(Image: The Philadelphia Citizen) Trash has become a hot-button political issue this year as service disruptions, irregular collections, and out of control litter contributed to a sense of unease about city government’s ability to carry out some of its basic functions.  And while the problem seems intractable at the moment, there are some hopeful signs that the growing salience of this issue could finally stir elected officials to action—if not in this Mayoral term, then the next one. Continue reading

(Photo: Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia) An important new JAMA Network paper from Penn researchers Eugenia South, MD; John MacDonald, PhD; and Vincent Reina, PhD. highlights the significant crime reduction benefits of investing city funds in housing repairs in low-income neighborhoods in Philadelphia.  Continue reading

(Image: 9th and Girard) UCLA planning professor Michael Manville recently coined the term “pretextual planning” to refer to a phenomenon that Philly housing politics watchers will immediately recognize. The idea is that city governments will sometimes intentionally put in place bad rules governing housing and land use and other issues, in order to use the removal of the bad rules as negotiating currency for some other agenda.  Continue reading

(Every supermarket with a beer section has to mean one less restaurant or bar under PA's broken licensing regime | Image: Jon Geeting) Pennsylvania liquor license prices have been spiraling out of reach for smaller restaurants and bars for several years now, without much interest from the political system, but one person in Harrisburg is finally starting to ask some questions, and it’s worth saying a good word about the recent work of Rep. Frank Burns, a Democratic state Rep. from Cambria County.   Continue reading

(Image: Governor Tom Wolf) As expected, Governor Tom Wolf has vetoed HB 1300, the Republican election bill that would have made sweeping changes to Pennsylvania’s election code and rolled back some of the voting access expansion policies in Act 77—the 2019 law that established no-excuse vote-by-mail and other changes.  Continue reading

(Image: Boardroom Spirits of Lansdale, PA) Governor Wolf’s COVID-19 emergency order was overturned recently after voters approved the ballot question curtailing the Governor’s emergency powers, but one unanticipated side effect of the change was to also cancel the emergency provisions related to outdoor dining, including to-go cocktails and outdoor alcohol-serving rules.  That set off a scramble by the hospitality industry and supportive lawmakers to hurry up and pass a few bills that had already been under consideration to make some of these changes permanent, so that the existing bar and restaurant operations won’t face disruptions. (Sign the petition from the Pennsylvania Restaurant and Lodging Association!) Continue reading