It's been moved and properly seconded. All in favor indicate by saying aye. (Aye.)
STATED MEETING 63 4/21/2022 4/21/22 - STATED - 2ND READING Those opposed? (No response.)
The ayes have it, and that resolution is adopted.
And a resolution recognizing April 30th as Vietnamese Heritage and Freedom Flag Day as a Symbol of the Contributions of the Vietnamese-American Community in the City of Philadelphia, introduced today by Councilman Oh.
Thank you again. I move for the adoption of the resolution. (Duly seconded.)
It's been moved and properly seconded. All in favor indicate by saying aye. (Aye.)
STATED MEETING 64 4/21/2022 opposed? (No response.)
The ayes have it, and that resolution is adopted.
And with apologies, Mr. President, there are no other resolutions on the Final Passage Calendar.
That's okay, Mr. Decker. It is a rare occasion when you -- I'm not even going to call it a mistake. An oversight, sir. We're all human. Thank you. Okay. We're going to move to our speeches, but prior to recognizing members regarding speeches, I will note for the record at this time that we will use the Chat feature available in Microsoft Teams to allow members to signify that they wish to be recognized. In order to comply with the Sunshine Act, the Chat feature must only be used for this particular purpose. STATED MEETING 65 4/21/2022 said, are there any speeches on behalf of the minority? The Chair recognizes Councilman Oh.
Thank you very much, Council President. Councilmember Cindy Bass and I have chaired the Council's Special Committee on Child Separation, and that Committee has completed its report. The report will be published. We are hosting an event in Love Park tomorrow at 12:00 noon. That is to distribute the report, its findings and recommendations. In addition, Sheriff Bilal, member of the Committee, will be there, as well as Andrea Lawful Sanders of WURD 900, Simply Monica of The Heat 100, and Dr. George Fraser, as well as others. I want to make sure I don't miss anybody, but we will invite everyone who has an interest in this matter; that is, the findings and recommendations, to ensure that the state law is being STATED MEETING 66 4/21/2022 followed, that the procedures are being applied properly to protect children from abuse, from harm, and to ensure that families retain their integrity and that siblings are united. Thank you.
Thank you, Councilman. Speeches on behalf of the majority? The Chair recognizes Councilman Thomas.
Thank you, Council President. This week -- actually, these last couple weeks since we didn't have Council session has been really busy for us, specifically in the budget hearings that we've been in. And I know a lot of folks who view Council can't necessarily partake in all of the different budget conversations that we participated in, but I would say that we've done well over 24 hours of budget hearings thus far, and STATED MEETING 67 4/21/2022 And I just want to take a moment to just highlight some of the things that I know I've advocated for. One of the things that we talked about this week is just the idea of the City generating more revenue and pushing the Administration to find ways to generate revenue for the City without increasing taxes for people or the businesses, and we sent a number of memos to the Administration around recommendations that we feel like can help that. Councilman Jones and I have also talked to the School District, and that wasn't necessarily part of budget dialogue but just in preparation for the summertime to continue to push this idea of giving programs and organizations access to our spaces so we can have as many free programs as possible in the City of Philadelphia. We've also talked about elections and the importance of fully STATED MEETING 68 4/21/2022 relates to where we are right now and the important elections that we have in the future. And last, but not least, I just really wanted to put the emphasis on the infrastructure investment that we know we need to see. I had the opportunity to spend some time on Broad and Girard yesterday, and I had the opportunity to meet a woman named Mrs. Johnson, and I told Mrs. Johnson I would give her a shout-out, because she says she listens to Council every Thursday on WURD. So I wanted her to know that her community is one that we care about. It's the Mrs. Johnsons of the world that we're thinking about when we are fighting as it relates to budget advocacy, and it's imperative throughout all the different things that we're fighting for that we see capital investment in infrastructure. I've said it before and I'll say it again, 12 percent of our roads STATED MEETING 69 4/21/2022 80 percent of our motor vehicle accidents. Twelve percent of our roads produce 80 percent of our car accidents. So at the end of the day, we've been pushing the Administration to have that infrastructure investment in intersections like Broad and Girard in Council President's district or Red Lion Road and the Boulevard in Councilmember O'Neill's district. These are intersections that are crucial to the safety of the citizens of the City of Philadelphia. And we're going to continue to fight for these issues as well as a number of other issues throughout the course of our budget advocacy. So I just wanted to highlight those things, because I feel like they're really important. And I want to say thank you to all of my colleagues for all of your support as it relates to the fights that we've been a part of during this budget cycle. STATED MEETING 70 4/21/2022 you, Council President. I appreciate the leadership.
And I apologize for the background noise too. I want to go ahead and put that out there. I'm not going to ignore it and act like it wasn't there. I apologize.
Oh, it's okay. No problem. Thank you, Councilman. Thank you for your hard work. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Gilmore Richardson.
Thank you, Council President. Very quickly, I just wanted to thank all of you for voting in favor of the One Book, One Philadelphia resolution, which is a resolution that I introduce every year and have worked on since a staffer under former Councilmember Blondell Reynolds Brown, STATED MEETING 71 4/21/2022 author has a very special connection to our Philadelphia City Council and Councilmember Maria Quinones-Sanchez (connection issues) a winning book titled My Broken Language, which is a memoir by Quiara Alegria Hudes. My Broken Language is her musical memoir of searching for her own voice while coming of age in the 1980s and 1990s in Philadelphia while she's striving to become an artist and tell the stories of her family and of her community. So I wanted to first thank each and every one of you colleagues for supporting that resolution. Secondly, I just wanted to remind all of you to please continue to share the information regarding our Community Evening Resource Centers that are up and running. I had the opportunity to visit the Community Evening Resource Center at the Dixon House last night for the second time in STATED MEETING 72 4/21/2022 weeks. Dixon House is located at 1920 South 20th Street. They are open daily each and every day, including the weekends, from 7:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m., and the Community Evening Resource Center located at Community of Compassion CDC is located right at the corner of 62nd and Cedar. And so I ask that all of you colleagues please share that information so that we can encourage young people to come to the Community Evening Resource Centers, have a safe space to be, be able to receive resources, conflict resolution training, job training, service linkages. Last night the young people were partaking in a cooking class, which was just wonderful. They made cheesesteak egg rolls. That was so, so amazing. We had the opportunity to sit in the beanbags in their game room with the LED lights and the murals all over the walls with their Executive Director, Otis Bullock, and some of the other STATED MEETING 73 4/21/2022 yoga available for the young people on the first floor yesterday. So there's a lot of great activities happening at our Community Evening Resource Centers, and we need your help with getting the word out so we can get as many young people as possible to partake in this resource opportunity. We know that there's currently an RFP out for additional Community Evening Resource Centers, one in Central Division, Council President, which encompasses your area, and also for the Northwest Division, which encompasses the areas of my colleagues Councilmember Bass in the Eighth District and our Madam Majority Leader, Councilmember Parker, in the Ninth Council District. So I hope that you encourage your organizations to apply for those opportunities. It is our goal to have at least six Community Evening Resource Centers up and running by the end of this STATED MEETING 74 4/21/2022 not dismay. I've already put it out there that we must look at the Northeast as our sixth option as well. So the goal is to have coverage in every division of this city, have an opportunity full of resources available for our young people, and do all we can to provide them with a safe space every day 7:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. Thank you so much, Council President, and thank you, colleagues.
Thank you, Councilwoman. Thank you. Thank you for your continued good work on that very important issue. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Bass.
Thank you, Mr. President. I want to thank my colleague Councilwoman Katherine Gilmore Richardson for all of the work that she's doing, particularly around young people. STATED MEETING 75 4/21/2022 to just speak about a couple of things, and the first is, I wanted to echo the comments made earlier by my colleague Councilman David Oh about the rally that we're going to be having tomorrow in Love Park. We really want to encourage people to come out. And really this is a good news story, and it's a good news story because we've done a lot of work. Particularly Councilmember Oh, I have to say, has done an outstanding job on this particular issue and making sure that we spread the word about families being separated, and it's incredibly important that we make sure that we reunite families, and the work that has been done by this committee thus far I believe has made a significant dent in the amount of children who have been displaced. There has been a sharp decrease, as per the budget testimony from DHS, there has been a sharp decrease in the number of children who were taken STATED MEETING 76 4/21/2022 and put into other placement. So we count that as a victory, and I really want to again encourage folks to come on out so that we can keep those victories going. And, again, this is really good news for our young people. And speaking of good news for our young people, I'm just so excited. I have two other things that I wanted to just cover today, and the first is that I'm very proud to announce that last night I learned one of my staff members, Legislative Aide Jemille Duncan, was named as one of the prestigious Gates Scholars. So we have a Gates Scholar among our staff on Philadelphia City Council. Many of my colleagues are already acquainted with Jemille, who prior to joining my team had a wealth of experience in policy and legislative analysis and research, along with the development and crafting of legislation. STATED MEETING 77 4/21/2022 passion for work with other elected officials, including State Senator Sharif Street and City Councilman Bobby Henon. And not only that, Jemille is a published author, a fantastic writer, director of policy and research at UrbEd, and a member of the Philadelphia Police Department's Youth Advisory Commission. What many may not know is that Jemille is an 18-year-old senior at Multicultural Academy Charter High School here in Philadelphia. This Gates Scholarship award is particularly impressive because it is so competitive and highly selective, with a difficult and rigorous application process. It awards outstanding minority high school seniors from low-income households and selects just 300 students from across the entire country. The Gates Scholarship funds the full cost of awardees' college attendance that is not already covered by other STATED MEETING 78 4/21/2022 contributions. I cannot be more proud of this brilliant, dedicated member of the Bass team, and I hope you will all join me in wishing him the very best as he pursues pre-law studies at Swarthmore, where he will begin his journey towards becoming an attorney. We just want to wish him congratulations, and as I said, I'm just so incredibly proud. We should all be proud. This is a City Council staffer who is doing this work, and he's just fantastic. m. and at the end of our staff meeting, we say, have a nice day at school. So he's just a phenomenal young man. W. Henry School, which is in the Eighth Council District, will now be the President of Central High School, which is also in the Eighth Council District.
And what's particularly notable about that is that Katharine Davis will be the very first in the history of Central High School's history, she will be the very first African American to head the helm of one of our most prestigious schools here in the City of Philadelphia. And, again, she's just an outstanding young woman. W. Henry, and I wish her the very best, as I'm sure that we all do, as she moves to her next challenge and represents from the community. Thank you so much, Mr. President.
Thank you. That's awesome news. That's STATED MEETING 80 4/21/2022 fine, fine people. Appreciate it, Councilwoman.
Thank you, Council President. I also just want to thank both Councilmembers Gilmore Richardson and Bass for that great positive news, what's happening in our city, especially in reference to young people, the things that are happening at Dixon House as well as the new President, I think the 15th President of Central High School. I think she was a member of Class of 264. So definitely congratulations on that great news. I just want to bring both my colleagues and the listeners up to speed on an event that my staff is doing this Saturday, which is April 23rd, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. We will be having a STATED MEETING 81 4/21/2022 Feltonville Recreation Center, 221 East Wyoming Avenue. This is an activity that will have a number of resources for the community. We'll have the Philadelphia Bar Association Lawyer Referral Information Service as well as Community Legal Services, PECO, the City's Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services. We'll also be doing screening for people to sign up for colon cancer, which really does impact Black and Brown communities around the country. In addition, we'll be providing COVID-19 vaccinations as well. So, once again, that will be this Saturday from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. at the Feltonville Recreation Center, 221 East Wyoming Avenue. I hope all that are listening are able to attend and participate. Although we had some great positive news from Council, we are still STATED MEETING 82 4/21/2022 serious issues in our city. I think many of us may have read the recent State of the City report from Pew, and 70 percent of our City residents that were in that poll stated crime and gun violence is the number one issue in our city. And we know we don't need to have a poll to tell us this information. All of us in our day-to-day travels and talking with constituents know that crime and gun violence has been a major issue in our city. Recently Councilmember Jones and I had hearings in the Public Safety Committee regarding the work of ManUpPHL where Dr. Brian Ellis and Solomon Jones talked about how they listened to the streets and heard the issues and concerns from young men who have been impacted by this issue. So we know gun violence is the number one issue in our city, and I know I have personally in my speeches in Council have been critical of the STATED MEETING 83 4/21/2022 the urgency that we need to address gun violence in the most recent budget proposal by the Mayor. But at the same point, I do have to give credit when credit is due. When Commissioner Outlaw came to our body to talk about issues in reference to the police, residency was one of the major issues she cited in reference to the challenges we had with policing in the City of Philadelphia. So the fact that the Mayor went to the Civil Service Commission to have the residency requirement lifted, I have to give the Mayor credit for that. I want to credit the Mayor for following our leadership. This happened after both the Council President and I introduced legislation regarding the residency issue. So I want to thank the Mayor for following our leadership and addressing this urgency issue. And as we STATED MEETING 84 4/21/2022 this budget process, I hope the Mayor will continue to follow our leadership to address the urgency in our city, especially as it relates to public safety. Thank you, Council President.
Thank you, Councilman. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Parker.
What a great day, members of the City Council of Philadelphia. I want to stay on a very positive note. In September of 2019, pre-COVID, colleagues, you will remember that I introduced and it was our body that passed a $10 million transfer ordinance to establish, make permanent and citywide in our great City of Philadelphia the infrastructure needed to establish a program that we call PHLTCB, an acronym for Philadelphia Taking Care of Business. STATED MEETING 85 4/21/2022 started, Mr. President, as a pilot program at Broad and Olney, that since I arrived here as a member of this body in 2016, you know, every year in our budget ask we had requested dollars to get a pilot established, and as soon as those green shirts were up and running on Broad and Olney, the text messages and telephone calls started coming in saying that we like this here and we want to see it all over the City. We had already, Mr. President, in your district, remember, the orange shirts that were already moving in North Philadelphia, and now folks are working all over the City. And I am proud to announce that on tomorrow, all of our colleagues, Friday, April 22nd, from 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center located in Council President Clarke's district, 2101 Cecil B. Moore Avenue, will host a Philadelphia Taking Care of Business pep rally. It is going to include the 200 STATED MEETING 86 4/21/2022 are cleaning commercial corridors and putting trash together, and then there's been special teams from our Sanitation Department that go around to pick that trash up. But we are going to celebrate them, Mr. President, for their work. And for the benefit of the viewing public who are interested in knowing, well, what has this group done, they've collected 170,258 bags of trash, Mr. President. That's about over 14,000 dumpsters, an average of 652 bags of trash collected on a typical cleaning day, in addition to 200 cleaning ambassadors who are employed earning a minimum, a minimum of $15 an hour, getting professional development, OSHA 10 training and certification, digital improvement to their skill set, e-mail address using the internet. So I'm really proud of all of them, along with the women and minority owners who are part of this. So STATED MEETING 87 4/21/2022 you, and I hope you will join us tomorrow in the Council President's district to say thank you to the men and women who are working to make sure that we in Philadelphia rid ourselves of that Filthadelphia moniker. Thank you, Mr. President.
Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman. Yeah, a lot of trash. Thank you. That concludes our speeches on behalf of the minority and the majority. So with that, I would like to recognize Councilman Jones for a motion to adjourn.
Thank you, Mr. President. I move that Council stand adjourned until Thursday, April 28, 2022 at 10:00 a.m. (Duly seconded.)
Thank you. It has been moved and seconded that Council stand adjourned until Thursday, April 28, 2022, 10:00 a.m. STATED MEETING 88 4/21/2022 indicate by saying aye. (Aye.)
The ayes have it. The motion carries. Thank you all very much and, again, please be safe. Thank you all. Love you guys. ) STATED MEETING 89 4/21/2022 CERTIFICATE I HEREBY CERTIFY that the proceedings, evidence and objections are contained fully and accurately in the stenographic notes taken by me upon the foregoing matter, and that this is a true and correct transcript of same. MICHELE L.