Crumbling Empires

 

Northwest Philadelphia’s political and governmental history over the last 25-30 years might best be described with an analogy to that famous novel “The Portrait of Dorian Grey”.  For those who are not familiar, an individual perennially appears young and capable, uses techniques to charm and captivate those around him into a comfortable life, while in fact misusing and manipulating most everyone. A portrait of him painted in his youth is hidden in the attic and while he apparently does not age, the portrait does, and reflects the most grotesque disfiguring as the years pass. Upon his death he instantly assumes that appearance.

Two parallel Dorian Grey like systems that for years have been regularly fooling the majority with promises and some visible superficial images, were in fact constantly misusing the assets of the communities, and manipulating hundreds of millions in public dollars from every conceivable source. Ponzi-like schemes with political help from the highest levels kept piling one fiscal lie upon another; covering the real horror of misuse and deception. In an incredible coincidence both of these empires were finally formally rebuffed by our legal systems this past week, and it will not be too much longer that the ugliness and duplicity foisted on the majority will become known.

Germantown Settlement was formally evicted from its headquarters in the Burgess Center at Wayne and Chelten after the Chapter 11 reorganization it tried to foist on the public was denied by a judge who ordered liquidation.  Its checkered history has been only partially documented by news reports, a Philadelphia Magazine expose last October, and a series in our newspapers; but there is much more to learn before the real portrait is painted.  Many more exposures of negligence, defaults and legal challenges from debtors and employees who were disenfranchised will be making their way though the courts in the months ahead.  It won’t be pretty.

Just days earlier, the Federal Justice Department indicts two individuals from this community for misusing nearly $600,000 in federal grant money received through the New Media Charter School that was being diverted to other business and personal activities while neglecting the educational obligations to area students.  Not outlined within those legal charges is the fact that the same two individuals, Ina Walker and Hugh Clarke, were the recipients of state funding for that same failing charter school through Dwight Evans, Chair State Appropriations, totaling $3.5 million in 2008/09, according to state records; while the school was listed as among the worst performing in the state, and was only relicensed on a conditional basis. Additionally, Dwight Evans through OARC funded the same two individuals as investors in the Mt. Airy night club North by Northwest in the amount of nearly $700,000.  This venture bailed out previous investors who were reportedly close associates of State Representative Evans, but instant legal problems kept the club from ever reopening.

It is becoming increasing clear that things are not what they appear in Northwest Philadelphia.  Political funding schemes in this city have been making the news lately, but these Northwest empires, Germantown Settlement’s corporate monopolies and Dwight Evans state appropriations, OARC and its affiliates, have long been running under the radar but not completely without concerns and challenges. It’s said that the cover up can be as critical as the misdeeds, and in these cases it seems as if the cover-ups have run for years and the amounts that kept flowing in the dark were and are staggering.

Settlement has a long history of non-compliance with even the most basic of federal requirements and even substituted the records of another Mt. Airy non-profit as its own in federal filings in recent years. Although the expressed purpose of OARC funding to local enterprises was to jump-start economic development that would lead to self-sufficiency, it seems that permanent financial triage became the norm, but keeping that quiet with clever reporting and accounting was a false picture of success that kept most convinced, or at the very least, confused.

Hopefully, the U.S. Attorney will continue to use the tools at his disposal to complete investigations that have been ongoing into these matters for some time. Our new administration inHarrisburg took control from Dwight Evans, but not before many in his own party removed him from the position of controlling public funds. Many of the details of these changes are just coming to light, and we are told there is resistance to disclosure and quite a few missing records.

Is anyone really surprised? A number of Philadelphia politicians are serving time presently, some returned from serving to assist the political system again in some fashion.  High level officials misuse authority and it takes a federal inquiry to get records from the most politically connected law firm in the city.  Some federal funding agencies are refusing FOIA requests as well.

However, it may very well be that the two pathways to funding the Northwest may be the biggest and longest running financial misappropriations this city has seen in over 50 years. The picture that is unfolding should outrage every citizen and voter. The veneer is just beginning to peel back, and what is underneath is likely to be as ugly as it gets.

Jim Foster

Publisher, Germantown Newspapers