Gorging at the Public Trough

Is there any such thing as private investment in Northwest Philadelphia in the last 25 years?  I doubt it. I have been searching for just one commercial project that did not involve the use of public money, selective use of the authority of elected officials to circumvent standing legal codes or requirements, back door zoning, or the outright intentional fraud on documents submitted to city, state or federal officials. Then we have situations where regulations and laws have been broken, but waiting a while when no one is looking they go away and the illegal morphs into legal, campaign contributions and fund raisers for the just elected take place, and no one asks any more questions.

 

Make no mistake, getting something rezoned through corrupt political practice is the same thing as taking money for a publicly-funding project under false pretenses, and then using it a different way. Who knows what it could have cost to properly inform the public under written law, submit financial statements when required, do necessary environmental and other preparation, and file necessary federal forms in complete detail.  There are some very strict requirements regarding how those who apply for public money have to inform how they intend to use funding, and how they do use it when funding takes place. Someone in our system of laws should be matching this up and another group should be taking action when they don’t.  That almost never happens.

 

In this city and state both compliance and law enforcement for non-compliance are off the table, and elected officials at the highest levels work hard to make sure it stays that way. This also applies to many in the judicial system who won’t even think about prosecuting clear cases of malfeasance and fraud where public money vanishes in 6 and 7 figure amounts, and judges wink at any suggestion of Grand Jury investigations. 

 

This is no secret and the rationale even among those who claim to be “good government types” is to look the other way, for those same high level elected officials who whistle past the graveyard when it comes to compliance and law enforcement, fund the law firms, universities, hospitals, corporations and think tanks they work for - - and are themselves exempt from compliance from how that public money is spent.  When do you think Controller Alan Butkovitz is going to examine all of Ballard Spahr’s billing records?

 

For you see everything that is done in this city has a government aspect to it, and buying influence can take any number of forms. It’s not just the Ward Leader passing out “walking around money" to voters on Election Day or the Traffic Court Judge fixing tickets. Folks at the upper echelons of our society and developers know you can lie on an application for public funds that the money is going to provide for some "low income need” and then switch how it is spent and no one will even consider asking about it. For you see compliance is 100% optional in all of the Northwest and most of Philadelphia.  File quarterly reports on the use of public money; fill in all categories with legitimate information in your non-profit 990, meeting environmental, zoning and L & I codes?  — all of that can be by-passed with a wink and a nod, and if some “citizen activist” raises the question, you can buy an elected official or judge who will make it all go away, with a lot of help from their friends.  All of that just happened with Chelten Plaza, but it is just another example of years and years of using the same tactics of fraud and the use of political power and public money.

 

Disproportionate distribution of that money can make some folks smile when their own community benefits, but when one asks the questions how a lot of public money got concentrated to the favored few rather than distributed fairly, then the same folks who claim they are for up-front justice and democracy can’t be found crusading for the transparency and balance that somehow evaporated when the “favored” had a pet project.

 

You see, it is not just the communities in the lower economic tier where the poverty profiteers and scamming developers like Emanuel Freeman’s Germantown Settlement took money in 7 figure chunks in the dark for 25 years with political help.  One of the most unbalanced uses of federal and state transit dollars in the last two years was the building of the Taj Mahal of all SEPTA stations at Allen Lane to the tune of $12 million or more when done. When I asked a SEPTA official how all that money was appropriated for one station that only needed selective work when 5 more in the Northwest were too scary to use, I was informed that the money was not requested by SEPTA, but granted resulting from political influence through Chaka Fattah, Cherelle Parker, and the support of WMAN and the community group.  When I mentioned that the station was not in Cherelle Parker’s district there was a long silence - - and no explanation. (The state rep in whose district it stands was never informed, and according to SEPTA officials the funding was 80% federal, 15% state and 5% city.)  

 

You see, this is business as usual. Large chunks of public money are requested and approved under programs where the recipients often don’t qualify, yet the funds are dispersed with the stroke of the pen, and I contend most of the voters know this very well. I am sure most of the developers and local community leaders know how the drill works and have knowingly participated.  Some very familiar local names with what many consider credible pedigrees have sidestepped the law and process and are continuing to do so. The best quote in recent years on this subject came from former Inquirer reporter Clea Benson during the last John Street election: “Most voters in Philadelphia know full well their government is corrupt from top to bottom — they leave it that way for the day when they need it for themselves.”  Then we have my all-time favorite: All of the animals on the farm are equal, but some animals are more equal” — From George Orwell.

 

The Northwest is Orwellian, and a microcosm of the country.  Unbalanced use of power and money makes hypocrites of most serving in public office and those who circle large portions of the public money they receive back to them in any number of ways; legal and illegal.

 

Now, I am not saying there are no developers, CDCs or community groups that play by the rules of compliance and transparency — there are.  What I am saying is that they are in the minority and are unlikely to be considered when decisions are made at the highest levels. We will have plenty more to say on this subject in the next 11 months.

 

You can help change that at the next election, but you must start at the top.

 

Jim Foster

Editor