The Partnership CDC is dedicated to addressing affordable housing, vacancy, neighborhood revitalization, and economic development in West Philadelphia. We accomplish our goals through 227 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 coordination with institutions, community groups, other CDCs, churches, government, public and private funding sources, contractors, professionals, and concerned citizens in the community. Our primary area is from 40th to 63rd Street, between Market Street and Baltimore Avenue. Since 1992 we have invested close to $35 million in housing and economic development projects in West Philadelphia. We are currently involved in projects that will provide more than forty-two rental units and twenty-seven home ownership units for first-time home buyers in our program area. The funding for these projects include HOME funds, Housing Rehabilitation Program funds, State and Federal funds, and funds provided by local and national foundations and corporations, most notably PECO Energy Company, Mercy Hospital, Fannie Mae Foundation, and the Lincoln National Foundation, just to name a few. 228 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 We are a certified housing counseling agency with the Office of Housing and Community Development. Additionally, we have become very involved in the city's efforts to educate the public regarding predatory lending practices. The Partnership CDC operates one of the largest Home Buyer's Clubs in the City of Philadelphia. In the program of economic development, the partnership CDC has created seventy-five new jobs through our affiliate company known as CORS. CORS provides painting, janitorial, and special services to businesses, other CDCs, institutions, and Business Improvement Districts, otherwise called Special Service Districts, throughout the greater Philadelphia region. CORS provides cleaning subcontracting services for the Mercy Special Service District -- that's in Councilwoman Blackwell's area -- the Frankford Special Service District which I think is in Councilman 229 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 DiCicco's area, if I'm right -- and Germantown Special Service Districts which is in Councilwoman Reed Miller's District. We will continue to work with our partners, with the Commerce Department, to increase economic activity across all Councilmanic Districts, through our CORS company. We believe that the impact of our programs has been positive for the City of Philadelphia. Much of our program's success is directly attributable to the support of OHCD, The Redevelopment Authority, City Commerce Department, and City Council, and in particular Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell. I want to take this opportunity to express our support for the following proposals before Council: Number one, we support the Administration's NTI initiative. Number two, we urge City Council to work with the Administration to resolve the outstanding issues surrounding the Initiative. 230 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Number three, we support full funding of the Initiative so that implementation can begin sooner rather than later. And number four, we support initiatives to remove redundancy and improve the efficiency of the City's redevelopment system. And number five, we support the funding proposed in the Initiative for critical predevelopment activities that will now move our projects, as well as probably hundreds of projects on the table, forward. Let me just say this about acquisition before I finish. There is a critical and immediate need to allocate funds for acquisition of vacant property now in the development pipeline. The Partnership CDC has fifty-three requests already submitted to the City for condemnation. Some of these requests were submitted more than three years ago. All the requests are made in conformance with the City Planning's Commission plan for West Philadelphia, to provide housing opportunities for low and moderate income 231 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 families.
This year the Partnership will produce twenty-seven units of housing for first-time home buyers through the HRP Program, mostly through the HRP Program. Of the twenty-seven, sixteen were acquired through the RDA. The remaining eleven were acquired on the private market, with acquisition costs wrapped in or reimbursable through the HRP program. Overall -- and this is probably the most important thing I'll say tonight -- we have over a hundred units for home ownership in the pipeline. And we requested one of the largest vacant rental properties, which represents a hundred units, for mixed income rental, and that's the Croydon at 49th and Locust. This collectively represents two hundred units which provides the kind of impact that we bring to the market. Just to add to that, for every dollar invested by the City in our organization, 232 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 we're able to produce four dollars. So, we're producing four dollars for every dollar invested by the City in our housing and economic development programs. NTI affords a unique opportunity to significantly impact and change the market, both now and in the future. Our request is inclusive of the Sansom Street Project at 44th and Sansom, the Mercy Home Ownership Initiative, which is a plan now underway to rehabilitate all vacants within a five-block radius of Mercy Hospital, which is located at 54th and Cedar Avenue, and of course the Croydon. 5 million for home ownership over the next three years, as well as a one-time grant of $3 million for the Croydon, plus acquisition cost. I could go on and on and on, Councilwoman and Madam Chair, and to the Council people, but time is of the essence, and I just would like to say this: I do not fully understand all the intricacies involved with NTI, and I doubt I'll 233 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 ever understand them. However, we know that once the City invests in CDCs or invests in private developers that can get the work done out on the street, that we can solidly begin to turn around markets that are now dormant. For example, if a house has not been sold on a block for ten years or twenty years, and the last sale was for $10,000, it's very hard to develop any equity on that block. We come in. We rehab a vacant house on that block, and we sell it for $50,000. Now the appraised value of those homes has now increased by $40,000, thereby creating wealth in the community. And that's what we can do. Based on the wealth that's now being created, shopping centers or retail services can be brought in, as we begin to do large impact projects that move people back into our neighborhoods. With that, I would like to end my comments. I want to thank you for the opportunity you've given me to speak today, and 234 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 I would like to take any questions if you have any at this time.
Thank you, Mr. Stoddart. And I would also like to thank you, as some may be aware and probably most not, we have the first Neighborhood Special Services District in West Philadelphia, too, where people don't pay. It's privately funded. We wanted to try to do our part to get some areas cleaned. And certainly Blane Stoddart and the CORS Company runs that program, and are also working on a program to expand it into other areas. So we thank you for your work also in that area, and the creative style and cooperative style that you continue to exhibit.
My name is Francis Vargas. I'm here today representing Asociacion 235 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 de Puertorriquenos en Marcha, otherwise known as APM. I'm providing testimony today regarding Bill Number 010694, in support of the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative and in support of community-based development activities, in particular neighborhood-based housing and economic development. APM is a social service agency which was founded thirty-one years ago to serve the needs of Philadelphia's Latino community. Today APM has grown into an organization which employs over two hundred local residents and serves both Latinos and non-Latinos citywide. In the past ten years APM has developed two hundred and twelve rental units for low income families, eight home ownership units for low-income, first-time home buyers and a shopping center, including a 40,000 square feet supermarket. Our development area is bounded by American Street to the east, 9th to the west, York to the north, and Berks to the south, and 236 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 extends down to Cecil B. Moore between 7th and 9th Street. I'm here today to testify that APM's work's not done. We need to continue to develop our neighborhood. And in order to accomplish this, we need the City of Philadelphia's support. We are currently working on a phase two of our commercial development, a fifty unit home ownership development, a thirty unit senior's development, a new headquarters site, and various smaller community development initiatives, including additional open space and gardening projects, community building, and ongoing housing counseling. Today our neighborhood and the City of Philadelphia are at a difficult time, as we struggle to find support for the work that needs to be continued. I'm here today to urge City Council and the Administration to resolve any outstanding issues between various bills that have been proposed, and support full funding so that implementation can begin as soon as 237 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 possible. The purpose of the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, as it is presented, is to support crucial predevelopment activities in our neighborhoods that include demolition, vacant lot cleanup and land assembly, in order to encourage development for the City of Philadelphia and make Philadelphia a better place to live for existing residents, as well as our newcomers. Now keep in mind, this is not an easy task, but at the neighborhood level, development has never been an easy task. This is an opportunity to streamline processes and allow community development corporations, as well as other outside developers, to concentrate on development and not bureaucracy and outdated processes. APM, as well as other CDCs collectively are eager to work with the Administration, City Council, and any key stakeholder, to address any obstacle to development. 238 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 The biggest area of concern today for APM is the ability to acquire and dispose of land to facilitate development. APM strongly supports NTI's goal of creating a land bank to streamline the City's acquisition and disposition processes. The consolidation of public land needs to be carried out at all levels, including vacant and blighted properties owned by the Philadelphia Housing Authority. A quicker process will allow CDCs to move quicker and take advantage of additional outside founding opportunities, in essence leveraging more outside funding with less funding from the City. Previous success by APM and other CDCs across the City can be attributed to the availability of acquisition funding to support the assembly of land in our development projects. Today there is an absolute critical need for new funding to support acquisition of land for future projects that are in the pipeline.
239 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Specifically there's a need for funding to be allocated to CDCs for assisted condemnation through the eminent domain process. An interim strategy to address the immediate need is also necessary, until funds become available from the bonds proceeds. In order to facilitate future development and for CDCs to have the ability to develop our projects in the pipeline, I urge this committee to amend the bond ordinance to remove the requirement of City Council approval of the land bank, prior to the expenditure of NTI funds for acquisition. While details of the land bank still need to be worked out, the need in our communities grow, and we are at the risk of losing precious outside development funding and opportunities for projects in the pipeline. NTI is embarking on a very difficult task: One that requires coordination and compromise at all levels. As we struggle to iron out details of the bill and pass a new initiative, the implementation becomes crucial. The key to 240 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 making this initiative work and our efforts being capitalized is the continued use of CDCs as the delivery vehicle. APM is mission driven and community led, and our track record shows that APM has the capacity to carry out successful development activities, but only with the City of Philadelphia's support. My testimony here today basically outlines the need for additional funding, support and emphasis for neighborhood based development activity, including housing and economic development, and includes predevelopment activities and the restructuring of the City's system of support for developers, both non profit as well as for profit. I also wanted to reiterate the need to move quickly to compromise and amend the bill 20 as necessary, so that process can be streamlined and we can continue to redevelop our neighborhoods. I want to thank you for all of your time, and I hope that we can continue to strive towards improving the quality of life in 241 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 neighborhoods. Our work's clearly not done. Once again, thank you for your time, and I'd like to take any questions, if there are any.
Thank you, Mr. Vargas. The issue with regard to the land bank was deleted.
So that issue was resolved. Thank you very much. Are there any questions? (No questions)
Thank God, no. Therefore, we thank you again for your patience. Next, Nora Lichtash, Women's Revitalization Project; Judith Robinson, Homeowners Association of North Philadelphia; and Franklin Coalition. After that we will have the final panel before we have further discussion. And the final panel will be Blaine Bonham, 242 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Horticultural Society; Joanne Jackson, my friend; Advocate, CDC; Ruth Birchett, Heritage Community Economic Development Corporation. If there was someone else here who would like to testify, please let me know. If you come to the side, we'll have our attorney, Doris Bovay, take your name. Otherwise, I will assume all who want to testify have been recognized or each individual has had his or her name announced. Thank you very much. Thank you for your patience. Please identify yourself and begin. Thank you, Nora.
You're welcome. My name is Nora Lichtash. And can you hear me all right? Am I speaking loudly enough? 243 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
Move closer? Thanks. I work with the Women's Community Revitalization Project. And I'm also here today to represent the Philadelphia Affordable Housing Coalition. The issues that we've been talking about, that you all have been talking about, are so critical. Much of what's called blight in Philadelphia is actually housing, places where people live and try to raise their kids. It's dilapidated, vermin-infested, coated by harmful lead dust, freezing in the winter, really hot in the summer, vulnerable to fire, and even collapse, often very crowded but very cheap. The Philadelphia Affordable Housing Coalition is committed to increasing resources for affordable housing in the City of Philly. We're advocating for housing resources that are permanent, decent and accessible, and are truly affordable for the 244 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 poorest households. I'm here today to tell you that we simply have to make the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative work, and make it an opportunity rather than a gamble, for the whole City, not just for new residents we want to attract, but also for those of us who have stayed, including the City's poorest residents. We want to share with you the ideas we have for making it happen. As it stands, creating affordable housing is not a priority objective of NTI, but we believe that it has to be because NTI seems likely to be the City's housing policy for the next five years. But first, I want to thank the Mayor for thinking of this NTI thing, because we think it's really an important thing, and we want to thank Council. We especially want to thank Council for making the process more open and more thoughtful, and we hope as NTI is implemented, it continues. Mainly what I wanted to talk about today was the need for affordable housing, and I 245 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 think you know it, Jannie, so . . .
We know that there's also a need for the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, and that it's been long overdue, a lot of the work. Clearly, a strong real estate market has a lot to offer the City, but one thing it won't do . . Are you going to listen to me? One thing that it won't do, it will never do, is create one home that a low-income family can afford. It's been decades since the private market has developed housing affordable for poor residents in the City, in this city or any other city. During those decades, tens of thousands of homes have been lost, now just vacant lots or gutted shells awaiting the bulldozer. To get the sense of the numbers that we're talking about, based on the most recent census data, one in every three 246 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 households in the City earns $20,000 or less. This translates into about a half a million people. One out of every six households is paying too much for housing. And the folks that are paying too much for housing often have to make hard decisions about whether to pay their fuel bills, buy the food that they need, or just have enough money to pay their rent. As you know, NTI proposes to create 16,000 units of housing over the next five years, and sets aside 3,500 for low-income elderly and people with special needs. To date, the City's housing programs have had a very broad definition of what's called affordable. Much of the housing that the City has subsidized has been targeted at what many of us would consider more moderate income families. In NTI so much of the focus is on producing housing for higher income households, that it seems only fair or equitable to demand that those 3,500 units should truly be affordable for the poorest households. 247 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 It's also essential that these 3,500 units make a difference for the disabled Philadelphians. So, at least fifteen percent of these units must be made accessible. We have seen other questions that are raised by NTI, so we would ask you: How many people in your District will have to pay increased property taxes because of NTI? What resources will be made available to the families in your District to be displaced by demolition and where will they go? Finally, wouldn't it be a good policy to have a clear, well-defined program plan to monitor and report on the progress of NTI? Don't you want input from the people facing the greatest impact of NTI? Don't you want to know how much you spent in your District and for what? The Philadelphia Affordable Housing Coalition proposes to support Council in answering these questions, if you want help. The primary goal of the blight plan 248 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 is to increase property values and tax revenues, but as property taxes go up, people in the neighborhood who are on a fixed income or low income won't be able to afford their taxes, and we don't want to see them have to leave the neighborhood. We think that families move to make way for demolition must get decent, affordable replacement housing, and that they have a right to return to their neighborhood where their schools and their churches are. The Affordable Housing Coalition believes that accountability and citizen participation will be the key to real neighborhood transformation. We believe that leaders in the neighborhood facing the greatest impact and their representatives in City Council must have a role in shaping NTI programs and in keeping the program on track. To this end, we are suggesting a kind of alternative to the Project Review Team, which would propose the creation of a neighborhood transformation oversight committee. 249 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 The committee could be composed of City Council members, neighborhood leaders, and community development experts. And it should receive reports on NTI progress, which should include production levels by District, income level, size and source of government subsidy.
We have identified a number of things we think you might need some information on. And it should be used to monitor and evaluate program activity and make recommendations for program improvement. So our Coalition has more details about this, in the form of draft amendments, and be happy to share them with you.
All righty. We'll move right along. You have a question, Councilman 250 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Nutter? Councilman Cohen has a comment.
Emphasis on the very poor and the most needy and most disabled; it's been a long time since political parties talked that way. Today the occasion is to talk about working families. For some reason talking about poor people, disabled people, people who really need government assistance in order to be able to live a decent life, that kind of talk is -- I congratulate you. I think that's where the major emphasis has got to be, on that part of society that has least and needs most. So thank you for your emphasis and your continued work. I've seen it. You may not remember, but a number of years ago my wife and I visited a number of buildings that --
-- your group was working on. And you're a tremendous asset to the City of Philadelphia. Thank you, Madam Chair. 251 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple of quick questions. Ms. Lichtash, I took from your testimony . . . A number of times you made reference to getting or gathering or receiving a wide variety of information and being able to report back to community people what was going on with NTI on both a . . . maybe what you would call a realtime basis, as well as a bit of historical basis, with community input or community advice. Can you talk a little bit more about what some of those ideas are?
Yeah. Since listening to the Administration and the testimony, as far as some of this may be in the works, but based on the constituency that I work with, we have not been involved in any kind of planning or understanding exactly how it's going to affect people in the neighborhood. And what we have done is gone out in the community and had community meetings, 252 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 asking people what their housing needs are, and what the needs are in the community, and why they stay, and why they love their communities. And I think people are very interested in that information. I think that neighborhood residents don't have interests that are that different than Council District reps, and many of the rest of us in the City. And I think they have a right to be involved and affect policy.
Do you have some suggestions as to how we might be able to accomplish that or who should be involved in something like that? Is it a system of neighborhood people working with either their local representative or the Council body as a whole, in some kind of advisory fashion? I mean, is that what you're talking about?
Well, I think one issue is that it can't slow down the process but it has to have teeth.
So a suggestion 253 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 would be that there would be Council members from Council Districts, as well as representatives and neighborhood leadership, maybe representatives from nonprofit housing developers, as well as for-profit housing developers, that get reported to quarterly, and understand these reports. And that out of that comes maybe one neighborhood meeting a year in the community, that reports to the community and the community gets to report back. And also that there be some, you know, some tracking along the way of: Did what we said was going to happen, did it really happen; and if not, what needs to be done; and some input from other folks.
Okay. All right. I will, I guess, kind of take both your testimony and some of the discussion that we have had, when the record is completed, and see if we might be able to put something like that together.
Thank you. 254 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
Thank you for your patience. I know you've been here all day, too.
Good evening. My name is Ed Franklin. I first want to say that I appreciate your effort in staying here these many days or so, and that your power of being a good person has been recognized in areas that you have no idea about. I am not here representing our organization. For the first time in 35 years I have to make this statement: My momma sent me; you understand?
She knows what you've been doing in the areas. Mother Jones sends her -- 255 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
-- blessings to you. And your influence has been from the small point where my brother, Calvin Franklin, in the block across the street from the playground, around 52nd and Spruce, I believe it is, you helped him to get some things together, to a larger point that I was able to go to the University of Pennsylvania two days ago and was totally surprised when they said to me: Look, we have put this thing together. Councilman Blackwell has helped us. We're going to help your organization. Forget about a lot of the traps that you usually go through. And we're going to help you go through an a, b, c plan of working with, in this case, Temple University, to try to do the same thing that was done at the University of Pennsylvania. Now, three years ago I could not get that cooperation from the University of Pennsylvania, and I was beating up Fannie Mae trying to get the information. But because of the influence that 256 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 you have put in there, that, look we're doing this together for the betterment of the whole community, that the University doesn't survive unless the community survives . . .
. . . they want to share that information with other folks. And I just want you to know that that's really working out there.
I'm here to say, I appreciate you, Councilman Clarke and also Councilman Miller, being here because they represent both sides of the community that I work with in the Target Nicetown Section of the City, and to say first and foremost, we are in a hundred percent support of the issue of the $250 million for the bond issue. I was on a recent tour with 257 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Councilwoman Miller and Mayor Street, and I actually seen folks crying in the happiness of the commitment that the Mayor said when he got to -- I believe it was around 20th and Butler. And there was a facility there, a group of houses that had been there over twenty-five years abandoned, and he made a commitment to them that they would start coming down. And he came back about ten days later and those buildings were coming down. And he was impressed, and the people were impressed. And those kinds of things are needed in this community. So, I'm a hundred percent for that, and although I have two reservations that I'd like to bring out also. Twenty-five years ago, we were part of blight one or the urban . . . the urban . . . I believe it's called the urban . . . Anyway, it was the first set, when the Redevelopment Authority came to knock out --
That they came to knock out approximately seventy-five houses in our community, in the objective of rehabilitating something. I'm sad to say that to this point fifty-five of those parcels are still there waiting to be rehabilitated. So I need to make sure that something goes along with this mass demolition. We have a significant amount of houses in that area with great architectural styles and structures. And I'll speak to that later on. But there's a lot of cases where we don't want demolition in our area. We want encapsulation, which is also part of the plan, and we want preservation. We have a significant amount of 259 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 seniors that are in our area, to the tune that my average board member is over sixty-five years old, and we need to assist them in maintaining those houses so they won't join the ranks of those houses that will be need to be demolished. I don't have a prepared testimony, but I do have some information that I'd like to share, and to introduce to City Council a specific new word, and that word is deconstruction. Unfortunately, it's not being used a lot in this particular area. The difference between demolition and deconstruction is the taking down of the building, with the intent to utilize some of the other parts in the building in the future use. My mother lives in the 2900 block of 25th Street, and there's a house that was recently demolished in that area. And there's another house that has fire damage. Her simple question is why you can't take some of those beams out of that house and put it in the beams in that house, and it will be much cheaper to rehabilitate the house. And that's basically what the 260 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 deconstruction is all about, utilizing some of the resources that are already currently in these houses, and put into those houses that we intend to rehabilitate, cut the cost anywhere from to 40 percent. 7 I have for you here some web pages, 8 through HUD and others, that I'd like to share 9 with you, that demonstrates -- I think it's over 10 a thousand pages on the web, that talks about 11 deconstruction versus demolition. 12 And it's a clear case that if we 13 utilize that, we can significantly reduce the 14 cost. There are several companies that are 15 doing that now. 16 The average company that does 17 demolishing a project does not just take all of 18 the material and threw it away. They take all 19 of the usable parts that's necessary and they 20 save those for use in the other communities or 21 in other facilities and only throw the other 22 material away. 23 This can decrease our cost of the 24 material that we put into landfill, decrease the 25 cost that the contractor has to pay or the fee 261 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 to pay for that landfill, and increase our opportunity for housing in that area. And that's the experience that I'd like for you to look at, as well as put something significantly in the bi-issue writings that allows community development corporations to be a part of the deconstruction of some of the houses and add some other cottage industries. For example, if there are doors and windows and other salvageable things in there, we can start an industry with we re-strip those doors and allow them to use them in there. A solid core door, which most of the houses in our neighborhood have, is a much more expensive door than a Luan door that they're putting up in these new houses. And we're able to take those solid core doors out, strip them, and restain them. We can sell them, a, for a lesser cost; and then, b, provide some additional job opportunities for many people, if we look at, again, deconstruction versus demolition. There are a lot of persons that can benefit those. 262 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 You can use less trained persons so we don't have to pay them $20, $30 an hour. We can pay a person $10 an hour and be comfortable and distribute.
It's not a significant cost to that because we have forty percent of the demolition's going to be taken down by hand anyway. So if we allow part of that forty percent to be utilized by community organizations and CDCs, we can significantly decrease the cost. The most folks holler is that the liability is a concern. But just like contractors get liability, the community organizations can get liability insurance also in these areas. So I'm urging, the number one thing for I'm here to say is, to look at deconstruction versus demolition, and allow the community organizations and the CDCs in the community to have a written -- not verbal, but a written -- agreement to have a significant part in the demolition of the Tyler-Nicetown, as well 263 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 as the rest of the City of Philadelphia. Thank you.
Good evening. Thank you also. I know you've been here all day. One moment, please, before you begin. Councilman Cohen, did you want to have a statement?
I just wanted to raise one question. Have you been involved in any of the actual working together, say, with the Building Trades Union, in an effort to increase the skills of neighborhood folk? Is that any part of the kind of work you do?
Absolutely. It's a significant part of it. There's a program called DAP, the Diversified Apprenticeship Program.
What has been your experience with the building trades?
The building trades 264 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 persons are part of the people who are training the individuals, in that to, first, get the basic information, like their GEDs and driver's license and those particular things, and then train them to be able to get into the unions. So, it's approximately a hundred people in that process right now, but we've taken folks that are off the street, with no 10 skills, and training them to be in unions. We have several that are contractors now that four and five years ago I sent them to the program to get training to actually be able to get their apprenticeship program. They started off at nine dollars an hour. And one of the projects that we have in our area where we told the developer: In order for you to start this, we want you to take on some of our community persons for at least six months. After that, they went from the six months into the union apprenticeship program. So that works very well in the communities in this area. 265 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
And would it be your feeling that, based upon your experiences, that continued effort in that direction would be worthwhile?
Oh, absolutely. We contact all the trades every year. Each of them gives us information about when their unions are open; the tests, what we need to do. And we send about twenty-five to thirty -- at least for the Tyler-Nicetown Area, we send about twenty-five to thirty people in to take the tests from the various trades every year. And we have had a successful relationship with those. They are actually encouraging because a lot of the trades have members who are mature, shall we say, and are needing more younger workers to come in. So we don't find what we found fifteen, twenty years ago, of the resistance to getting into the trades.
Could you estimate, based upon your experience, about how many additional actual union members have been 266 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 developed in the area in which you work?
In a recent call, as early as the 1st of December, none of the trades said to us that they were closed. All of the trades said they will be open and taking on additional persons, from pipefitters to electricians, to plumbers, or so. So all of the trades are saying that they're open. And with that program, it is my understanding that working with -- I believe it's the Carpenters Union, that they also are a part of this program. So, it is clear that there is both a need, with the increased construction coming on, with the stadiums and other, there's a need for other young union workers coming in.
Good evening. 267 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
My name is Judith Robinson, and I am a licensed real estate broker. I've been in the real estate business nearly twenty years. I've been owner of Complete Real Estate Service for ten years. But I'm here today in a two-fold capacity. But I want to give you that background of my professional experience. But I am a lifelong resident of North Philadelphia. I want to first say that the six neighborhood identifications, terms that are being used by the Administration, are not terms that are used in the real estate industry. I sell homes all over Pennsylvania, from Exton, $200,000 homes, to maybe a $1,000 home in North Philadelphia. " The choice of a home buyer is the choice based on the things that are important to 268 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 them. So, these terms are not terms that are used in real estate. I've never heard them before. So I just want to really be clear on that. I contend there must be a plan before $250 million is borrowed in the name of bright removal. I read, Madam President, your bill; and I also read the bill that came from my Councilman. I read all of them very, very thoroughly. I love the controls in your bill, because being a lifelong resident of North Philadelphia, as the gentleman here beside me said, I've lived through Model Cities Program, the Urban Renewal Program, most recently the Empowerment Zone deal, and now the Neighborhood Transformation. As much as I would like to have any neighborhood anywhere -- Because of my background in selling real estate, I would like to have any neighborhood revitalized. However, I am very, very concerned 269 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 that the people in the area where it's most blighted will not have any input. Over the past two years I have been to at least about fifteen NTI meetings throughout the neighborhood. Most recently I was at the Building Industry Association's conference. And I've listened very intently to everything that has been stated. I've seen so many power points, I could probably give one myself. And I still don't see the connect between $250 million and what needs to be done to truly transform our community. The Mayor, being the former Councilman for the Fifth District in North Philadelphia, where most of this blight exists, begs for a plan. And there are plans. There are plans. I have read so many plans, community plans. You got the North Philadelphia Plan that was back in former Mayor Wilson Goode's Administration; the Home Ownership Plan. I found one plan in my collection, a Vacant Land 270 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 in Philadelphia Plan, a plan that was done in June of 1995 by the Planning Commission. Okay? That was done in 1985, but then it referenced some other plans that was done in '86, and it said some of the same things that we're talking about now. So I hope you all can understand some of my cynicisms, because I'm living through this. And with the Mayor being my former Councilman, to be honest -- not to be disrespectful to the Mayor, but I found out about community block development grants from him twenty-five years ago. And when I gave him my vote, I thought he was coming down here, twenty-five or nearly twenty years ago, to deal with some of this. So here we are nearly twenty years later talking about transforming something. I see all these plans. And I've been constantly asking, at least over the past eight years, at all these hearings, OHCD hearings, wow, you all got some great plans 271 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 here. How come none of them are being implemented? That was always my question. And they sort of looked at me a little puzzled, like, what is she talking about? But I had read the plans, and I couldn't understand why there was some disconnect. Why weren't these things, the great ideas, being implemented? Especially from someone like my former Councilman, now the Mayor, who we always were talking about housing in the community meetings.
As I looked at some of the things that need to be dealt with, Licenses and Inspection, which I really didn't see any kind of change in the way they do business. As I look at the Housing Agency Reorganization Project, I was looking for maybe something to be done about the way Licenses and Inspection handles their business. First of all, Licenses and Inspection has not been enforcing all of their codes over a long period of time. So, if nothing has been done to 272 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 change the way Licenses and Inspection is doing their job, all of this transformation that we're talking about, I think, is kind of going to be a little null and void because the same things that are going on are not going to be dealt with. When a neighbor has a tree encroaching a neighbor's property, Licenses and Inspection will go out and cite them. They don't follow up. At some point, according to documents that I've seen here in this Council, Licenses and Inspection is supposed to, after a period of time, abate the problem. Licenses and Inspection rarely abates any of these problems. So abatement is nonexistent, is an area that really concerns me. As we talk about demolishing things, if Licenses and Inspection would deal with enforcement and then abatement on some of these properties that they're talking about demolishing, I think we would have no problem finding people to fill them because we have a waiting list for every housing agency for sale 273 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 and for rental. So I'm concerned about the level or the amount of money that's being spent or proposed to being spent for demolition. As this gentleman next to me talked about deconstruction, that's a very great concept, because some of the properties that Licenses and Inspection are proposing to demolish could be partially demolished and rebuilt, probably using some of these used materials that will be left over from some of the properties that are imminently --
-- imminently dangerous is what I want to say. Thank you. There needs to be a more concrete plan about what is imminently dangerous and what is just a vacancy and an eyesore. What I do sometimes is kind of backtrack from some things that have been done. And in my neighborhood, I am requesting that some standards be set, because we do know we have a lot of vacancy, a lot of abandonment. But we also have a lot of blocks 274 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 where there's strong home ownership. They're solid blocks, for the most part. Neighbors try to do the best they can to maintain it. And they only have one or two properties on it. So when I backtrack -- I'll give you a property. The 1300 block of 28th street. It's one of those blocks that's fairly solid. There's a fire department on one end of the block. There's a church anchoring the other end. And this is a pretty good North Philadelphia block, pretty clean, etc. One day I saw a dumpster in front of this house, 1314 North 28th. So I begin to watch it. I thought maybe they were rehabilitating it, because most of the block was intact. Well, I came back about a week later, and they were tearing down this property. Now, I forgot to say that I went in there partially, just to kind of look at the general condition, because I sell real estate. We do home inspections. I kind of have an idea of how bad a property is. So, I was concerned that it was 275 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 being demolished. So I backtracked. I went to Licenses and Inspection. I said, "Give me the violations on that property." Now, I'm expecting to "imminently dangerous," right? I go back. The code for "imminently dangerous" and where it has to be demolished is 308, PM308. Well, all I could find was up to 307, PM307. And what it said is that the roof needed to be repaired, and that the drainage system needed to be repaired. So, I called all around Licenses and Inspection livid, saying, "Well, why was this property torn down?" Licenses and Inspection did not have any record of imminently dangerous documents for this particular property. I contend that on some of our mostly intact blocks, that are strong and stable, properties are being torn down unnecessarily, and there's no documentation in Licenses and Inspection records that the property is imminently dangerous. So I would at least expect that 276 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Licenses and Inspection process could be changed to where we can at least, as citizens, get a document that says this property is imminently dangerous, find out what is the reason that it's considered imminently dangerous. And that should just be available to the public, because there may be, depending on what the condition is, there may be some contractor that would be willing to take that property over, do that repair, and put that property back on the market. I deal with a lot of investors that do just that. So I know there is a market. There is capacity to do it, and it can be done. So I'm really very, very much concerned that Licenses and Inspection was not addressed, as they talked about reorganizing and restructuring housing agencies. Licenses and Inspection was not even addressed at all there.
Excuse me. Was that the only house on the block that was demolished?
There was one other, and I didn't go back to find out what those 277 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 violations were. But this block is so nice for a North Philadelphia block -- and for any area, for that matter -- that I was a little concerned that that other property had been demolished, and a fence was put up. There has been over the past eight years this almost like a rule, that they wanted to reduce density, which is okay. But to come into a block that is mostly intact and tear into our blocks like that, without any kind of respect for the homeowners that live there, and their capacity to be able to finance, or without any concern about what an appraiser would think, and they would try and get a home equity loan or somebody was trying to sell their home . . There is no information about this Administration talking to, for instance, mortgage companies, banks, appraisers, and people that make decisions about whether they would loan money on blocks. For me selling real estate, I know if I go to a mortgage company they'll ask me how 278 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 many abandoned houses are on the block, how many vacant lots, because they count them and determine whether they will loan money on those blocks. So a block that's mostly intact and mostly well maintained, we must definitely take much precautions to make sure that we don't, without regard, tear down these properties without them being definitely imminently dangerous and in need of being demolished. Let me move on because I have some other things I wanted to talk to you about about our neighborhoods. , can be dealt with. Madam President, I heard you yesterday talk about taxes. They're allowed to be delinquent for so long a period of time. I, too, am frustrated about that. That's the reason why some of these properties 279 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 are demolished or abandoned and later to be demolished. The City goes too long before they do anything about delinquency. In addition, City-owned properties have long been abandoned before private people moved out of their properties. I have a photograph here I would like to show to you all. This gentleman just said he knew which block I was talking about. He's absolutely right. It is a good block. In that photograph, right in the middle you'll see an outline of Center City. But all of these other pictures all around it are North Philadelphia. And I just want to point out some of the things that concern me, because we're pretty close to Center City, too. We can see that beautiful vision of Center City. But if you look at the top photograph there, of a relatively newer-looking facade there, that's a PHA house. And I want to talk a little bit about PHA because PHA has 280 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 really contributed a lot to the blight in our community. That property there was renovated within the last year: Total new facade, brand new windows, the whole bit. Totally done over. And it's about the second time it was done over. It's on Susquehanna Avenue. But after it was completed, the first floor had the boards on the window, and the tenant was on the second floor. Recently the tenant moved out. Now it's totally blighted. So I want to know, how is this Administration going to reign PHA in, with all those dollars and their bad management, and their strange use of rehabilitating properties over and over again, to the tune, I'm sure, of millions of dollars over a period of time, and after that the tenant is moved out and the property is left vacant. There's a substantial group of properties that are PHA owned in our community that have facade treatment done, total rehab done, and they are now vacant. 281 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 That needs to be addressed because those properties are going to be considered among the ones that supposedly need to be demolished. I think that's such a waste of money.
I didn't hear anything about specifics of how the Administration plans to restructure or to deal with PHA in this whole restructuring of housing agencies. The property next door to that is a old property that was demolished, but I want to show you . . I believe you have a photograph over there with some new construction. One side is the property that was demolished. The other side is what PHA is putting back up. You can see a fire wall, what they propose as being a fire wall, that is very thin. Now I know some of the people on Council are people who have background in the trade industry. I just am wondering: Is that the code now, where where they're allowed to have a wall that thin? 282 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 I'm really concerned about all these issues, because we're running ahead talking about transforming -- give me $250 million, but in North Philadelphia we see very strange things happening with the money that's on the table already. So we're very concerned that if you give this $250 million up, and they run ahead and all these strange things are not dealt with, we are really going to be in a really terrible condition in our neighborhood. The properties that they're tearing down, although they might be in pretty bad condition, are better than what they're putting up. I am working with advocating for homeowners on Diamond Street, seventeen houses in the 1600 block of Diamond Street, which is one of the most recent developments in our neighborhood. Every last one of those homeowners signed off for me to advocate for them because their homes have terrible workmanship, shoddy materials. 283 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 I'm working with other residents on another project called the Three S Project, one of my favorites, where PHDC did rehabilitation. All of those property owners are very concerned, that they got horrible workmanship and shoddy materials. If we're talking about transforming, clearing land, putting in new developments, we need to look at what's going on with the new buildings that are going up. The conditions are not very good. We are talking about making new homeowners happy, bringing these people in, making sure they're a part of our community. We need to look at what kind of conditions they are living in. What are these new houses, how are they being developed? We need to really look at that. PHDC, I understand, will be folded into this whole housing restructuring. I think not only do you need to restructure these housing agencies, but the process by which they do whatever they are proposing to do, you should look at that. 284 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 PHDC has a very strange way of doing their business. They do total gut rehab, which end up with a product that is less than the houses that have not been rehabbed. They gut them out, tear up all the beautiful hardwood floors. All of that's taken out. They put back in plywood.
Do you think you can tie up in the next few moments?
Every time we talk about housing, you come and give us great information. Thank you.
Right. Okay. But I 285 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 want to make sure you're really clear on this, because we're talking about running ahead with this money.
That have been going on for the past twenty years, and nobody has seen or been able to figure this out.
I know. You continue to bring us this good information, and we appreciate it.
Right. Okay. But I mean, I don't want to just bring it to you. I would hope that we do something about this, you know.
So, I mean, beyond just bringing you that, because everybody's here saying everything is hunky-dory, and it's really not, you know. 286 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
So I want to talk a little bit about acquisition and disposition of properties. Yes, there's a lot of redundancy in agencies, but there are redundancies in how the process of getting a property, or you enter the system, or taking it out of the system. Those processes need to be changed. We don't need to just take old wine, so to speak, put it in a new bottle. We need to change those processes. Okay; I'll tie this up. For instance, there has been no 16 connection with one of the largest institutions in our community Temple University, to offer them some of the land that we already have that's been vacant and there for the past twenty years. The one thing that we do have in our community right now, the Liacouris Center, the Mayor fought them when they were trying to build it. So, I don't know what that relationship is, but that's one of the most 287 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 positive things we have. They are not being reached out to, to maybe give them some of the land. They are trying to get housing for about 5,000 students and faculty. That will be an area that we might look into, to give some of this vacant land away. I am really just majorly concerned that the Mayor is now coming to the community saying that he wants to transform, when I am looking at some of the projects that he's doing right now. I mentioned earlier the Three S Project? The Three S project is on a back street, three streets that they're spending $1.5 million on twelve houses. We only have $250 million that's being proposed. How are we going to move through and do all of these things that are in this proposal here, if you're spending $1.5 million on some back street that doesn't have any impact on our community? So, before we go running ahead 288 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 talking about transforming, let's look at what we're doing now. Labor issues need to be dealt with. The permit process. I mean, you're talking about tearing down houses and they will come and start building. The processes by which a developer would have to go through to get to building need to be addressed. There needs to be some standards set before demolition is done. That's why all the controls that I saw in President Verna's bill I think need to be in place because, as I see it now, our properties are being taken down, no standards are being used, etc. Historic properties, where near Diamond Street we have plenty of historic properties. We want them preserved. And in addition, we need to have some community input. All of those forums that I have been in, we have not actually had any input in them. The one forum that we had that we did have input, we gave twenty-five questions 289 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 that were very legitimate to the NTI team. That was two years ago.
Thank you, Miss Robinson. We're going to have to bring our next panel on, but we thank you for all your information.
Thank you very much. Our last panel, Blaine Bonham Horticultural Society. We thank you for your patience and input. My friend, Joanne Jackson, Advocate, CDC; and Ruth Birchett, Heritage Community Economic Development Corporation. Thank you. Thank you for your patience. Blaine, we'll call on you to get started.
Thank you. Please identify yourself for the record and begin.
Yes. I'm Blaine 290 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Bonham. I'm the Executive Vice President of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. " Madam Chairwoman and Members of the Finance Committee and Members of Council. I'm here today to talk to you about the proposed Greene City Strategy, which we think is an integral part of the City's overall Neighborhood Transformation Initiative. I think everyone on Council knows that for the past twenty-five years we have worked with community groups, and particularly in the last decade worked with a lot of the CDCs and also a lot of parks groups, making substantial inroads in turning communities around in helping physical redevelopment with dealing with open space. So, we see the addressing of the vacant land in the City and the maintenance of the vacant land as a key strategy that, whereas the land needs to be maintained on an interim basis before development occurs, and that there needs to be reinvestment in existing open spaces 291 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 and resources and streetscapes, like the fellow from Fairmount Park testified, and also that planning for new open space needs to be a part of rebuilding neighborhoods. The Greene City Strategy must be a part of a range of bold and complex efforts. It can't, of course, stand on its own, and no one would ever think that greening makes a statement just by itself, but it needs to be integrated with the physical, economic, and social redevelopment plans that add value to the total transformation effort. So the City needs to capitalize on the power and effect that greening has on the community and the power to inspire its residents to get involved. What you have in front of you is, if you look halfway down through it, there is a diagram, colorful diagram with a tree in the middle that says NTI's Greene City Strategy. And what this shows is a series of actions that include physical development, that include a major education and training program for residents and groups and other entities in 292 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 the City. It has an open space planning component, and also then a major campaign which will promote the activities, in the sense of creating the City. And I just want to talk just briefly about what these include. You'll also notice past that chart is a series of photographs which will help illustrate the aspects of it. At the basic level, with physical development and maintenance, the City needs to commit to maintaining basic housekeeping on vacant land, and that is a part of the proposed NTI program, and is already being implemented by the Administration. Based on that cleaning, the next level up would be to look at neighborhoods to help them green up their gateways, to plant trees along streets, and to also green up lots so that the open spaces and vacant lands that are there then become part of a neighborhood revitalization effort. And then the third level is to 293 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 address the Municipal parks and the public spaces. These Municipal parks not only include the Fairmount Park System, but the over one hundred neighborhood parks that exist throughout the City that are both under the purview of the Fairmount Park System and the Department of Recreation. In addition to investing more in our public spaces or our Municipal parks, we need to encourage the investment of the City's public spaces, and these are not necessarily publicly owned -- They may be owned by institutions; they may be owned by businesses -- to encourage them to improve and maintain them so that entire neighborhoods can benefit from the upgrading of the public spaces. Again, it is acknowledged that much of this land will be redeveloped, but it will be redeveloped along the lines both of lower density but also greater public spaces.
It's now an acknowledged fact that in any urban area, maintaining public spaces not only adds to the quality of life but also 294 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 improves the property values. In addition to physical improvement, we propose to establish a City-wide training program, where people from all over the City can come to training classes, learn not only how to convert vacant lots into side yards, to make them into community gardens and just green spaces, but also train agency teams and staff so that City Department responsibilities on public land can be carried out with the best efforts, and also to work with community-based organizations that may be involved in vacant land management in a community that support their ongoing community development activities and help to increase their capacity and awareness so they can do the best job possible. In addition to training volunteers, who may also come from outside communities -- and sometimes these come from corporations. They can come from a group like Philadelphia Cares or volunteers from other neighborhoods. They would be trained and also deployed to assist in the neighborhood volunteers to help maintain spaces. 295 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 The open space planning component, in talking with Maxine Griffith at the City Planning Commission, is very much in the thinking of NTI, which is to look at the national standards of what is needed in a City like Philadelphia. And when you look at areas like North Philadelphia, where very few public spaces were built initially, but we have the opportunity to reintroduce those back into the community and plan for the kind of amenities that people who want to live in cities now really require. More open space, more public space, so that these can support the kinds of activities and quality of life that we desire in the cities. We need to look at that on a City-wide basis, and then overlay that with the desires of the community, to increase that, so that there is a blending of the needs of the City as a whole, and also the needs of the community. And finally, a campaign is needed 296 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 which will really help promote the greening of the City to residents across the City, both through the public media, through the printed media, through the electronic media, with leaders like yourselves and the Mayor leading the way and demonstrating what can be done. We think that the degree to which the Greene City Strategy will support the physical and social and economic development of the City needs to be incorporated in whatever plan emerges from these hearings. And we will be working with the City over the next couple of months to develop a plan that will operationalize the Greene City Strategy so that it can be incorporated into the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative. Thank you for your attention.
Thank you very much, and thanks for all the work you've done in this area. Joanne Jackson. Welcome. Good to see you.
Thank you, Jannie. I thank you for welcoming me as a friend. I live 297 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 in Jannie's District. I'm going to keep my comments very brief because of the hour. And I think we're all a little tired at this point. Advocate Community Development Corporation does have some concerns about certain aspects of the Administration's Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, particularly about acquisition and the disposition of property funding to support acquisitions and for planning development projects, and the costs of union construction within the City. However, what we feel, that the Administration's NTI ordinance will serve Philadelphia's neighborhoods and community development corporations far better than the Council President's ordinances. We believe that the Administration ordinance offers Council sufficient oversight, and that certain provisions of the Council President's ordinance, particularly that Council approval is needed for all funds, including non-City funds, to be used in NTI, and the 298 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 creation of a two-person Project Review Team, to review all NTI bid packages and to review all NTI contracts, will lengthen the development process. ACDC firmly believes that NTI and City Council should be streamlining the real estate development process, not adding potential bottlenecks. Thank you for allowing me to testify.
You said under the Mayor's plan Council would be able to review every expenditure and control it?
No, I did not. I said that this was one of the things that we objected to in -- in the Council President's ordinance, that we felt this would make the real estate development process even slower than it currently is.
It is slow now. That's the reason we don't want to see it get any slower. 299 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
That's why I thought the last witness that discussed all the present problems probably had a very valid point. We ought to be addressing a lot of those issues. But I don't understand how I, as a Council member, can be expected to meet my obligations to the community that elects me if all I can do is discuss with somebody but don't have the power to vote something down. And I'm looking for, in both bills, the power of City Council to be maintained, with respect to appropriations. That's the main function of City Council, is to act as a financial oversight body. We are responsible, above all other things, for expenditures by the City Government. And I fail to find in the Mayor's bill anything that gives me, as a Council member, the right to do anything, other than have a conversation. And then if the Mayor and/or his representatives chose to pay attention to my -- to the conversation had with me, that's one 300 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 thing. But they would be absolutely free not to pay any attention. And this Mayor I know personally very well because I've worked with him for more than twenty years. He has power and he knows how to use power. For example, when he became President of City Council, he had the power to decide what bills go into what committees. And because he did not believe my policies were probably good for the City -- I assume that was what motivated him -- he chose during an entire four-year period not to permit a single bill ever to get into my committee. So I know he knows how to use power. Whether it's for good or for bad, he can use it. Therefore, I have to assume that if he has the sole power to make a decision and all I have is the power to discuss, is I ought to be discussing it somewhere on the beach in the summer or in the mountains somewhere, because I'm not going to have any impact. " And unfortunately, under the terms of the bill as I read them, the Mayor's judgment would win out. " Now, if there's anything different, if you can show me or anybody can show me where I have some power under this bill, as one of the Council members, then I could understand that. But right now it seems to me as if the thing that -- you talk about oversight by City Council is just not there. All it is is that we have a chance to talk about it, express our opinions, but that the Mayor is absolutely free to do what he wants to. " I say, "Well, whatever the Mayor wanted by the way of money, I gave it to him. " I would have a tough time answering that question. City Council, it seems to me, has a very real responsibility, with respect to deciding whether or not money gets spent for something. And that's what I'm looking for. Same kind of fight I've had about the Veterans Stadium. Whether you like something or not, one thing is, you've got the whole Council responsible for making financial decisions. And if we make a decision to just turn over $250 million or $290 million, whatever the sum turns out to be, to the Mayor, for the Mayor to make all the decisions on, I don't know why bother setting up the City Council and the Home Rule Charter, if we are just advocating all of our rights. So that's my main problem, just as 303 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 I have it with the Mayor on the School District. The people of Philadelphia voted to empower the Mayor to run the School Board. They said, Mr. Mayor, we want to make sure you have enough power to do it. We're going to change the whole appointment process, the Board members, to make sure nobody can interfere with your total control over the School Board. I don't believe the Mayor of Philadelphia has any right to come to an agreement with the Governor of this Commonwealth, to eliminate the City factor in the school system and to say to the State, you take over and run the schools. We don't elect people to give up power. We elect people to responsibly carry out the duties of power that they're elected to assume. So if you have an answer . .
I'm sorry to be this long, but I just don't see any ability of City Council -- if this bond issue passes, as under the Mayor's bill, if the bond issue passes, seems to me we have provided the 304 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Mayor with a total pool of money which he could spend the way that he wants to, no matter how I or any combination of Council members believe the money ought to be spent. And I don't think that's what the Home Rule Charter provides, as to the way in which decisions should be made in the City of Philadelphia. Sorry. I didn't mean to make the statement at all, but I'm looking for carrying out my duties as a Council member. And I find that the Mayor's version of the bill eliminates those duties. The other bill seems to incorporate the concept of Council responsibility. And then we go to the voters, and they have a right to make a decision as to whether we decided to spend the money appropriately or not. Sorry, Madam Chair.
Yes. 305 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
No; I'm very sympathetic to your position as a Council person. But I think that you, too, should understand the frustration of being a community development person and things taking forever. One of the previous people who testified, in fact, right before us, Judith Robinson talked about some houses that ACDC has developed, and that the work needs to be done on them. The agreement has been made with the City Council person, with RDA, was made back in July. I haven't gotten a letter that I need to proceed on that project. Things take a long time. Therefore, the idea of having a two-person review committee that has to review every piece of information, including projects using non-City money becomes a very scary process for those of us who work at CDCs.
All right. 306 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. Thank you, Joanne.
All right. Let me say, since Mr. Cody Anderson, Sr. is here, again as I thanked the family, I want to thank you for your support of the affair last night, and your support of people in need. Thank you. Ruth Birchett, I guess you're the last one for this part of our discussion. Thank you for your patience. I know you've been here for two days as well.
And very much appreciate this Council's accommodating Sherri Honkala and the people who, like we are here, have a very real interest in having a decent place to live.
We support them very 307 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 much. Thank you for this opportunity to speak before you and give you greetings to my Councilman, Councilman Clarke, and to all of you indeed. I want to say very first that I support and very much do appreciate discussion about transforming our neighborhoods. Our North Philadelphia neighborhoods --
Excuse me, Miss Birchett. Please identify yourself yourself again and to your organization to the record for the stenographer and spell your last name.
I thought we were having a little conversation between ourselves, Jannie.
My name is Ruth Birchett. I am President and Founder of Heritage Community Economic Development Corporation. We, in our North Philadelphia 308 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 neighborhood which is just west of Temple University, very much do need to be revitalized. Aside from being the head of Heritage, I happen to be Committee Person as well in the Division, the Ward and Division where Councilman Street got his start years ago. The difference is that I was born and raised there and am still there. In addition to that, I serve as block captain, and a number of other capacities as well in the community. And I need to tell you that I feel very, very comfortable in speaking for a good number of our residents in our community, particularly long-term residents, when I say that we want this to happen. We want more than the North Philadelphia Plan which was awesome, to even have anybody pay attention to the fact that there needs to be development and development opportunity in North Philadelphia. But NTI also comes with the dedication of dollars. And we really do need and fully expect Council and the Mayor to work 309 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 together to cause this to happen. Many of you I've worked with for many, many years and have tremendous regard for you, as well as individuals, but also as law-makers. And we really need stewardship on this. We need good stewardship on this. I appreciate your comments, Councilman Cohen, in reference to what you believe is necessary, in terms of the oversight, in terms of feeling comfortable about what goes forth. But I also recognize our Mayor's need, as many mayors have had privilege, to exert judgment, responsible judgment, in our behalf. Let me tell you, I'm very nervous about this. People in our community are very, very nervous about this. Why? On one hand, it's opportunity. Finally we're going to have a decent place to live. And I'm talking about people who have survived the gang wars, survived the riots, who have survived the police brutality, and 310 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 still duck and dodge every now and then; but nevertheless have held fast to the property where they are, and have hoped for a better day. Blight elimination and this NTI initiatives really gives us cause for hope. But it also gives us cause for fear, too, because the very people who have weathered all those storms should not fear displacement. Because someone's out there who knows somebody who knows somebody or have some organization or entity are being listened to, and not us. We are very, very concerned about that, and clearly don't want to be disenfranchised. I tell you very clearly that it surprises me and really sends a warning flag up to me when my property tax triples, when my mail from the Department of Revenue came and my property tax had tripled, yet there have been no 21 improvements in the area. And I'm telling you, on a block where there are no houses left standing across the street from my house, and at one point we were over fifty homes, five abandoned properties 311 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 on my side of the street and three vacant lots, I'm totally puzzled, Council, as to why my property tax would triple. I need a rebate. I need money back. Something's not right. And what I'm saying to you is that it's things like this that really put fear into the hearts of elders, into families who have been long-term residents of our community. My family is fifth generation there, have the same address and phone number as when I was born. And I recall back in the '50s coming home from elementary school, and my father, who only went to second grade: couldn't read and write, but was a good neighbor, and helped repair any household, any house in the neighborhood, really was fighting about Temple University coming through to tear down homes.
And I say to you that that whole dynamic still exists, and even this blight elimination idea has a lot of old wounds opened and a lot of old suspicions opened as well. What I say to people is that no one 312 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 can dispute the fact that we need our neighborhood fixed up, but it's not just bricks and mortar. You really have to understand that there are departments within the City of Philadelphia -- and I have to agree with Miss Robinson that mistakes in demolition do occur. I can give you one that occurred many years ago, 1935 West Norris Street, that had just been rehabbed about three years prior by the Redevelopment Authority. And they came back and tore it down by mistake. So those kinds of things happen all the time. And what I would like to ask for is, in reference to the Redevelopment Authority, PHA, PHDC, the City Planning Commission, in particular the Zoning Board of Adjustment as well, that there really does need to be disclosure to residents of the immediate area of a project, in reference to what is being planned for that area. I have no idea how it is that public funds can be utilized by public agencies, and even by private developers as well, in a way 313 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 that is contrary to what the desires of the local residents might be, because it just never was asked in any kind of a way. Now, you may say, well, it's our responsibility to go out and look at the orange zoning notice sign. That may well be. But guess what? Things should not happen so far above our heads that at the ground level, basic community people, residents, citizens of the City of Philadelphia, who breath life through their own dollars into the coffers of this City, should not have proper say-so. I give you one particular example. We have a Raymond Rosen Housing Development Project which we fought very, very hard to have happen. But the development exists with properties with -- I'll give you one example. On 20th Street, you can go on 20th Street and see development of the new units on one side, development of new units on the other side. And smack dab in the middle is an over hundred year old, three-story brick building that is occupied by residents that's 314 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 going to sit in the middle of this complex. It confuses everyone in the neighborhood as to how this kind of planning can occur, and would it occur other places than neighborhoods like ours, where people are so routinely disenfranchised. What I want to say to you is that this is the kind of thing that happens when the City Planning Commission does not consult area block captains. This is the kind of thing that happens when committee people and even local residents that have been there a really long time aren't consulted, when local churches aren't consulted. It should not happen that the Redevelopment Authority can promise a neighborhood church that they will convey land to them during the development and yet somehow mistakenly convey all of the land to Philadelphia Housing Authority because they're in a good relationship and they're constantly working with one another. That should not happen. 315 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 It should not happen that our Councilman has to suffer frustration over us, laying him out about that happening, when in fact it wasn't him that caused it to happen. So the oversight beyond the Mayor isn't just necessary. These City departments do you a tremendous disservice. You have people who are professional . . whatever they do, who don't do it very, very well. And we're stuck with whatever decisions that they make. They consider themselves expert about our communities. And let me tell you, they aren't. I have yet to get a phone call from a North Philadelphia planner about anything, and people are planning all around me. And I will tell you, just like my father said when I asked him who was Temple. " Well, he's dead and gone.
I'm still here in my little, dilapidated, three-story house. And I tell you, it is a struggle, but we're holding fast. I will tell you very clearly, that 316 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 you don't see them here in the balconies, like the union comes through here -- and I'm going to talk about them, too -- and sitting around in these chairs. But elders in our community are brokenhearted. I'm the one that's outraged. They're brokenhearted. Just coming down here on the 33 Bus, the bus got to 19th and Fairmount, and an elder sitting next to me said, "You know, that's a shame. That's a shame. " That brings me to the issue of the institutionalized racism within this town in the trades union, and perhaps all the unions. But today the topic here is about building. It is about building. There is no excuse. There is no 20 excuse in a so-called city of brotherly love and sisterly affection, for non-minority people -- for minority people to be primarily relegated to one union of trade. That's local 332. Now, this is my assessment. And I believe it is very, very close to accurate. 317 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 It is inexcusable. And let me tell you: I approve of you supporting the $250 million. I would like to see that leveraged on behalf of communities, particularly disenfranchised communities and distressed communities, urban renewal communities, blighted communities, whatever you want to call it, like mine. And the reason is that the only kind of commerce I see flowing around our community isn't e-commerce. It's d-commerce. It is the drug commerce within our community. When Operation Sunrise hit on the east side of Broad Street, we began to have lots and lots and lots of new kind of drug stores opening up on the west side of Broad Street. I'm saying to you that if you're going to spend $250 million and part of it is going to benefit our community, that we have a very, very real opportunity to leverage that economic resource for the benefit of families. How so? That people who are interested in obtaining jobs in the trades, and 318 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 businesses that are interested in utilizing their talents, whether it be electrical, plumbing, or whatever, minority businesses get a chance to be utilized. It should not be on a contract where you have -- one white company has got a contract here and then their wife's company has another subcontract on it. It should not be. It is not fair. I really believe that there really ought to be some public hearings regarding this issue. It is unacceptable. No way in the world can you tell me it is right anywhere that you can spend public dollars: Federal, State, and City, on public land, acquired by the Redevelopment Authority, for people to utilize for their own benefit. Companies that aren't even -- sometimes development companies that aren't even from Philadelphia. And they do the proposal, and they expect for community groups to sign on to it as a silent partner. Ain't nothing silent about Ruth 319 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Birchett; hasn't been; ain't going to be. And this is a major, major problem. It is not fair. Any African American business out here will tell you, whether it be construction, general contractor, electrical, plumber or whoever will tell you that they can't speak up about it openly. I can. I ain't looking for a job from nobody. I can, and I will, and I am speaking forward at this moment.
Thank you. Miss Birchett, I believe Councilman Cohen wanted to say something.
I have a number of questions. I just want wanted clarification for the record, but I think perhaps you need not take the time. I'm not sure I understood what you meant by your various references about minorities being relegated to a single union. I don't know whether you're referring to the laborer's union or not. The number sounded as 320 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 if you might. I don't know whether you're referring to apparent instances of discrimination in the building trades. I'm not sure what you're referring to, but I am concerned about the existence of whatever problems you are talking about. I'm going to be asking you to meet with my Legislative Director, Tim Carney, and not take the time of this meeting. I would like to get clarity on what it is you're saying, because it seems to me you are dealing with a very important subject.
Actually, I need to state to you also, as you're looking at going through all of the NTI and what will be coming forward with it, I think you also need to 321 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 consider, in the interests of preservation, grants for existing homeowners, no less than fifty-fifty perhaps. If I, for example, own my home -- and again, these homes are a hundred years old. I'm having work done in my home now. My son and my nephew are doing the work. And I'm telling you, it's more than a notion to try and rehab these kinds of houses. So, if I as a homeowner have $5,000, can you configure inside of this budget where, from the NTI initiative, I can get a match, as a homeowner, so if I got $5,000 for home repair or whatever I want to do, then you'll give me $5,000, too, as a grant, not a loan. Many neighborhoods like ours, people simply don't have it. They simply don't have the money. Our elders are on fixed income, etc. But there needs to be some opportunity for people, for a family like mine that wants to have its legacy continue here, on Norris street, in Philadelphia, that we might be 322 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 able to exist here up to a hundred years -- We're in our fifty-first year now -- up to a hundred years. Well, how to do that? The property has got to be kept up, as well. And so I'd like some sensitivity and reference to that.
Can you conclude for us? Can you tie all the ends together for us?
Once I complete my next issue, which is social infrastructure. As we look at the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative and its focus being bricks and mortar, we also clearly need to look at social infrastructure. That is one of the reasons why we want to see leverage to the maximum degree, the economic benefit to create jobs and business utilization opportunities here in the 323 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 neighborhoods where the projects exist; not having any excuse for people with Jersey tags, Delaware tags, California tags, and all of that, coming and working in our communities -- and we don't have a job. But we are burying our young people from the corners. We just buried another one last Thursday. It is simply not fair. We stopped the job for three days, and then they went and found some black folk and brought them to the site. Well, guess what? We still know that none of the people working there are from our community. When I talk about social infrastructure, I'm saying that there's an opportunity within blight elimination, within this Initiative, to create some economic independence for some families. This is turnaround time, and it's not just bricks and mortar. It's time to create some of that. And I would like to know what is 324 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 happening to create opportunities for family stabilization, along with neighborhood stabilization, because we should not have to pull up our guys and go, because we've been totally displaced as community. And it's our expectation very, very fully that this Council think about it, not just think about the business people who have -- who are looking for the tax credits and all that stuff, to come forward. You know us. You know what we need. You have family, too. You're lifelong residents of Philadelphia as well, just like many of us are. And you have to protect us. It is your job. You have to protect us.
Thank you for coming in. Thank you for your testimony.
Is there anyone else? It is time for us to get back to our discussion we began earlier. Anyone else to testify in regards to this bill? (No response) 325 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
All right. I think, then, that it is time for us to get back to a discussion we began earlier. Would anybody like the technical staff to appear? We started out there with regard to the discussion about the Project Review Team. I have been submitted an amendment, but let me say before that that earlier today in one of my meetings with regard to Penn faculty, University of Pennsylvania faculty, they have volunteered and did several months ago, in fact last spring, to work with District Council person to help them to create a workshop, and to help them deal with issues involving information to do blight in their own respective neighborhoods. So Penn faculty are willing to deal with District Council person, to help them create and maintain the data base necessary to do the work that is required, with regard to properties in their respective Districts. So I put that on the table. I confirmed that again today, and that is in fact 326 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 a bona fide offer.
Madam President, would you like to say something?
Madam Chair, I notice that Lance Rothstein was still in the room. If he would come up and provide us with the information that I had asked him for this morning.
Mr. Rothstein, please identify yourself for the record, and continue.
My name is Lance Rothstein. I am the Project Director at the Capital Program Office for this project.
I think one of my questions was: What were each of the subcontractors paid? What specific functions did they provide? And who are the principals in the companies?
Yes, ma'am. The first sheet which you have in your stack is a 327 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 simple chart which shows the different companies which are working as part of the Hill International team. The second sheet addresses the issue of owners, officers, and leads from each of the companies. On the third and fourth sheets we have attempted to detail the specific items within the Scope of Work, which is also attached, that each of these companies is responsible for. And then on the third line of each of the company identifications on those two pages we identify the value of their contracts.
Are there questions from members of the Committee with regard to the testimony submitted by Mr. Rothstein? Yes, sir. Councilman Nutter.
Thank you. Mr. Rothstein, is it my understanding from the documents that we have, that for Hill International, that a James P. Rowan, when you have here . . . whatever the person's title is 328 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 and "lead" does that mean that they are the lead person from that particular company that's going to interact with --
Yes, that is what that means. And in the case of the Hill International team, as an example, the four people that are identified as leads are all four working diligently on this process.
Yesterday they were? Okay. Sorry. I did not know that. Now, who will supervise Hill?
Well, Hill is under contract to the City, and it's through the Capital Program Office. So I am the direct point of contact, through the City, to Hill. 329 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694
All right. And so where does the NTI office fit into this structure?
Patricia Smith. I'm Director, Neighborhood Transformation, Mayor's Office. So Mr. Rothstein, though he is part of the Capital Program Office, he is part of my team over on the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative. So he reports to me.
Okay. So the NTI office is ultimately responsible for managing Hill?
Yes. I mean, we are that part of government that oversees the various components. So I work with representatives of the RDA. I work with representatives of the Office of Housing and Community Development, on issues related to NTI, the City Planning Commission, etc. But in terms of the technical 330 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 day-to-day operational, Mr. Rothstein is sort of like the Project Manager.
So the reports that have been generated out of the various work activities, I assume, will go first to Mr. Rothstein?
He holds weekly meetings with the Hill team on progress. We receive monthly written reports on work activity which are all included in the Scope. That's the type of information, from those monthly reports we talked about, including on the Project Administration web site. I receive a copy of the monthly report. In addition, Mr. Rothstein and I meet, you know, very regularly to talk about the status of the project.
And what 331 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 component of either, I guess, the service agreement, or the Scope of Work, or any other document lays out the nature of the relationship between Hill and City Council?
Well, for example, in the Scope of Work, we talk about the word "stakeholder." And in the Hill contract and in the Scope of Work we use the term "stakeholder." And we define stakeholder to include all City departments, boards, agencies, City Council, City financial advisors, the Redevelopment Authority of Philadelphia, Housing Authority and the Philadelphia Housing Development Corporation. We also included in the program statement that we submitted as part of the -- by the Administration, that the District Council person, we would work -- the Hill team, particularly the GIS support tools that they're putting together will be available and accessible to the Council when we're looking at demolition. So, things like master schedules and the like.
I'm sorry. 332 12/12/01 FINANCE COMMITTEE - BILL 010694 Where is that information? It's in the Scope of Work?
The thing about the GIS support, when we submitted the program statement, that was appended to the legislation that was introduced last week and also, I believe, distributed at various points, pieces of it, in various meetings we have had, talks about the oversight piece. We met with, I believe it was, the Council tech staff where we tried to be responsive to concerns raised about oversight. So we delineated very, you know, specific roles in how Council interfaces with the Administration, particularly around the selection and identification of properties, encapsulation or demolition.
Okay. Well, you said that was in the program statement. I guess I'm trying to understand from a contractual --
Right. What I'm trying, I guess, to understand is, from a contractual and obligation standpoint, what is there in the agreement that lays out in any way, shape, or form what the nature of Hill's relationship is and what they are required to do, any minimum level of either contact, relationship, meetings, directions, taking advice, having discussions. What is there -- what is the mechanism in the contract that requires that?