Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

this_shit t1_isa8e44 wrote

Reply to comment by PhillyAccount in The captain of a busy Philly police district is often absent. Yet he’s in line for promotion. by BroadStreetRandy

This guy is a byproduct of much more than city government. The city tried to fire him twice, but state law has created a system that makes it impossible to fire cops for almost any crimes.

The thing to understand is that the entire department is lousy with complete fuckups like this turd. 11% is out on 'long-term disability' (thanks again to state law) and over 800 clerical and office roles are filled by sworn officers -- many because they're too stupid/dangerous to do street work.

When you look at crime and dysfunction in Philadelphia it's hard to understate the pernicious influence of corrupting state laws imposed on Philly by an ideological group of rural Pennsylvanians dead set on making our city as dangerous and unlivable as possible. In the schools, taxes, parking, and here in policing it's just corrupt.

161

Level-Adventurous t1_isaap6l wrote

Can you cite some of these laws? I’d like to have them in my pocket when I get in my weekly arguments with conservative in-laws

30

this_shit t1_isaglu5 wrote

  • PA Act 111 created a parallel legal system that adjudicates any disciplinary actions or dismissals of police officers through binding arbitration. The process is supposed to be fair, but over decades has accumulated bad precedents to become a firewall to firing cops. It's become essentially impossible to fire a Philly cop who isn't convicted of a crime. As recently as 2020 there were bipartisan efforts to fix this law, but pro-cop Republicans and some Democrats defeated it.

  • The Heart & Lung Benefit - a state law that lets the police union pick doctors who can then 'diagnose' long-term disabilities - has been abused to the point where 11% of our police force is out sick for months at a time. Not only that, they get paid more while out sick.

  • The Uniformity Clause in the state constitution prohibits Philadelphia from raising property tax rates on commercial properties, unlike many other cities. This means that Philly either has to raise taxes on poor residents (who can't afford it), or forgo lucrative revenues from high-dollar commercial properties in center city. There have been large coalitions of businesses and politicians trying to fix this for years, to no avail.

  • The School Reform Commission (SRC) was created to 'responsibly manage' the city's schools by taking control away from Philadelphians and putting it in the hands of republican legislators from the middle of nowhere for nearly two decades. That experiment ended a few years ago with no serious improvement in school outcomes, but with 1/3rd of our school seats closed and handed over to unaccountable charters that do things like teach abstinence only sex ed and steal district money.

  • The Philadelphia Parking Authority is a state agency with no local governance - ostensibly it exists to collect parking revenue and hand it over to the schools. In reality it's a local republican patronage mill that fails to effectively enforce parking restrictions (see: south broad, sidewalk parkers, etc.), somehow manages to make very little profit, and spends suspiciously large sums on "consultants" who are friends of the board. PPA has never hit its revenue targets for sending money to the schools. Last year they even tried to claw money back from the school district.

In each of these cases, Philadelphia politicians are powerless to fix the problems created by state laws because state laws supersede local laws. Kenney may be a no-show at this point, but frankly there's not a lot he can do about the police.

134

mustang__1 t1_isbmioo wrote

This report from 2years ago on the Ppa is.... Enlightening...https://controller.phila.gov/philadelphia-audits/report-on-the-philadelphia-parking-authoritys-on-street-parking-expenses-and-other-matters/

15

ScienceWasLove t1_iscla8q wrote

I worked in the Philly SD for 18 months. I believe you had to work for at least 6 months or 1 year before you could claim full disability. I was surprised of the wait time, but it exists because of rampant long term disability fraud.

2

The_Clamer t1_isaepj5 wrote

I think it’s a bit unfair to blame rural PA voters for the problems in Philly. They could never appreciate the nuance that certain laws/regulations that work for them won’t work for a city. Also no one in rural PA cares about Philly. They care about issues in their tiny towns and getting in fights on Facebook about pipelines.

Source: Grew up there.

−34

pessimistic_bastard t1_isafbtx wrote

Many rural PA townships/counties defunded their police departments years ago and now rely on our state troopers who are paid from the state fund to patrol the areas. Half a billion dollars (2019 dollars, not adjusted for 2022 inflation) we as a state pay for the troopers to patrol these communities.

Source

38

ikover15 t1_isah9xr wrote

Some of those places aren’t even THAT rural. Quite a few spots in the 4 surrounding counties have state troopers at least overnight.

14

The_Clamer t1_isaq5e6 wrote

I don’t contest this in fact I agree with you but do you think the people choosing to do that thought “well maybe Philly will pay for it?” It seems a bit disingenuous to assume malicious intent. The people making those decisions probably thought “we need to cut budget, where can we do it?”

−4

pessimistic_bastard t1_isbfkam wrote

Cutting the police budget is "defunding the police", malicious or not and someone has to pick up the tab. I assume when Medicare / Medicaid is cut, it won't be malicious but they wont care to stop and think who will have to pick up the tab.

3

1up t1_isahr7x wrote

People in rural PA definitely care about Philly judging by how I've heard about Philly being a lawless hell-hole in some way basically everytime I've gone to visit my rural in-laws over the past decade plus.

18

earf123 t1_isaukym wrote

A large amount of people believe that major cities are akin to no man's lands. They live in a completely different reality.

One night I was out at a party with a group of friends, and one of their SOs is one of those people that are convinced cities are warzones. While walking back after the parry we saw a man get in his car. What I and everyone else in the group saw was a guy having to jiggle his keys a bit to get the door unlocked and get in his car, what they saw was some dude deffinitively stealing a car in a lawless hellscape they were lucky to have walked through unmolested.

7

mustang__1 t1_isbqazx wrote

Parts of Philly, not insignificant in size, are no man's land... At least if you're sane.

1

AbsentEmpire t1_isb8vxt wrote

You hear that from Philadelphians as well, it's not unique to rual areas.

0

1up t1_isbbc42 wrote

Nobody was saying philadelphians don't care about philadelphia though.

0

karensPA t1_isaftwi wrote

Or maybe rural PA is just as bad with corruption and police operating with total impunity but we never hear about it because it doesn’t fit into the popular “diverse cities run by Democrats are corrupt and dangerous” narrative.

15

this_shit t1_isah7b7 wrote

> Also no one in rural PA cares about Philly

Not in a conscious "hey, fuck philly!" way they don't. But when they go to vote, they have an impressive record of always picking the guy who then fucks over philly.

Intentional or not, this is on the rural voters picking shitty legislators.

8

The_Clamer t1_isar9na wrote

I agree they aren’t going to the polls to spite Philly residents which was my original point. Sadly yes there is an impressive track record of rural politicians making choices that negatively impact the city, but in general the people in those rural areas aren’t voting for them because of that. Anyways go vote and donate to reasonable candidates in rural areas if you want to see change.

−1

this_shit t1_isawdai wrote

> but in general the people in those rural areas aren’t voting for them because of that.

I mean...

Does it matter if it was 'intentional' or not? If my elected leaders were fucking with the democratic self governance of other parts of the state, I would hold them accountable. When was the last time Philly's legislative delegation got together to take control of York County's schools away from York County voters?

Rural PA voters vote for reactionary ideological blowhards who have long used the power of state government to hurt the prosperity of the state's largest city. You can't call it anything other than what it is.

4

AbsentEmpire t1_isb8pi3 wrote

This is bit disingenuous as rural officials did not seek to take over the Philly school district. The school district declared bankruptcy, the city refused to bail it out, and the state was required to step in. As with any state bailout for a municipality the state gets to appoint oversight of the financial distressed government, which is what it did with the school district.

Are you going to complain about rual officials bailing out the city with PICA next?

1

this_shit t1_isbaigr wrote

SDP did not declare bankruptcy, Act 46 was passed without the support of Philly representatives. Act 46 gave the state the power to unilaterally take over school districts by declaring them 'distressed'. Only Philly was targeted.

More to the point, the SRC was not a receivership because most receiverships end when the financial woes end. The SRC stuck around for ~two decades to implement an unpopular and unwanted program of school privatization that hasn't produced better results for either taxpayers or students (but it did weaken the teacher's union...).

You can disagree, but you can't call me disingenuous. Your analogy to a receivership is just wrong - it's a completely different thing.

Addl important context: the Philly school board was suing the state at the time for violating the civil rights of minority kids because state school funding to the city was so little. The SRC was imposed on Philly to counter the political and legal campaign for more state funding of poor school districts.

1