, and the restraint on the part of our officers I thought was extraordinary and the training. But also, as you know, I have a great team, and not only do we have daily calls around this, but I've had a phenomenal team led by our events folks and working in conjunction with the police and civic affairs to do a really great job on this issue. So thank you very much, and on behalf of all of them I'll say thank.
And so I appreciate that. There are a couple of issues I'd like to focus on, and I'll share my mic time with my colleagues unlike I did, Mr. President yesterday. I had a bone to pick but -- and it is thoroughly picked for me. First, and foremost, I want to say on the record that I am totally against and appalled by bandit ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 50 signs in the City of Philadelphia. They are a scourge that go from as far as the Far Northeast to the deepest part of South Philadelphia and seem to reflect themselves particularly in inactive neighbors, low-income neighbors, almost in a predatory fashion, like, we buy your house, we do -- we will -- we will do anything kind signs with a total disregard for the ability for us to catch them and enforce them if they have a phone number on them, and they have a location with them. It seems to me that we can put together a strategic way the bring them down. They are a public safety hazard. When you try to come up to a turn sign signal, you can often -- your eye can be districted by the multicolored signs that hide the actual traffic signs, speed signs, things that the Streets Department has. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 51 I want to say also for the record, Mr. President, I'm not for legalizing them. I'll say it three times, because that seems to be what -- you know what has come out of this. I want to say it again: I'm not for legalizing them, but I am for providing advertising space in a wider range of use that we've discussed in the Veterans 10, outdoor advertising and providing revenues for the City of Philadelphia. So what I'd like you to respond to is how we are going to start to aggressively deal with them? And if you would, for the record, tell us about that.
And thank you, Councilman. The bandit signs is not a problem the City can't solve on its one. I think that's become clear. We don't simply have the resources to tackle this issue on a product -- in a proactivity way, but ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 52 we do need to be doing a better job. And over the last six months we have developed a strategy that I think will put a significant dent in the bandit sign issue. First of all, there's no 7 reason for when our crews are already on the block either cleaning a vacant lot, sealing a house or sweeping the street, that they don't also take down bandit signs, and we will start -- we are starting to do that now. There's no reason for our sweep officer not to record and -- and take pictures of those signs so the citations can be -- can be issued. The struggle that -- the largest struggle we've had is being able to identify the folks who are putting up the signs. As you indicated, for the large -- for the most part, folks are putting up signs with phone numbers and phone numbers only. Being able to track down those ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 53 folks and where they live and an address has been challenging. Working with the Office of Administrative Review, we think that we'll be able to solve that issue, but we're going to need some resources to do that. We have reached out to some private entities, what, we're not to announce today but -- what those private entities are. They have agreed to provide today us some resources, and hopefully in the next two to three weeks we'll be ready for a formal announcement, and most certainly we'll include you on that.
We'd like to work with you on that. If we can find Bin Linden, it seems to me we can find some of these guys with these illegal signs. And I'm going to yield, and I'll go around on my second round on my next issue, Mr. President.
ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 54 Thank you, Councilman. Real quick, community service individuals who have been giving alternative sentencing for whatever, they currently perform work such as cleaning lots and graffiti removal, but I guess under the law they must be supervised by a City employee. So does that mean that technically, if authorized, slash, supevised, they can abate a nuisance?
We're going to have to get back to you on that, Councilman, specifically. If you're asking if they need to be -- if they can abate a nuisance without being supervised?
I'm saying, just being supervised. I mean, we will get to -- I want to ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 55 respond to the question that Councilman Jones raised when you said there was limited resources so --
We utilize them today. So if you look at our PhillyRising clean up if you look at our service events and our days that we do around service, we have a major cleanup day coming up.
But you'll see the folks out there with the vests on in the jumpsuits, and we utilize --
You know, it was period before when we had a lot of money and City workers used to do it. ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 56
So my question is: As it relates to the bandit signs, is that an activity that community service people could do?
In part, yeah. And we have -- we have spoken to community service folks. And again, this goes back to when we have -- when we have workers on the block, there's no reason that those workers shouldn't be pulling down signs at the same time. The question -- the question is going to be: Do we -- where is our priority; is our priority the vacant lot or is our priority the bandit signs and just being able to balance those priorities going forward. And I think to your point, there are going to be neighborhoods and circumstances that we need to prioritize the bandit signs, and I -- ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 57
Well, let me ask my last follow-up to that question. If you were in a position to receive additional community service -- and unfortunately, we have a lot of people that qualify for the program unfortunately -- we're looking at some other programs that could conceivable divert individuals into a community service program, the lady I don't want to say her today, but -- so if you received additional people that would qualify for the community service program, would you use them?
I think the answer to that is if -- if we're talking about doing those stand-alone projects, we are going to need an supervisor to supervise those folks. If we're able to incorporate those into part of an already existing ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 58 cleanup where we have supervision there and available, I think the answer is it's much easier to do it that way.
Is there a ratio, supervisor versus community service presence to be like one supervisor for every ten or twenty people?
So there is a ratio. All right. Okay. All right. I'm just -- just a thought. I'm trying to figure out, you know -- I mean, we have a lot of -- like I said, we're working on this other program to try to have a diversion process as it relates to some of --
Yeah. But from my prospective, I think it's a great point when you talk about when we go into an area and do a cleanup, whether ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 59 it's through PhillyRise or one of our other service areas, there's no reason why the bandit signs can't be part of the initiative about cleaning that neighborhood up.
So whether it's the folks that are doing community service or the volunteers in the community that we have in the community out there doing that, I think the bandit signs are, you know, fair game when we're doing that.
Yeah. Just tear them down while you're there. COUNCIL PRESIDNET CLARKE: Okay. Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Tasco.
My suggestion for getting those signs ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 60 down would be to -- when we have the cleanup on the 14th, one way, in addition to using the community service staff, that we should get some of the old-fashion heavy rakes -- you know the rakes?
-- and just pull them down. It doesn't take that much time. You don't have to stand there. Just rake them down. Call it a raking day and just take them down because we -- are they're all over my area, particularly the ones about if you want to sell your house. So that would save time and -- because you're concerned. Taking into consideration the time, first, I want to say thank you to the office for responding to the calls we make to you and to find a way also always responding to what we -- some of the problems that we have. The main concern that I have ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 61 is -- I have several. Logan. There needs to be a better coordination with entities who are contracted to cut the grass. I think the Horticultural Society does it. But what we end up with, we don't have anybody taking care of weeds, so you get all this growth and it becomes a safety issue for people who are getting off the bus on 9th Street or over on Wyoming Street. So we need -- because that area, I'm mean, we're still struggle trying to figure out what to do with the 34 acres of land. It is in a neighborhood that, you know, people deserve not to have that blight, and it should be controlled and it's on a major thoroughware -- thoroughfare, the Roosevelt Boulevard. So -- and we -- also for a moment, there were cameras to get people who were short dump -- short dumping. They stay a couple of minutes, and they go away. The areas ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 62 that the cops were surveilling, and we have a guy who comes up and the weekends, and he just spreads his tarp and he puts out junk to sale. He doesn't have a license. It's not a vending area. The police will come and they don't do anything. He doesn't have a license. He doesn't have a license and, then he shouldn't be there. So these are the complaints that we get. We have the Logan CDC that's working very hard of there to maintain that area, so we need better coordination of how you control the weeds and the shrubbery over there as we try and work to figure out what to do with that land. Okay? The other thing is the 3-1-1 reports which I read, I look at the 9th District and I see there's a large -- the most complaints I get are about abandoned cars, and we need to figure out how you better control that or ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 63 respond to that. It's always been a problem. When I first came into council in 1988, I introduced legislation to get rid of abandoned cars, so it's an ongoing problem, but it seems to be in the District a 7 major problem based on the charts that 8 I get from 3-1-1 in terms of the calls 9 that I get in my district. I also see that on the PhillyRising it does have -- come into 9th District in the Lawncrest District area. There is an effort by DA to open one of his --
Community offices. Is there a way you all could coordinate the services and maybe like PhillyRising, also use that site as their point of operation?
I'm not sure. I know the DA is looking to do that. I'm not sure exactly of the location ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 64 for where he's looking at and whether that lines up with where we are in Lawncrest, but I'd be happy to look at that because we coordinate and talk to the DA on a regular basis.
Okay. It's next to the library and the rec -- next to the rec center in a little complex. Yeah. I think there's a lot of City offices in that area.
The other thing is I don't see -- what are you going to do about Town Watch? I see that the Urban Coalition had the ELECTRONIC REPORTING STENOGRAPHIC AFFILIATES 65 contract and that is not in the budget this time. What's happening with Town Watch?
The Town Watch contract, we intend to provide Town Watch services and increase those services by, I believe, 200,000, but the contract and how it's run will be put out to bid.