COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING COMMITTEE ON LICENSES AND INSPECTIONS - - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Wednesday, December 1, 2004 1:45 p.m. - - - - BILL 040134 - An Ordinance amending Title 4 of the Philadelphia Code... BILL 040756 - An Ordinance amending Title 10 of the Philadelphia Code... BILL 040869 - An Ordinance amending Section 9-601 of the Philadelphia Code... BILL 040870 - An Ordinance repealing Section 14 10-813 of the Philadelphia Code... BILL 040871 - An Ordinance amending Section 9-703 of the Philadelphia Code... PRESENT: COUNCILMAN RICHARD T. MARIANO, Chair COUNCILWOMAN JOAN KRAJEWSKI COUNCILMAN DARRELL CLARKE COUNCILMAN JACK KELLY COUNCILWOMAN BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN COUNCILMAN JAMES KENNEY COUNCILMAN FRANK DICICCO - - - - V A R A L L O Incorporated 1835 Market Street, Suite 600 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103 215.561.2220 215.567.2670 I N D E X BILL 040947 PAGE OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I............... PAUL LEVY, Center City District...... 11 RICH MCCLURE, BOMA................... 16 JOHN MCCULLOUGH, Wannamaker Bldg..... 17 MARTY TUZMAN, Jenkintown Windows..... 19 BILL 040906 OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I............... 36 SCOTT GLOVIER, ADVO.................. 58 MIKE CHAMBERS, ADVO.................. 58 BILL 040756 AMY ISDELL, Motion Picture Assoc..... 75 Charles Fogle, Association of Theater Owners of Pennsylvania. ........ 79 BILL 040134 OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I............... 82 BILL 040869 OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I............... 86 BILL 040870 OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I............... 89 BILL 040871 OTIS HAIGLER, JR., L&I.............. 103 3 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947
The Committee on L&I is now in session. Will the Clerk please read the bill.
Bill 040947, amending Section 9-618 of the Philadelphia Code entitled "Sale of Spray Paint Containers, Indelible Markers and Etching Acid," by prohibiting the sale of etching acid providing for penalties and making certain technical changes, all under certain terms and conditions.
Thank you. Let me say who's here for the Committee. Myself, Councilman Mariano; the Vice Chair, Councilwoman Krajewski; Councilman Clarke; Councilman Kelly; Councilman Kenney; and Councilman DiCicco, the sponsor of this bill. Do we have any witnesses on this bill? Mr. Haigler, do you have any testimony on this bill?
Good day, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am 4 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040907, which if enacted will prohibit the sale of etching acid in the City of Philadelphia. The provisions governing the sale of etching acid was originally added to the Philadelphia Code through enactment of Bill 11 010555 on November 2, 2001. Since that time, the Department through its Business Regulatory Enforcement Division has enforced provisions regarding sale of this material to the public. The Department's Business Compliance Unit had issued violations to retail business establishments found to not be in compliance with Section 9-618 governing the public sale and display of this material and has confiscated the offending material when compliance had not been achieved at the time of reinspection. The Department of Licenses and Inspections also recognizes the deleterious effect that illegal use of this material has 5 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 on the quality of life in the communities we serve and therefore offers no objections to the enactment of Bill 040947 and is prepared to enforce the outright ban on the sale of etching acid should the bill pass in Council and be signed into law by the mayor. Thank you for the opportunity to provide the Department's testimony.
Thank you, Mr. Haigler. Councilman DiCicco, do you have a statement?
Actually, I was, but I'm happy to hear that they're enforcing it. We're moving in the right direction. I know Councilwoman Krajewski and I, I think back in '01 originally addressed this problem and attempted to be as reasonable as we could at the time, but apparently we haven't gone far enough. I'm not sure what the other districts may or may not be experiencing in terms of vandalism by way of the use of etching material. I'm sure 6 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 Councilman Clarke, at least in the Center City portion of his district, is probably have similar problems that I'm having in my district. Most of the areas that are being hit with this material are the Center City areas, as I said, and areas that are in what we refer to as the entertainment areas, South Street area, Old City. And as the growth in the 1st Councilmanic District with neighborhoods developing in more areas that are becoming more retail, commercial, that this etching issue is just growing along. It moves with it as these neighborhoods are developing. And that's a sad thing because people are making these investments, and unlike removing paint graffiti, which in and of itself is a problem and cost a certain amount of dollars to do, etching for the most part is more of a permanent damage to the property. There will be people here today who will testify on the cost of removing the etching. In some cases, you can't even remove it other than to replace the window pane. It 7 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 could be a large windowpane on a storefront which could literally run into the thousands of dollars. So we're not talking about a few dollars here and a few dollars there or maybe somebody coming out and getting a roller and painting over some graffiti message. We're talking about a real property damage and almost to the point where it's permanent unless you either replace the pane or hire someone to bring out a specific type of equipment to buff it out. And that, again, you will hear testimony on the cost, the cost a property owner will incur to get that stuff off the glass. A reporter ask you, you know, if you paint it and people can get it on the internet, do you think it will go away? No, I don't think it will go away. I'm hopeful that the ban will at least minimize the number of people who will have access to it and take the time to get on the internet to order this thing through the mail to get sent to them. I mean, at the end of the day, I may be proven wrong, but I think it's something we need to 8 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 do and at least attempt to do to minimize it, because really the only people that need this are people who are in business in glass work to do etching for glass for retail sales and things like that. This is not something that your typical student would do at home.
I'm sitting here and I'm trying to wonder, Councilman and Mr. Haigler, what's the legitimate use for this etching?
If you ever saw a window pane where the glass has a -- I want to say smoke effect -- a design in the glass of a person or a scene?
Councilman, he's not here today, but Councilman Rizzo has it as you walk into his office, he has it.
I know he's going to upset that I said that, but sometimes 9 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 I get humorous myself. You'll see it in hotel lobbies and store lobbies and places like that where you'll see this decorative pane of glass. And I think as the Councilwoman said, you refer to it as art but it's a smoked kind of glass effect.
So it wouldn't necessarily involve retail sales, right?
They're buying it from a supplier. I don't think they're running out to your normal arts and crafts store to by a small bottle. They're buying it probably in quantity and they're legitimately -- they should have it because that is art and that's what they do. I certainly don't want to harm them in any way. The problem is it's just to accessible to everyone else that's out there. And what we did in '01, Councilwoman Krajewski and I, didn't go far enough. We 10 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 still have this problem and it's getting worse.
Councilman, I just want to know, where do they sell this etching acid?
I don't know if any of the home building places sell it or not. I know they sell spray paint. When we tried to ban on spray paint, at least we got the paint industry and the retailers agree to keep it locked up and you have to produce ID. Although graffiti hasn't gone away by no means, it certainly, I think, has helped to eliminate that.
So it's the smaller stores, in other words, that have it, arts and crafts stores and what-not.
Yes, arts and 11 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 crafts stores and places like that.
Mr. Chairman, when Mr. Haigler is through testifying, if he hasn't finished already, I know Mr. Levy is here to testify. And if he can be called up next, he does have another appointment. He will speak on behalf of Center City Special Service District.
Any questions for Mr. Haigler from this panel? (No response.)
Good afternoon, Councilman Mariano and other members of Council. I very much appreciate the courtesy. I have very brief testimony, and I have copies being distributed. I am here on behalf of the Center City District to testify in the strongest possible terms in favor of the passage of this bill. 12 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 Clearly, this acid etching is being used for one purpose in Center City and throughout the rest of the City, which is vandalism and defacement of property. For over a decade the Center City District has exercised a zero tolerance for street level graffiti downtown, and our crews routinely remove graffiti. And because of that, we've been able to see a dramatic reduction in the incidence of new graffiti. However, in the last three to four years we've seen this emergence of a new an virulent form of graffiti in which this acid spray is used and it creates a milky white smear on the glass but it actually eats into the glass. We have seen, from transit shelters downtown with directional maps and signs to help people find their way around, to retail storefronts, and you'll hear from office building owners in a few minutes, the very large windows department stores and office buildings and if you, sadly, walk to the Kimmel Center today on the Spruce Street side, the stone there is defaced with the same 13 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 material. So there is nothing that is being respected. So it is office buildings, major civic buildings. And the problem, as Councilman DiCicco just noted, is this is not easily removed and, therefore, it begins to buildup. And everything we know about graffiti is graffiti attracts other graffiti. And the quicker you get it off, the less people are willing to put it up. And because this is so hard to get off, we are at risk of going right back to where we were in the early '90s with just layer upon layer of graffiti. Just to give you a small example, on Market East where we manage the transit shelters, they started getting hit fairly frequently about three or four years ago. It cost us about $5,000 a pane of glass to replace. So we then invested in the plastic film that you put over this. We are changing that plastic film three times a year at the cost of $12,000 just on a series of transit shelters. You will hear from representatives of major building owners and from Jenkintown 14 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 Window Cleaning, and they will testify essentially to a dramatic increase from almost no incidence to about 250 calls for serve here in the downtown at numbers that are approaching the hundreds of thousands. I think particularly for the proper owners and businesses in Center City this is particularly frustrating because if you realize, as in our district as in any other special services district, they are already paying extra for us to remove graffiti. And this is a form of graffiti, frankly, that we don't have the skill and ability to remove, so they have to pay on top of their charge to us and the other districts in this City an extra charge to remove this really terrible form of graffiti. Quite simply, if the acid spray is not banned, it will have a very debilitating effect on business not only to downtown but every other portion of this City and I think will really set bark the enormous progress we have made in improving the appearance of all of our communities. So I very much urge your support in passage of this bill. 15 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 Thank you very much for the opportunity.
Thank you, Mr. Levy. Any questions for Mr. Levy? Councilman Clarke.
Does the City of Philadelphia Graffiti Removal Unit have the capabilities of removing this?
Not to my knowledge. You need a special -- the folks from Jenkintown have become the specialists in this. You're buffing glass and it's very easy to break and, frankly, the liabilities issues there are fairly large.
Is there 16 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 anybody else? Marty Tuzman, Jenkintown Windows. John McCollough from the Wannamaker Building. I note Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown is here, along with Councilman Kelly. Mr. Tuzman, you can go first. Say your name for the record.
I'll go first. First, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee, my name is Rich McClure. I'm here as a Chair of Codes and Legislative Committee for Building Owners and Managers Association, BOMA, and we put forth today two of our members. We have John McCullough who is the assistant property manager at the Wannamaker Building, and we have Marty Tuzman who is with Jenkintown Window Cleaning. These two individuals offer their testimony in support of Bill 040907. I can only say that our members in this City -- we represent about 51 million square feet here in the City, and we look at any of our buildings that get marked is 17 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 clearly a mark on the City. We wholeheartedly support this bill. I offer John McCullough, if I could, to present testimony.
Thank you, Members, for this opportunity to speak with you this afternoon. My name is John McCullough, and I am here on behalf of BOMA, as Rich had stated, and IPC Amerimar Management Company which owns the THE Wannamaker Building at Juniper Street and 1300 Market. We're asking that you amend this Code to prohibit the sale of this etching acid and spray paint containers and markers. Our building which encompassed a full City block right across from City Hall here -- we have over 30 street-level windows raging from 10 by 8 to 16 by 7 which are shared by the office building and Lord and Taylor. Just over the last year -- this is only for the last year -- we've spent over $18,000 in removal, replacement, and prevention of acid and paint graffiti. Lord and Taylor has spent more than 30,000 just in 2004 on their Market, Chestnut, 18 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 and Juniper Street display windows. The first time our windows were vandalized, we spoke with Marty Tuzman and we had the acid buffed out of the glass. This procedure can only be done once on our large windows as really the glass becomes unstable after one buffing. After subsequently replacing two oversized windows at a cost of $11,000, we started to cover our windows with a graffiti shield that, to be completely honest, is rather unsightly. It's the only defense, though, against this acid. The shield needs to be replaced after each acid or graffiti incident if you don't get it off immediately a cost of about a thousand dollars per windows for our windows. We have very large windows. I urge you to consider amending this section, 69618 so that Philadelphia landmarks such as the Wannamaker Building can continue to be an attraction and not an eyesore. Thank you for your time.
Thank you. Any questions for Mr. McCullough? 19 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 (No response.)
Thank you. Greetings Honorary Councilpeople. I'm honored to be able to testify before you today. My name is Marty Tuzman and I'm the owner of Jenkintown Building Services as Jenkintown Window Cleaning. We've been servicing the region for about 70 years, and our base of operations is at 11th and Callowhill, so we're right here in the City. We've been working on this problem for about three years when our first clients called us to describe a problem on the glass. As window cleaners, we assumed we could get it off right away and we took all of our chemicals out of our bag of tricks and were unable to. I'd like to speak in full support of the bill to restrict the availability of acid, as well as to speak more generally about the blight of glass graffiti in the City. We invested at that time about a half year to figure out a variety of 20 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 solutions, and we've found them to be able to remove them from glass. They're precarious. They're very, very challenging. They cost a lot of money. They can break a window in the process. We brought into liability of some damage. And as John his has said, they can only be done so many times. We're learning to be more and more careful, but you can only do a window so many times. Just briefly, in terms of statistics, in 2002, the year after we saw this -- and I know a little bit about the history, but I won't take the time to speak to it at this moment. But in 2002 as the problem began to hit the East Coast and Philadelphia a little bit more, we were called times; 17 18 times for acid damage and about 9 times for 19 scratch-ity, for scratches. 2003, almost 20 double, 40 times called; 29 for acid damage. 21 2004, 285 times we were called, an increase of 22 1100 percent; 258 of these calls were for acid 23 graffiti and 27 for scratch-ity, scratches on 24 glass, representing an increase of 1520 25 percent. Worse off, our billing increased 21 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 significantly because as opposed to one tag, the graffiti folks were becoming more brazen by tagging window after window after window so that we saw many properties that had 6, 8, 10, large windows being tagged at once. Our 7 revenues went up over 2000 percent from 2002 8 to 2004 in terms of the amount of work we were 9 doing. " And we find it very, very despairing. We used to be called for Center City properties strictly as the areas were defined, South Street, Old City. We're now being called to Northeast Philadelphia, Southwest Philadelphia, South Philly, West Philly, Franklin Mills, Castor, Cottman Avenue, Bustleton Avenue, throughout the City. Acid damage is by far the greatest 22 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 increase. I should say that scratching glass has been significant and problematic for years. People have again, Philly attitude maybe, have tended to put up with scratches on glass because it's not as bad. The milky white problem that acid represents is a much more damaging effect. So maybe the graffiti artists weren't getting people sufficiently with the scratches and went to the much more aggressive damage. We've attempted to communicate to property owners, to retailers, out ability to be able to restore glass. Still, people don't know about it. They're still people who are spending thousands of dollars to replace a window. In some cases, there may be minor cracks in a glass. We at this point know better what window we may damage. Just economically, a tag on a window could take 2 to 6 hours of buffing. And in the packets I've given you, you can see some of the equipment that we use. It's very slow, it's very tedious. We can charge from 75 to $300 for that kind of a tag. Now, if you 23 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 multiply that by six windows, 8 windows, 10 windows, it becomes very, very costly. We, unfortunately, feel that we may be restoring or percent of the acid damage that's 6 going, and that's very, very frustrating.
We 7 feel that there's probably more buildings that 8 are left with acid on it than are deciding to 9 restore the acid. 10 Specifically, we find that the most 11 frustrating aspect, as has been mentioned, in 12 some of the regions where retailers and store 13 people are taking over property pushing the 14 limits growing our City as we should be seeing 15 happen, they're quickly blighted. Maybe 16 around them are buildings that have been 17 blighted already. There are leasing signs 18 where they're waiting to find a tenant. And 19 now you've moved in, you were the guy who 20 broke the block there and now you've been acid tagged. So it's really a battle of frustration. And I think of several people who yelled at me, pissed at me, cried at me that they broke in the new block, they were so happy to open up in this region, the were 24 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 looking for people to follow, and the whole area got hit very badly and in some case obviously they leave it on because they fear that the cycle will not stop. So there are a lot of vacant buildings where it's left on where leasing people want to lease the space but they don't want to clean up the acid because there's nobody in the building. And yet, they can't lease the space because the acid continues to blight the property. We strongly support all efforts to control the problem and restrict the availability. We'll be glad to offer our assistance to City Council Center City District, Special Service District Anti-Graffiti Network, et cetera. We've worked closely with the Police Department. I just want to address one aspect of this. I think the prevention of this must go possibly a little bit further and to be considered at the future time. Scratches are left on windows. The preventative approach to this, as John said, it's not an easy approach is the application of film. Besides the 25 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 restriction of the availability of acid we hope that the penalties and fines and financial retribution and recompense for the individuals that have caused the damage is considered as well as part of this centralized effort with the Anti-Graffiti Network to coordinate communication between police, victim properties, the special service districts perspective vendors that might be able to address it, and the suppliers of the chemicals. I'd be glad to offer our support to that. We have digitized pictures of every acid tag that we remove, and we've been able to give them to the police. And in some cases, they've been able to use them to get to the individual and then know that that guy was the one that tagged all these other properties. Most effectively, we question the City's ability to participate in some of the costs for restoration either with some method of tax-saving for renovation of a property and to consider some kind of financial assistance for the restoration of graffitied glass, as 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 well as very importantly assist in the cost anti-graffiti film application. I volunteer my efforts in any way that can b of support. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Tuzman. Any questions from this Committee? I was going to ask you about the police, but you answered that without me asking you. What I want to say is, "Who thinks of this shit," but I don't want to say that here. I mean who sits around and ays, "Let's invent something that we can put on windows" -- I mean, it's there. If you don't know this answer, I'm just -- in my 49-year-old mind, I can't understand like where the they say, "Hey, if you take this and put it on a window, you can right 'Rick' real big." Is that some kind of sexual excitement or something? I can't think like that, I'm sorry.
In 30 seconds, I can give you a little bit of a history and maybe help to psychology which might help -- 27 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947
While you're doing that, just Philadelphia or is it New York and Boston and D.C.? Everybody must be seeing this, right?
It's New York, it's California, it's major metropolises. Let me tell you in terms of the history and also address some --
You're not going to tell me like there's Web sites where people do this crap. I mean, Councilman DiCicco was deep into this before with the graffiti, and he enlightened me to a whole world of these underground things.
In terms of the use of this generally, and this may be helpful in terms of us being able to identify how to control this. And unfortunately, with the Web and with the kind of supplies that are available nowadays, I think the control of it is going to be challenging which is why I would suggest that we also look at how we can increase penalties, increase the organization of the efforts of the Anti-Graffiti Network, 28 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 increase maybe the participation with a film protection program and possibly, if the City could imagine, some kind of compensation either through Center City District to be able to help people remove it. Because, again, I keep thinking of the few people that opened up on the frontiers of new developments and then came to me saying, "Look, I didn't even know you guys could take this off. I just spent $3,000. The guys are coming here, they already cut my glass and they're going to install it." So it's a problem. The origin of it -- let me say a couple things. It is not only used to decorate glass as we by for storefront or for decorative doorways. It's also the product where you might get a very nice bowl or picture that it's a fogged pattern on the glass with a pitted surface. And that's hydrofluoric acid that etches the surface. And so art students know how to do this. In a former life, I was a jeweler and I knew how to etch metals with nitric acid. Hydrofluoric acid is the acid that you learn in art school 29 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 to etch. Thereby -- and I hate to single out anybody because I was an artist and some of them are my best friends, but the challenge might be to look at some of the source of art supply and art students for the possibility of whether or not there's a connection that's not been explored sufficiently. We know that Pearl Art Store, some art stores have looked at this problem and restricted the availability before. In terms of its origin, it was used as political protest initially for the furriers and PETA, the animal environment activist groups and in the Seattle trade riots was the first -- the world trade organization riots happened in the West Coast, that the origin of first seeing graffiti damage. It quickly went from the West Coast to the East Coast, and Philly certainly had the problem for a few years. But I would respectfully submit that the importance of restricting it in the bill 24 being discussed is Ground 1, is Step 1; it's very, very important. But I think that there 30 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 may need to be some further evaluation of a broader evaluation of where it is coming from, how can we get the police to be more active, how can we build a network that will nip the problem, and how can we support the poor retailers and property owners, whether it's real estate in the City that are struggling as we are in the business or whether retailers. It's really a blight that it's become very large finance.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Did I hear you say that Pearls and other art supply stores are cooperating?
I know that they have been approached in the past with the last bill 20 a while ago. And I realize that there is an awareness of the responsibility and issue and discussion here. I can't speak and I have not certainly gone into the enforcement aspect of it. But I can't speak to where it stands nowadays. I know that it's been two, three 31 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 years ago it was on the store selves of Pearl Art Supply and we saw it on the store shelves two or three years ago when this bill first came up.
So it was on the store shelves and it was open, it wasn't restricted?
And that was around the hearing a couple years ago which initially restricted the availability. And I don't know what extent to this there's cooperation now where there's self-policing and what the efforts of L&I have been to control that as well.
Just getting back to the art students again. Do they purchase their own material or does the school purchase it and give it to the students?
I was an art student once, and I think it's a combination. Frankly, in my years buying acids I was a 32 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 jeweler many, many years, it became more restrictive over time. But as I studied at Tyler Art School for a period time, I would get some of my chemicals either I'd pay a certain school supply bill and that would get me some of the chemicals. So I can't answer that well.
But as an art student, you could go into one of these stores and whatnot and purchase that material, is that true?
Or should it be restricted to just the schools would be able to purchase that and then distribute it to their students as they see fit? I think this is one maybe loophole that we may have to close up. I just have another question. I don't know if any of you gentlemen can answer 33 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 it. Maybe Councilman DiCicco could. What is the cost of this material, this etching acid? Do you know how it's sold?
More than a can of paint. I think if I can remember it was in the area of $10, give or take couple bucks.
So that wouldn't prevent anybody from getting a few dollars and going in there.
In the form I saw it in a few years ago, looked similar to like a roll-on deodorant or a roll-on for your white sneakers to keep them really white. You could kind of paint it on. It has a applicator.
Mr. Tuzman, in your opinion, is this directly because of it's harder to get paint or would they just come up with this anyhow? It's, "We found something 34 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 that's better than paint and you can't take this off." Do you think that's what it was? I know you're speculating. I'm just amazed.
I often chuckle with Jane Golden and my good friends in the Mural Arts program and Paul Levy about how effective we've become in removing graffiti. And then there's a whole psychology of the taggers and what it's about and territorialism and laying your claim and defying one person being able to do this damage. And glass damage is much worse. So as I kid Jane and Paul Levy, you know, you've done such a good job of eliminating one kind of graffiti, you kind of force these people to go to something that's a whole lot more damaging and difficult. And there are many people, including ourselves, that at one point said "We just can't do anything about it." Now we've learned how to do something about it, but many people, you still see them out there with razor blades and steel wool pads and all kind of chemicals to try to remove it. The acid literally eats the glass and creates that milky look. So it is a 35 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040947 very damage effect. And the psychology of graffiti vandals is they'll look for a way around which is why I think that the future perspective on this problem should go beyond just the availability into police enforcement, into better levels of understanding the control, and also into some possibly assistance to the blighted areas or the developing areas there, somebody's invested in new region, a new block. 17th and South Street, a woman opened beautiful restaurant and the next thing you know, it's tagged. So I'm afraid that the nature of the psychology graffiti is they're going to figure out a way to work around it, and we have to create more hurdles and more systems for the problem.
In the meantime we have to help those who have been attacked by it. Somebody's probably thinking of something now that will be more devastating than this. Maybe some laser or something they'll be writing on the walls and windows. No other questions? Thank you, gentlemen. 36 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 Bill 040777 will not be heard today. It's held by the sponsor. Next bill will be 040906. Any witnesses for that bill? Of course, Mr. Haigler. The Clerk will read the title of this bill.
Bill 040906, an ordinance amending Chapter 10-700 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "Refuse and Littering," by amending the provisions of Section 10-723.2 to prohibit the door-to-door distribution of handbills unless they are handed directly to an occupant, all under certain terms and conditions.
Good day, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040906, which if enacted will place an outright ban of the door-to-door 37 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 distribution of handbills in the City of Philadelphia unless given directly to the occupant of the premises. The Department of Licenses and Inspections is the local regulatory agency charged with the enforcement of the requirements of Section 10-723 related to the distribution of commercial handbills. Currently, the department has a record of 820 active licenses which have been issued to distributors of this type of printed material. Also, over the period between 2001 to the present, the Department has issued a total 2,102 tickets in the amount of $100 each for violations of the provisions of this section 17 of the Philadelphia Code. All tickets issued by the Department are processed by the Bureau of Administration Adjudication. In light of new information received from the City Solicitor's Offices related to C Constitutional concerns regarding the enforceability of the proposed bill and on the advice of Council, the Administration regretfully will be unable to support passage 38 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 of this bill. Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony. I'll be happy to answer any questions that I can at this time.
I'm looking for your testimony, Mr. Haigler. Just bear with me. The question had to do with the issuance of citations, 2100 or something, was it?
Over the period between 2001 through the present. I have a breakdown somewhere in my notes as to how much was issued for each year.
And those citations were issued to whom? Business owners who have --
The citations were issued to the responsible party for the distribution of the handbill, whoever that might be, based on the information that might 39 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 have been contained on the handbill.
I have with me -- and I would ask at the Sergeant-at-Arms to come over to the table so that he might pass this out to the Committee. I have with me a brochure that's issued by the Department to any person so desires, and on the back of the brochure it has on there how you could make a report to the Department for violations of the handbill ordinance. On the back it says that we would receive information from any concerned persons through facts or by calling our handbill coordinator located at 990 Spring Garden. If the person whose home is registered as a registrant to not receive handbills, if they want to complain about receiving a handbill after they have registered with the Department, then they can call our department or fax the information to our handbill coordinator, at which point the tickets are issued directly from the office to the person or whatever information we can 40 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 gather from what's on the handbill, if we can identify the responsibile party or the source of where the handbill is coming from, we will issue the ticket to that party.
Do you know if any of these violators are repeat offenders? They businesses that have repeatedly done that?
So basically, you rely on the public to notify L&I that a circular, a flyer, what-have-you was left at their doorstep?
And it's mostly by people, I assume, that will have the decals on their window, which I have on my front door which pretty much goes ignored.
Councilman, do they have one of them like a pizza pie on there with a line through it? Because that's 41 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 what I get. I couldn't eat that much pizza in a lifetime. Some places that aren't close to where I live.
Well, that's the interesting thing. I get notices from restaurants or pizzerias that are literally two to three miles from my house. I live in South Philadelphia. Everybody knows South Philadelphia; there's a pizza parlor on just about every block, so I don't need to order one from three miles away. And I have personally over the years gathered up flyers on my block and in my neighborhood and put them in a large brown envelope and shipped them back to the distributor, meaning the business with a note saying, "You really wasted a lot of money because most of this stuff winds up on the street and never even gets brought into the house in the first place." And it's really a scourge, if you will, on our City. Philadelphia's had this reputation of -- people refer to it as Filthy-delphia, which I'm offended when people say that, but on the one hand I can almost 42 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 understand why people think that way about our City because of all the trash that is generated by a whole of things, but then when you have businesses who are out there and haphazardly just throwing flyers or sticking them in the storm door or on the handrail which ultimately wind up in the street, we as citizens, as taxpayers, eventually pay the price, not only in our reputation, but in the actual cost of cleaning up the litter, the Streets Department, Sanitation, whatever. I know Councilman Kenney worked on this a number of years ago.
If I can give a little background on what some of the problems that we ran into in dealing with this. And I think it's certainly better than it was. It's not perfect, but there's a number of methods of distribution and it runs from large companies like ADVO and Donnelly and people who do that business with generally circulars that are put in bags. When we first started the effort, the commercial free speech provisions 43 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 apparently in the Constitution are extremely strong. I wanted to eliminate the whole process altogether. At the time, the Inquirer was involved in it. They had a subsidiary of their company that was distributing these things. So we sat down and we started to negotiate with the larger company. And as a result of the negotiations, we came up with new standards they agreed to on the weight and method of distribute. So what happened was a number of companies who wanted to advertise this way decided to consolidate, put their stuff in a bag. The bag was less likely to be blown around and more likely to be used by the resident. The other method of distribution are small individual stores that get a kid, a teenager or someone to take the pizza menus and stick them in everybody's railing. That's different distrubution than the larger companies. What you have, Councilman, on your desk that you brought in today, I notice was distributed in South Philadelphia on -- 44 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906
There was stuff going around on Friday that was being delivered by Donnelly trucks from New Jersey. And what I noticed at the time was they were being rubber-banded and there no where near the weight we agreed on in the prior legislation. So what happens I think sometimes is these companies even though know the rules start slipping back a little bit because it's close to Thanksgiving and Black Friday is coming and we gotta get this out so we'll ignore the weight regulations and agreements we made and we'll throw this out in the neighborhood because we're delivering it Friday for the Friday, Saturday and Sunday shopping opening of Christmas season. So greed again gets them where they got to get the stuff out. The smaller stores and the pizza places and the Chinese food places and all that other stuff, they're really aggravating because it's hard to get them cited. I would 45 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 like to see them cited for every individual house, not just one incident. And we developed -- actually, the brochure and the sticker we developed as a result of trying to allow people the right to refuse this stuff, because the argument they were making was people they don't say not to deliver it to our house. This sticker which of course you say you have on your door and is ignored is a way at least to get people -- and the people who put these on the door normally will call L&I and complain because they're motivated, they hate getting this stuff in their door. It's really, as Councilman said, an extremely frustrating situation. And I notice the other thing that it does is when that stuff is distributed all around the street and on the street a day like today, one of the reason why we have the rain storm water problem that we have is that our storm drains are clogged with all this crap, not only advertising circulars but fast food restaurant stuff, soda cups, pizza wrappers, I mean, you 46 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 name it, cheese steak wrappers. I live next to Pat's and Gino's. You go out on a Monday morning and there's nothing but Gino's wrappers and Pat's Steaks wrapper in the street. Now, it's not business' fault necessarily, it's people are slobs. But all that stuff then washes down the storm drains. We have rains like this today and we have our constituents calling up saying, "The City's got to do something about the water in my basement. It's all related because one problem begets another. Again, the frustration is, as you know from the Law Department already, Councilman DiCicco, they're going to tell you that it's unconstitutional to stop them from having this ability. But I think the larger companies need to continue to conform to the deals we made them years ago and the understandings that we had. And I think that it's people just start sliding back into the old habits again.
Councilman Kelly has one question. 47 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906
I just want to follow up on what Councilman Kenny was saying. These stickers, how effective are they? In other words, if you have teenagers delivering those pizza things, do they actually look on d a door or do they ignore it?
My experience is the larger companies, they abide by it. They will abide by it. If it's a small -- my wife one day had an argument with a guy delivering Italian restaurant menu, and the guy said, "Hey, Lady, I'm making like $20 for the day. Leave me alone. I don't care." That's the level of people you're dealing with. They don't care.
Know. They're even more protected than the advertising.
What about the ads that come? I see them going up the street and they keep throwing them on each patio.
That's what I 48 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 holding in my hand.
Do you really think that they're going to look to see if they have one of these in the window?
Well, they look at the door because they throw it in the direction of the door. And as Councilman Kenney said, the young kids that are doing it for the pizza shop or the Asian restaurant or any restaurant for that matter, they don't even know. I don't think they even know that there's a prohibition. This is Walgreen's, by the way. I don't who their distributor, but this was on my sidewalk as was on everyone's sidewalk.
Councilman, do either of you that got that, the Councilpeople in South Philly, do you call Walgreen's?
I think it was Donnelly. I saw Donnelly trucks in my neighborhood on Friday morning with a flyer that size with rubber bands. I don't know if it's exactly Walgreen's, but that's the size they were throwing on the pavement. 49 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 The only thing this does is it gives the resident who has it on their door the right to call L&I to have them cited. And people I have found who asked for these or participated are so rabid against the handbills, they're the first ones that call, provide the circular to L&I and the ticket goes out. So that's really the only benefit to this is people have a right to get them cited.
If I can just finish my thought. I appreciate the Chair and the Committee for allowing m to speak. I don't expect that this is going to go because Constitutionally this has been tried. Councilman Kenney and others have tried, but it kind of goes to the etching stuff and the graffiti. A lot has to do with, I think, education. And maybe L&I could help us when L&I issues or re-issues a license to a merchant for the person being in business, maybe there's some sort of notification that 50 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 could be placed along with that that says "You are prohibited from doing the following things," some educational component to this and maybe the folks who are here from the industry who are the people who are responsible, the people who know how to do this the right way and abide by the law and pay attention to these stickers can be somewhat helpful in helping us get some sort of an educational program out there again. Because this, again, it cost us money, the taxpayers in the end. As Councilman Kenney said, it winds up in the street in the storm drains. We get the complaints. People say, "The City never cleans the storm drains." And I know we do. At least in my community most of the time they're done once a year, sometimes more than once a year. It's a horrible situation. I got out of my car yesterday, and they just throw them and they're just laying all over the sidewalk. Most people are working people today, not like when I grew up. My mom was home. She was a housewife and her 51 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 job was maintaining the house and her and her friends came out every day and kept the streets clean because that's what they did. Today, most women work. When they come home, it's 5, 6 o'clock. The last thing that they're thinking about is going out to do the sidewalk because they've got to take care of the kids and other things. So it's just one of those -- I'll borrow Councilman Kenney's phrase -- incivilities, but I don't think this is one that we have to live with and should accept.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Councilman Kenney, you had indicated earlier that it was an agreement reached between the larger distributors. Can you clarify that? One of the reasons I ask the question is that in my area, we actually have different types of distribution. One is the 52 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 plastic bag with the circulars in. In a large part, a lot of people really look forward to those, particularly senior citizens that get the discounts at the supermarkets and whatnot. Is there a particular company, first, is a part of this agreement; and two, what's the requirement of that company versus Joe Blow Pizza Shop?
The largest company that I dealt with in negotiations was ADVO, and they were very cooperative. They understood the problem and they --
They're regional, I think. I'm pretty sure they're a regional company.
They were cooperative in understanding what our concerns were and trying to find a way -- the big problem at the time was having the stuff delivered in the fall where it was really 53 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 windy, stuff that was light it was blowing all over the place. I don't have the legislation in front of me, but we did come up with standards and I think were codified with L&I regulations on what the minimum weight was. They figured out what the how much needed to be in the bag so it wouldn't blow in the wind up to like 35 miles an hour. We had it down to like the wind velocity. So that really has been affective, the white bags. And I agree with you on people looking forward to getting them because when I was in the midst of fighting with them before we started cooperating, they stopped delivering my street. And people were calling to complain to them about not delivering and they said, go see me. And they did, they came and knocked on my door, a lot of senior citizens. So we got to a point where we actually worked together with it. And, again, with the exception of this one now, the smaller one that I saw this weekend being delivered by a larger distributor, most of the problems that the Councilman is talking about are small 54 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 corners like Sal's Pizzeria. And I don't know what you do with them other than bang them with go count the number of houses they delivered on one street and pose the fine based on the number of incidents. Maybe that gets their attention. Because paying a $100 fine, to them, when they've distributed 2500 menus, I guess it's the cost of doing business.
And I agree with you, it does create a problem as it relates to litter in the community. And actually, sometimes even the larger ones, they find their way in the storm drain. I also have another type of situation in parts of my district where you have individuals who have these informal businesses. They cook dinners like on every Thursday and Friday night and they put circulars, their homemade little leaflets out and that's the only way they have of advertising for their businesses. And I'm assuming that they wouldn't be a part of that distribution process that there was 55 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 arrangement with. How would that affect them?
It would prohibit them. I'll tell you what else I did once. I actually called up the owner of a pizzeria on the west side of Broad on Passyunk Avenue. And I said, "You know, I looked at your flyers. I can tell you that 90 percent of them are now just literally blowing around in the street. I understand you paid somebody. You paid them a minimum amount of money to distribute them, but there was a cost of printing it and getting it out there. You're actually losing money." I had a nice conversation with the guy because I just got tired of sending him this stuff back in the mail. And I called him and I said, "Don't you get it?" And I said, "Why don't you see what the cost would be to your business if you had it included in a circular in the South Philadelphia Review. There are advertisements that are stuck in there, or taking an ad." And I'll tell you, since then, he's either taken an ad or he has the circular stuff in 56 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 the Review because now everybody -- most people open the paper and see it, whereas the other stuff winds up in the street. Again, it goes back to educating. There's all different levels of education. I think business people if they recognize -- I don't think they realize that most of this stuff never even gets looked at. If they're lucky enough that the homeowner picks it up and takes it in, my guess is that it winds up almost immediately in the trash. And for the rest of it, it winds up blowing around the streets. And I'm wondering how many homeowners have received tickets for not keeping their sidewalk clean because some of this stuff winds up on their sidewalk and sweep unit people go around and they write up the ticket for not maintaining your sidewalk. I'm just curious. I'm sure that is happening as well. We're getting hit all the way around. I understand mom and pop operations that you're talking about, Councilman. We 57 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 don't want to hurt them, but I don't know if we can have it both ways. I don't know how you can do it.
I understand because they are prevalent throughout the City. People don't have the ability to advertise in any other way, unfortunately. I've actually been trying to formalize a lot of these businesses, but in a lot of areas, that, frankly speaking, is their way of life. If not for that ability to sell dinners and do things under the radar screen, they have no 17 other employment, so I have to look out for everybody as a Councilperson for certain areas.
I have a similar situation in many neighborhoods in my district too. I'm familiar with that.
Thank you, Councilman. Anyone else? 58 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 Any other questions for Mr. Haigler? Seeing none, is there another witness for this bill? State your name your name, gentlemen, for the record.
A-D-V-O. In the interest of brevity, I'm going to talk about -- we have brief testimony. I want to thank everybody for their time here, and what we wanted to do is to give a brief overview of ADVO as a company and then get specific into the process that Councilman Kenney referred to that we all agreed to, I believe it was about eight years ago. So we might be able to answer Councilman's questions about the actual rules and how we actually go above and beyond those rules to police the community and the 59 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 effects.
Mike, do you want to read this whole thing or do you just want to put it into the record? It's up to you.
I'll be happy to place it into the record. I think the process is in here. If there's a time issue, we'll certainly abide by that.
We will have that put into the record. I think there are some questions we might want to ask you which would save us some time. Councilman Kenney enlightened us with what he went through with you guys before trying to do this. Explain for me and maybe the rest of the Committee here and other Councilpeople exactly how you operate. You do what Councilman Kenney said, you're the white bag guys. You weight that bag out.
On average actually in the last year, our bag weight was eight ounces. We have a five-ounce requirement, so 60 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 we're well within those guidelines. In response to Councilman Kenney, it's mandatory that our distributors use these bags. The days are on Thursday and Friday. We do recognize the do-not-deliver list which we have at approximately 3,835 households. Yet internally we also have our own do-not-deliver list which is in excess of 19,000 households
We have folks that have contacted us. We an 800 number, customer service toll-free number on our bag and they contact us and require that we don't deliver any longer. What we do with our vendors is weekly we review a do-not-deliver list. We hold their crew foreman responsible basically where they're provided with lists within their territories. They need to double back and honor those requests, anything inadvertently that would be left. Some of the folks that are delivering utilize lists on the street. So there are various methods that they 61 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 deliver, but ultimately I think we're able to not deliver to the appropriate houses and respond to their needs.
Councilman, one of the other things that they agreed to do was not to deliver to obviously vacant properties. Because one of the problems that we had was these guys were just trying to get rid of the stuff as best they could, so you got an empty vacant house, obviously it was a vacant store, they no longer deliver to those properties. And also if they come back a week later and there's the one from the week before, they stop delivering there also.
I know at my house I get your guys on Saturday, I think Friday or Saturday. So maybe Councilman Kenney gets it a different day. We live in different parts of the City on different days.
They supply us with a delivery list as to what zip codes, what sections they'll be in. Specifically, you probably have -- Donnelly distribution handles your area more than likely. And within that 62 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 list, we're able to fall behind them with our own internal inspectors. So there's a couple safety nets in place. We have the list which go to the delivery folks. I have 31 inspectors out on the street monitoring delivery. Again, if there's issues with the do-not-deliver, we will pick the bag up.
If I'm on the do-not-deliver list and somehow it slips through your safety net, your company gets fined or Donnelly.
Their revenue is a lot of our expense so they pay attention to us and respect us. I did also want to make the point that we are a national company. We go out just under 80 million households every single week across the country. Philadelphia is a 63 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 very large market of ours, but we're in all the top markets across the country. Our primary business is Postal Service or direct mail company. In certain high density cities across the country, we do the private carrier distribution. It provides a better service to our clients which are the grocers, the drug stores, the Home Depots, Lowes, et cetera.
Let me ask you this. Sal's Pizzeria, would it benefit him to hook up with you guys or is it just out of the range for a little neighborhood pizza parlor?
We do have certain minimums that we're able to get down to, and if their geography is just, as Councilman DiCicco said, is two block, we're not that targeted.
You would be more a Pizza Hut or Dominoes because there's one everywhere, right?
That's correct. And 64 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 our minimums, you can put an advertisement out with us, print it in mail for about $500. We have many, many small pizza and Asian restaurant clients across the country. My guess is that they are able to do this for $20, and depending on their labor, it may supposed to be going in the screen door where it's secure, but I'm sure the business owners know it's not doing them any good flying around the street as well.
Thank you. Any questions for these witnesses? Councilman DiCicco.
One question. Is there anything that you as a company who's been a responsible company and all the stuff you worked out with Councilman Kenney, is there anything else you think we need to do in terms of education? Do you have any ideas on how we may be able to address this issue without harming the, quote/unquote, legitimate distributions of materials that we're concerned about? Any experience from other cities, how they may be handling this same 65 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040906 problem? I'm sure they have similar problems or have had similar problems.
I'm not aware of any. Because of this private carrier is a little unique in Philadelphia. We do it in Cincinnati and we just opened up in Las Vegas. I mean, I'm sure the larger cities all have the litter problem. I can recommend that if there is a package when a company asks permission to do business and goes through the typical city or county application, if there's some type of literature that we can place in there. And I envision it as "Don't litter your neighborhood if you're interested in advertising." We can certainly provide our name and an 800 number for them to call for help for those types of things. But other than that, there's plenty of vehicles for them to spend legitimate money in a reasonable fashion, whether it's a local paper or utilizing us to get their message out on the streets. I'd be happy to help them out if you need me.
I don't have a question for these gentlemen, but I just want to state for the record, Councilman DiCicco mentioned the sweeps officer and I don't know if the Committee or someone can check what the responsibilities are of the sweeps officers when they come through. I know that they go and they find individuals who place trash out on the wrong day, but could it be possible for them to get these circulars that are flying down the street and sidewalks and subsequently issue a citation for the debris that's caused as a result of this illegal distribution -- not illegal but this inappropriate distribution. And unfortunately, Mr. Haigler is here who is from L&I, not the Streets Department. But I would like for us to get some response from the Streets Department as to what their responsibilities are as it relates to sidewalks. I think it's 67 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 inappropriate for a homer owner to receive a citation because a circular happens to be on their sidewalk and times out of 8 they had 5 no relationship to that circular being on 6 their sidewalk other than somebody sticking it 7 in their door and it slides out. 8
Let me have the 9 Clerk, Mr. Lisko contact the Streets Department and get an answer for you. That's a legitimate question.
Thank you, gentlemen. MR. Lisko, you want to read the next one, 040756?
Bill 040756, amending Title 10 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "Regulation of Individual Conduct and Activity," by prohibiting the attendance of children under the age of 6 at certain movies shown at movie theater establishments after 7 p.m. and amending Title 9 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "Regulation of Businesses, Trades and Professions," by conditioning 68 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 licenses for the exhibition of motion pictures on compliance with that prohibition, all under certain terms and conditions.
I just wanted to say for the record, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me to speak. There's been, obviously, a long tradition I guess since movies were invented of having a night out at the movies with your wife or a date or your friends. And sadly in Philadelphia in many cases, that experience has become less satisfying than t used to be. Obviously, people who live in this City work hard and save their money and use their leisure dollars wisely and decide to go to a dinner and a movie and get in the movie theater and, you know, it's 8:00 at night and feel that it is appropriate to bring their children who are under 6 years old to a movie that may be rated R and disrupt everyone else's fun. Nothing against the children. Children who are or years old are supposed 69 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 to cry, are supposed to be needy, are supposed to have attention paid to them. But I believe it is inappropriate to pay attention to those children when you're out there trying to have a nice evening with your wife or a date or your friends. We've discussed issue before a number of years ago and had some assurances from the industry, both the motion picture industry and the theater owner organizations that they would make an effort to try to police this a little better. But I'm still getting complaints from people who on a night out have their evening disrupted feel that they are the ones who need to police this by approaching people who kids are involved in this kind of stuff. That's inappropriate for them to have to take on that responsibility when management should be doing it. The days of having a manager in the theater that goes through with a flashlight and tells people to keep their feet off the seats and quiet down and not disrupt, those days seem to be over in most movie theaters. 70 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 And I think it's appropriate that adults should be able to enjoy an evening out in Philadelphia without having to have that stress and confrontation. That's on a personal level. On a practical level, it's bad for the City's restaurant business and movie theater business when people decide because of the environment they're in in a movie theater in Philadelphia to go to Cherry Hill, to go to the suburbs, to go to movie theaters outside of Philadelphia so they can have some decorum and some and some viewing pleasure without being disrupted. I have met with the motion picture representatives and will meet with the theater owners association to try to figure out a way to effect this without doing an ordinance. The ordinance, again, reintroduction was to get some attention to the problem, and they have responded that they're willing to sit and talk and try and figure out a way we can maybe do some innovative things like in these multiplexes have adult-only theaters where 71 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 adults can go like they do at the -- not adult movies. Theaters where people can go and be with adults only. I think, obviously, families should go to the moves with their children when appropriate movies, G or PG movies and have that kind of experience. But if you're out as a working adult spending your leisure dollars, you should be able to go into a theater in the City and not be disrupted not only by children but by cell phones, by people talking out loud, by people getting up and moving. There's seems to be when I was a child or when I was young adult a different set of Rules in a movie theater than there used to be, and I would like to try to figure out a way to get back to those rules.
Councilman, on a personal note, and I co-sponsored this legislation with you, so I think hopefully a direct effect to your introduction of this bill. The last two weeks on a Saturday night I went to a movie with my wife at the same movie theater, United Artists, Grand Avenue. The first week I saw National Treasure which, 72 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 by the way, I highly recommend. The second week I saw Alexander; wait for the DVD, for obvious reasons. But what I noticed both times, different theaters in that multiplex, there was a uniform presence that actually came in like our days of old when the guy came around and said, "Rick, Jim, get your feet off the chair." This guy walked around and busted a couple people for bringing outside food in. But I never seen attention like that -- and it was in the last two weeks since our introduction of this bill, so I think they're hearing us.
This weekend I attended a movie called Sideways, which I will highly recommend, at Ritz Theaters. And the Ritz Theater's policy is no one under 6 is permitted in their movie theater at all without -- no one under 6 and anyone between 6 and 16 with the accompany of adult. Now, I'm not suggesting that we should strictly legislate every movie theater in the City to be like that, but I do think -- I have had people who have said to me: "I went there, I 73 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 had a terrible experience, and I'm never going back there again." I think the advent of the Ritz in Cherry Hill is probably a result of people having that bad experience. And what happens, I think, sometimes is that you're out there with your wife, you're out there with a date, and somebody, either children are being disruptive or the adults are being disruptive. You feel exposed to have to go and confront that person, to say "Could you please keep it down." The response isn't always a wonderful response. People carry weapons these days. I mean, it's a whole stressful environment for leisure activity in Philadelphia that does not happen ofttimes in the suburbs or the areas surrounding Philadelphia. It seems to be -- I mean I will not go to Riverview. I just will not put myself through that stress of having to confront someone after I paid $20 for two tickets to see a movie where I'm going to maybe get into a physical confrontation with somebody over their rudeness or the fact that they brought a 3-year-old child to a movie who 74 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 is hearing the noise and is crying as a result of that. I think we need some better rules. And they've agreed to have this discussion and to work to try to get something done over the next three or four months, and then we'll come back and report. But I don't know if anybody from the industry wants to confirm that or have anything to say.
He's holding the bill, but if you want to testify, you can. Councilman Kelly.
I just want to follow up on what Councilman Kenney was saying because I had an experience the same way. It happened many years ago. I took my four children to see Star Wars. I guess the youngest was 8 years old at the time. And there were people in there with infants, and they screamed throughout the whole movie. And I agree with Councilman Kenney because I almost did have a confrontation, having one with the manager. And he was trying to defend his policy. I want to tell you right now, if 75 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 you own theaters, I think that if we have to do it, I think anyone or under should be 4 accompanied with an adult. There's no doubt 5 in my mind that somewhere along the line 6 there's going to be all sorts of problems if we don't put some regulation. Because a lot of people just don't think, they really don't.
Well, I've had people complain to me that they paid $30 for a baby-sitter to go into a theater to sit next somebody else's kids who are screaming their head off.
My name is Amy Isdell and I'm the Vice President of State Legislative Affairs at the Motion Picture Association of America. We're the trade association that represents seven major movie studios, Fox, Disney, MGM, Paramount, Warner Brothers, Universal and Sony. We very much appreciate the 76 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 Councilman's concerns, and we have heard him and we have heard you loud and clear. There's nothing like being called before this body to get your attention, and you certainly have ours. We apologize that your experience has been what it has been. And after talking with Councilman Kenney, we have pledged to work with him and to work with you and anyone else you want us to work with to try to address this problem over the next few months to see what we might be able to do on a voluntary basis to solve the problem. That being said, the proposal before you, we believe does have some strong Constitutional and very practical concerns. We have put those in writing in our memorandum which we've submitted for the record, and we just ask that it be included.
Thank you. It will be. Councilman Clarke, do you have a question?
I just wanted to make a brief statement with respect to 77 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 Councilman Kenney's references to problematic individuals. I'm glad he brought up the older child, frankly speaking. The last time I went to a movie, it was not in Philadelphia, it was not even in Pennsylvania. It happened to be in this big multiplex in New Jersey. And the person that was causing the problem had to be at least years old. It was probably one of 10 the most unpleasurable experiences I've had in 11 recent memory. And as you have the 12 discussion, I would hope that you don't only 13 deal with the situation in the City of 14 Philadelphia, that you talk about the industry 15 in its total context because I'm assuming that 16 most operators tend to have theaters beyond 17 the City boundaries. I know United Artists 18 and Regal have them throughout this area. So 19 I would hope that you just don't have the 20 discussion to talk about Philadelphia, but you have the discussion in the context of the operation of theaters in general. We will be shortly announcing ground breaking for a theater at Broad and Cecil B. Moore. I don't know which one of you all have 78 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 the pleasure operating that, but we will like to make sure we have some very strict guidelines. And I agree with you, in the old days when you had the flashlight and the individual who actually knew who you were in the those theaters, it was a much different experience. I look forward to the outcome of this discussion.
Thank you. Let me commend you for your willingness to work through the particulars and bumps in the road because I think that's an important first step, to try to work it out without having it being legislated. I'm curious to know, however, is this concern a first, given the industry that you represent and what's been raised by Councilman Kenney and many others agree with? Is this the first time you're talking about this particular type of issue? 79 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756
Actually, interestingly, it is. This is the first time we've ever had a proposed ordinance dealing with this subject. There have been other attempts to regulate the admittance of minors to certain films usually using the voluntary movie system as a basis for either admittance or denial for a particular individual. And the courts have look at those proposed -- either the enacted statutes or ordinances and have overturned them on Constitutional grounds. But this particular proposal is unique, and to my knowledge, we haven't seen it in another city.
My name is Charles Fogle. I'm the President of the Association of Theater Owners of Pennsylvania. And I echo what Amy said. We are happy to sit down and talk about this problem and work out a 80 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 solution. There's four major circuits of Philadelphia and two independents. I'll get ahold of them and we'll set up a meeting with Councilman Kenney and we will work the problem out.
One of the amazing things is I know the industry understands the disruptions because they have that trailer or whatever you call it, the inconsiderate cell phone man. You might want to make one like that and have the inconsiderate parents who bring their 2-year-old to a movie for adults.
Mr. Chairman, one of the solutions to the cell phone issue is there's ways of making buildings inaccessible to cell phone --
They're illegal in this country, but you can get them.
They are buildings in the City you get a cell phone signal. If you couldn't get a cell phone signal in a theater, you're not going to have 81 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040756 the cell phone problem.
To my knowledge, there's a device that you could buy in Europe that you can get here. They're illegal to sell but you can have it that you can scramble all the cell phone for a mere couple hundred dollars inside of the theater. I've seen it in magazine seen. I think that anybody that brings their child to a movie, especially at that age, is not clearly or they got other things on their mind and they need to be reminded. It's not all on you. There has to be som individual behavior patterns. There's no 16 parenting brochures. I'm looking at Councilwoman Brown, and her child -- I don't she would bring her to the movies. She was small when we started here. She's probably in high school by now. What is she, in grade school?
She's very smart. She's in high school at eight. 82 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040134 Brilliant child, yes. (Laughter.)
You would never bring her to a movie theater when she was two, right? I mean, that's something you know. Thank you. And we'll just hold that bill to do what the sponsor wants to do. Fine. Thank you. Could the Clerk read the title of the next bill, 040134.
Bill 040134, an ordinance amending Title 4 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "The Philadelphia Building Construction and Occupancy Code," by amending Subcode PM by amending Section PM-704 entitled, "Business Standards Applicable to Designated Areas," by adding the East Passyunk Business Improvement District, as delineated in Bill No. 020431 to the list of areas covered, all under certain terms and conditions.
Good day, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am 83 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040134 Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040134, which if enacted will add the East Passyunk Business Improvement District to the designated areas subject to compliance with Section PM-704.3 of the Property Maintenance Code. In general, the Department of Licenses and Inspections enforces the provisions of this section during the permitting process for the installation of security gates and devices on the exterior of the premises within the designated area of PM-704.3.4. As part of the Department's responsibility to enforce the provision of this section, we will amend our records to include the designated area once the bill is passed by Council and signed into law by the Mayor. Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony on this bill, and I will be happy to answer any questions at this time.
Mr. Haigler, I 84 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040134 think Councilman Kelly has a statement.
Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Unfortunately, due to a commitment that I made I have to leave. I have a meeting up in the Northeast at 4:00. I would like to go on record as voting for any bill that is voted out of the Committee, voting aye on all bills that are going to be voted aye. And I also vote aye for any of the sponsors who may request a suspension of the Rules in order to permit first reading at the next Session of Council.
Thank you, Councilman. That will be duly noted. Councilman DiCicco, do you have a statement on this?
Not unless anybody has any questions for me. This is basically at the request of the business improvement district. It all go to graffiti gain. The solid security gates become a 85 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040869 canvass for graffiti. So this is an opportunity to remove that problem that we're having down there and still offer security because the gates we're talking about are the ones that you can literally see through which helps in terms of lighting and other things. If anybody has question for me, I'll be certainly glad to answer.
Seeing none, thank you, Councilman. Could the Clerk read the title of the next bill, 040869?
Bill 040869, an ordinance amending Section 9-601 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "Garages, Parking Lots and Sales Showrooms," by deleting certain requirements regarding private parking lots and garages, amending Title 4, Subcode PM, the Philadelphia Property Maintenance Code, to add a new section regarding private parking lots and making certain technical changes, all under certain terms and conditions.
Good day, Councilman 86 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040869 Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040869 which, if enacted, will eliminate the licensing provision for private parking lots and place the safety and maintenance requirements for same under the Property Maintenance Code. The Department of Licenses and Inspections in its efforts to streamline the regulatory process to improve the service provided to our stakeholders work with the City's Labor Relations Unit Redesigning Government Initiative, RGI, to review the requirements of this license and recommend ways in which to provide relief for businesses and organizations wishing to have private parking as an ancillary use to their main operation. The goal of this initiative was to streamline the process required to gain approval for the use while continuing to regulate maintenance and safety issues 87 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040869 involving private parking lots. The current provisions of Section 9-601 of the Philadelphia Code defines private parking lots as any outdoor area or space where more than six motor vehicles may be parked, housed, or kept without any charge. The Code further provides that no person shall maintain a private parking lot unless he or she has obtained a license from the Department of Licenses and Inspections. As a condition for the granting of a license to maintain a private parking lot on the premises, the location has to be in compliance with zoning and building code requirements which include having a use registration permit for the private parking activity. The process to grant initial approval for the use registration permit involves several departments and is time consuming for persons wishing to maintain this use. Conversely, after having been granted approval for the use registration permit, the applicant is put through the same 88 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040869 process for the purpose of obtaining a license for the continued maintenance of the private parking use. This is not only overly bureaucratic, but has been found to serve no 6 significant purpose. The elimination of this license requirement and relocation of the requirements for maintenance from Section 9 9-601 to the Property Maintenance Code will enable the Department to better manage inspections for this use and reduce the time needed to process other licenses the Department administers. The property maintenance inspections for private parking lots will be conducted by the Department's residential and commercial inspector and will enhance its ability to respond to complaints related to the maintenance and safety of the lots. Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony on this bill, and I will be happy to answer any questions at this time.
Thank you, Mr. Haigler. Any questions for Mr. Haigler from 89 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 this Committee? (No response.)
Seeing none, we will move into the next bill. Would the Clerk read the title of the next bill?
Bill 040870, an ordinance repealing Section 10-813 of the Philadelphia Code entitled, "Swimming Pools," and amending Section PM-302 of the Philadelphia Property Maintenance Code entitled, "Exterior Property Areas," to include provisions for the safety and maintenance of swimming pools and enforcement of same, under certain terms and conditions.
Good day, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040870 which, if enacted, will eliminate the licensing provision for private swimming pools and place the safety and maintenance requirements for same under 90 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 the Property Maintenance Code. The provisions governing the licensure of private swimming pools was originally enacted into law in 1964 and amended in 1973. At that time or at the time when the provisions were originally enacted into law, private swimming pools were not widely prevalent in the City and the codes enforced by Licenses and Inspections did not specifically address pool maintenance and safety issues. Through the evolutionary process, a model code adoption by the City of Philadelphia and now the common use of pools and spas/hot tubs, more attention had been paid to pool safety and maintenance throughout the country. The model codes adopted by the City provide for uniform application and enforcement of provisions governing private swimming pool safety and maintenance. Specifically, Section B-3109 of the Philadelphia Building Code governs swimming pool enclosure and safety devices. The term swimming pool in this section is defined as 91 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 any structure intended for swimming, recreational bathing or wading that contains water over inches, including in-ground, 5 above-ground and on-ground pools, hot tubs, 6 spas and fixed in place wading pools. 7 Subsection B-3109.4 applies to residential 8 swimming pool safety and provides for a 9 variety of safety devices to be installed at 10 the residential premises to prevent 11 unauthorized access to the swimming pool. 12 Many of the devices mentioned in B-3109.4 were 13 developed subsequent to enactment of the 14 original swimming pool ordinance in 1964 and 15 takes advantage of new technology which may 16 already be present on the premises such as the 17 use of alarm sounding devices connected to 18 entry doors leading to the pool area and 19 locking mechanisms on gates and ladders for 20 above-ground pools. By amending the Property 21 Maintenance Code to reference the safety 22 requirements of the building code, the 23 Department will be able to enforce these 24 provisions retroactively to existing residential properties. 92 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 We believe this will not have an adverse effect on this occupancy since the requirements are minimal, may exist already on the premises and are easily adaptable if not already present. Additionally, the Department will continue to require construction and zoning permits for the construction erection of pools that are more than inches in depth. At the 11 time pool activity commences, inspections will 12 take place to ensure that all safety measures 13 as prescribed by law are present and the pool 14 is in compliance. 15 The elimination of license 16 requirement and relocation of requirements for 17 existing residential pool safety and 18 maintenance from Title 10 to the Property 19 Maintenance Code will enable the Department to 20 better manage inspections for this use and 21 respond to complaints related to stagnant 22 water and maintenance by shifting 23 responsibility for responding to this type of 24 complaint from the Department's business regulatory inspector to the Department's 93 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 residential and commercial property maintenance inspectors. The department will also coordinate its inspections with the Department of Health to address health-related issues and concerns with regard to the accumulation of stagnant water resulting from lack of pool maintenance. Thank you for the opportunity to present testimony on this bill. I'll be happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Haigler. Mr. Haigler, what did you just say? What was this all about, in laymen's terms? We're making the pools safer in people's back yards?
Yes, sir. In laymen's terms, it will allow the Department to better manage its inspectional resources to investigate any issues related to pool safety and maintenance by taking the responsibility from one group of inspectors and placing it with another group of inspectors.
And you're including hot tubs, because Councilman Ramos 94 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 and I are hot tub guys, not together but separately
Thank you. Any other questions from this Committee for this witness? Councilman Clarke.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Actually, Mr. Chairman, I had a question that related to Bill 040869. Is that in reference, to some degree, commercial lots, sales of vehicles?
To a limited degree. It's primarily for the convenience of the customers to park on the lot, not the actual sale of the vehicles from the lot, but it's an ancillary part of the lot that customers will park.
There's a separate section of the Code that deal with the sale. That's different from this, from this 95 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 provision. This is primarily for private parking lots which are ancillary to -- it's basically a parking lot where you have a business and they provide --
Let me just ask the you the question that I want to ask you. With respect to commercial lots. The sales of vehicles, be it new or used, what are the requirements or the prohibitions as it relates to use of sidewalks for sales of vehicles or showing of vehicles?
They are prohibited from using the sidewalks for that. They're not allowed to use the sidewalks for any purpose. That's the public right-of-way. They're not allowed to --
They're not allowed to use the street either, but you ride up to Erie Avenue between G Street down to North Catholic, and that's all you see. That is taken over.
Seeing that it's 96 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 so prevalent and so noticeable, do we have like an aggressive --
To my knowledge, you have to call the Police Department on that, the individual district captains and have them have a crack-down. I don't think L&I goes and tells So-and-so Car Dealer that his cars are on Frankford Avenue.
Only unless there's a zoning proviso or something that we were out there to inspect for.
Councilman, I deal with the police captain on that district; that's how I do it. If it's district-wide thing, you tell the inspector --
But isn't it a part of the Civil Code? We don't normally ask the police to enforce the Civil Code.
Parking on the sidewalk is a violation of the Motor Vehicle Code.
It's under the 97 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 Motor Vehicle Code because it's a state regulation held by the City. But what they're doing is -- you could put a car out on the sidewalk, but there's a license on them. Most of them don't. They have a dealer tag on one.
This is my problem -- Councilman Mariano is indicating that our ability, frankly speaking, to get the Police Department to aggressively enforce this has been extremely limited. And I assume it's because they have other things to do dealing with violent crimes. Is there any way that the regulatory agencies such as L&I, Streets Department, could be involved in citations for sidewalk intrusions? Right now, Streets Department has the ability if somebody places a -- they need to get an ordinance to have an extension of steps or anything that needs to be placed on the sidewalk is done in a regulatory way with other departments beyond police.
Anything that is involving the public right-of-way comes under the jurisdiction of the Streets Department. 98 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 The public right-of-way is under their jurisdiction.
But they can't enforce any violations as it relates to the public right-of-way?
They can. The public right-of-way, they have a right-of-way unit that enforce the provisions related of sidewalk cafes that are placed on the public right-of-way. We enforce provisions related to newsstands that are on the public right-of-way
That's Streets Department, you're talking about, right?
Absolutely. They issue permits for the placement of street furniture on the public right-of-way.
So can't the Streets Department issue citations for placement of vehicles on the sidewalk?
I really can't answer that. I think we need to explore what to see what the full implications are. I don't know what the full implication of the law is 99 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 related to something like that.
Councilman, I think of because what we were doing with the pocket rockets, the motorcycles, there's a lot to do. And Councilman DiCicco might know this answer. The Councilman wants to know about like car dealers that put their cars out on the street. It goes under the Motor Vehicle Code.
He knows it's illegal. He just can't anybody to enforce it. I said I call the police captain.
If the Streets Department is responsibile for regulating the conduct, the ability to have encroachments on the sidewalk why the Streets Department can't enforce a violation of a vehicle on the sidewalk.
I think the answer to that maybe is that the issuance of the ticket, the citation, falls under the Motor Vehicle Code. When we did that 100 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 legislation, it became a violation under the Motor Vehicle Code. And the only people that can write those citations are police officers.
You know what amazes me, though, while we're on that, my son got a ticket for not having an inspection sticker, but his car was parked. The Parking Authority wrote that, and I didn't know they could do that. And when I looked at the ticket, surely they could.
If it's in conjunction, I believe -- if the main purpose was the parking violation so they're writing the parking violation, if they see that you have an expired sticker, they can write that. They can't stop you. They can't do a stop violation.
On that particular case, he just got the expired inspection sticker. No parking that time.
I wasn't paying attention to what your questions were, Councilman Clarke, but I think that --
My issue has to 101 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040870 do with the previous bill. The placement of vehicles on the sidewalk.
Right. I was told that the police should enforce it. The police are not enforcing it, for whatever reason. My question is, if it's a violation, sidewalks are traditionally regulated and cited by the Streets Department --
Councilman Clarke, I have something to answer your question. In this bill, I believe it's on of the bill, down at the bottom there under PM-313.4 where it talks about use of streets. The owner of a private parking lot shall not use or permit the use of any part of any street or sidewalk for parking or storing a motor vehicle in connection with the operation of motor vehicle repairs or sale businesses. So from that perspective alone, then our property maintenance and commercial inspector can write the violation just on that.
That was the 102 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 original question bill.
We learn every day. Thank you, Councilman. Let's go back to bill we're working on here. Any questions for Mr. Haigler on the swimming pool bill? (No response.)
What's next, John? Bill 040871, would you please read that bill?
Bill 040871, an ordinance amending Section 9-703 of the Philadelphia Code entitled "Dance Halls," by redefining the types of establishments ane activities that require a license under that section and changing the name of the license to a special assembly occupancy license, all 103 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 under certain terms and conditions.
Good day, Councilman Mariano and Members of the Committee. I am Otis Haigler, Jr., Director of Legislative Affairs for the Department of Licenses and Inspections. Today, I'm here to provide testimony on Bill 040871 which, if enacted, will amend Section 9-703 of the Philadelphia Code by redefining the types of establishments and activities that require a license and by changing the name of the license to special assembly occupancy in order to better regulate this use. The tragedy of the Rhode Island Station Nightclub fire resulting in the loss of life has left an indelible impression in the minds of all those who witnessed it and particularly those of us in the regulatory code enforcement. As a result of this tragedy, many studies were conducted to analyze the cause of this disaster and to seek ways in which to prevent this from happening again. 104 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 The City of Philadelphia, along with other jurisdictions in the nation took a hard look at the laws GOVERNING nightclubs and similar uses to determine whether amendments were needed which could possibly prevent such an occurrence from happening in their jurisdiction. The Mayor subsequent to the Rhode Island disaster directed the Managing Director to conduct a study of the City's fire, building and other relevant laws regulating safety in nightclubs and to issue a report with recommendations for improvements as needed to protect our citizens and visitors who gather at this type of establishment. Under the direction of Managing Director, a variety of City agencies, which included Licenses and Inspections, Fire, Police, District Attorney's Office, Commerce, and the City Solicitor's Office, came together to evaluate the laws and inspection processes governing this industry. Fortunately, the City of Philadelphia has been at the forefront with regard to regulating this industry and has had a specific section of the Philadelphia 105 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 Code devoted to this industry since the mid-1990s. In May of 2001, Council passed additional amendments to Section 9-703 entitled "Dance Halls" to provide further assistance to Licenses and Inspections with its enforcement responsibility regarding this industry. Also, as recently as December of 2003 and subsequent to the Rhode Island disaster, Council passed legislation which amended the City's fire and building codes to incorporate many of the recommendations in the Managing Director's report and to address the issues related to overcrowding, crowd control, improvements to this occupancy fire protection system that included the shutdown or shutoff devices for the sound equipment upon the activation of the fire alarm system and to require the periodic announcements to highlight the location where the exits are located in cases of emergency. To ensure that these requirement would be applied to the uses and that are the subject of particular can concern for safety, 106 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 the term "special assembly occupancy" was added to and defined in the aforementioned codes in order to enhance the safety requirements to these types of establishments. The term "special assembly" or "special use" is in line with a trend throughout the nation to classify these types of establishments, so defined based on heightened concern for safety for employees and patrons and to provide reasonable degree of protection for these individuals in emergencies. The 2003 edition of the National Fire Protection Association Uniform Fire Code and the National Fire Protection Association Life Safety Code added the term "special use" and defines it as a use that includes but is not limited to events or occurrences during which life safety threatening situations or fire hazards exist or are likely to exist as determine by the authority having jurisdiction.
Are you done, Mr. Haigler, or do you have another 10 pages?
Yes, I'll just answer 107 12/01/04 - LICENCES - BILL 040871 any questions.
And you'll give us your testimony for the record anyhow. It's very important. We're not making light of what you're doing. Any questions for this witness on this very serious issue? (No response.)
Seeing none. Seeing no other witnesses, this concludes the public hearing. - - - - 108 COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC MEETING COMMITTEE ON LICENSES AND INSPECTIONS - - - - Wednesday, December 1, 2004 - - - - Public meeting conducted by the Committee on Licenses and Inspections, held in Room 400, City Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on the above date, to consider action on the following: BILLS 040134, 040756, 040869, 040870, 040871. PRESENT: COUNCILMAN RICHARD T. MARIANO, Chair COUNCILWOMAN JOAN KRAJEWSKI COUNCILMAN DARRELL CLARKE COUNCILMAN JACK KELLY COUNCILWOMAN BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN COUNCILMAN JAMES KENNEY COUNCILMAN FRANK DICICCO 109 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING
We now enter the public meeting. I understand that, Councilman DiCicco, you have amendment for Bill 040134. The Chair recognizes Councilman DiCicco.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I believe all members of the Committee have a copy. I ask that the amendment be approved.
It's approved, the amendment is approved. I moved that amended Bill No. 040134 be reported out of this Committee with a favorable recommendation and further recommend that the Rules of Council be suspended so as to permit first reading at our next Session. (Duly seconded.)
A motion has 110 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING been made and seconded. All in favor? (Aye.)
Seeing none opposed, the bill passes as amended and a suspension of the rules. The Chair recognizes Councilman Clarke for a motion on Bill No. 040869.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion that Bill No. 14 040869 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation and a request for a suspension of the Rules as to allow reading at the next Session. (Duly seconded.)
Thank you, Councilman. It has been moved and seconded that Bill 040869 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation and further that a recommendation that the Rules of council be suspended so as to permit first reading at our next Council Session. 111 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING All those in favor say aye. (Aye.)
Seeing none, the bill passes, as amended, and with a suspension of the Rules. The Chair recognizes Councilman Clarke for a motion on Bill 040870.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion that Bill No. 13 040870 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation and a request for a suspension of Rules as to allow reading at the next Session of Council. (Duly seconded.)
It has been moved and seconded that Bill 040870 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation and further that a recommendation that the Rules of Council be suspended so as to permit first reading at our next Council Session. All in favor say aye. 112 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING (Aye.)
Seeing none, the bill passes. The Chair recognizes Councilman Clarke for a motion on Bill No. 040871.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion that Bill No. 11 040871 be reported out of committee with a favorable recommendation and a request for a Rules suspension to allow reading at the next Session. (Duly seconded.)
It has been moved and seconded that Bill No. 040871 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation, and further that a recommendation that the Rules of Council be suspended so as to permit first reading at our next Council Session. All in favor say aye. (Aye.)
Opposed? 113 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING (No response.)
Seeing none, the bill passes. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Brown for a motion on Bill 040907.
I move that Bill 040907 be moved out of Committee with a favorable recommendation with a suspension of Rules so that the bill can be voted on at our next regularly scheduled Session of Council. (Duly seconded.)
It has been moved and seconded that Bill 040907 be reported out of Committee with a favorable recommendation and further that a recommendation that the Rules of Council be suspended so as to permit first reading at our next Council Session. All in favor say aye. (Aye.)
Seeing none, the bill passes. 114 12/1/04 - LICENSES - PUBLIC MEETING I'd like the record to show that Bills 040756, 040777, and Bill No. 040906 are being held. This concludes the public meeting of the License and Inspection Committee, thank you. (Council adjourned at 3:30 p.m.) - - - - 115 C E R T I F I C A T I O N I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Wednesday, December 1, 2004, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of the same. RE: COMMITTEE ON LICENSES AND INSPECTIONS _________________________ Lisa C. Bradley, RPR