With an overwhelmingly successful ballot petition initiative behind us, and an impassioned ground game under way, my campaign to become the next State Representative in the 181st has moved to establish our web presence. At www.lewisforstaterep.com, you can learn about my personal history, read about my vision for North Philadelphia, sign up to volunteer and contribute electronically. I sincerely hope you take a few minutes to visit the website, and join us in our fight for progress in North Philadelphia.

Onward and Upward!

Lewis Thomas III
Democratic Candidate for State Representative in the 181st District
www.lewisforstaterep.com
info@lewisforstaterep.com

Please join me this Saturday along with special guests State Senator Shirley Kitchen, State Representative Frank Oliver, Bruce Crawley, Lana Felton Ghee, 37th Ward Chair Diane Bridges, 14th Ward Chair Virginia Wilks, 20th Ward Chair Renee McNair, Dr. Anthony Monteiro and many others THIS SATURDAY AT 1:00 PM at 2221 NORTH BROAD STREET as we ignite this movement for change and transformation for North Philly.

We have a great event event lined up featuring The Latin Dance Team of North Philly, North Philly Stompers and a spectacular African Drum Core. There will be great food and the great people of my district; not to mention you will get an opportunity to hear firsthand my vision for North Philadelphia moving forward.

ONWARD & UPWARD!

Lewis Thomas III
Democratic Candidate for State Representative in the 181st\
votelewis181@gmail.com

Dear Marge,

I was reading a Marcia Gelbart story about a PICA report on elections, and I couldn't help noticing this comparison between City Commissioners and your peers in the burbs:

Among other points, (PICA board member William) Leonard focused on a chart that compared the 15 counties' number of registered voters and the annual spending by their election administrators.

In Philadelphia, where the city commissioners and a staff of 97 oversee everything related to elections, including training poll workers and preparing ballots and voting material, that figure is $9.18 per voter.

That amount is nearly twice as much as the median spending in the other counties, $4.68, and nearly three times the $3.26 per voter spent in Montgomery County, which has half as many residents as Philadelphia.

So I was thinking: Couldn't the School District and City Health Centers use that extra $6 per Philly voter that your office wastes on dozens of patronage "workers" aimlessly hanging out on Spring Garden Street spends on elections?

Apparently the idea that City Commissioners might waste precious Philly tax dollars so shocked the Nutter Administration, they were struck speechless:

That prompted Leonard, an appointee of Democratic state House Speaker Keith McCall, to question Philadelphia's efficiency and suggest the creation of a five-county regional authority to run elections.

"The mayor has always talked about regional efficiencies," Leonard said.

Then, turning to Philadelphia Finance Director Rob Dubow, an ex-officio PICA board member, he added: "Rob, I think we ought to do that, I really do."

Dubow did not respond.

Huh. Good thing the mayor's not protecting patronage. He's always saying he wants to promote regional cooperation too.

Oh, and understandably, you were similarly dumbstruck:

A spokeswoman for Margaret Tartaglione, the city commissioners' chairwoman, said she had no comment since she had not seen the report.

Hmmm.

I guess those of us who've started noticing that extra cent we're paying on every dollar we spend in town should probably just suck it up and not read that PICA report that's scheduled to be released in a few weeks.

That might lead us to return to that Committee of Seventy report called "Needless Jobs" that recommends

City Council should pass a proposed amendment to the Philadelphia Home Rule Charter to eliminate elected City Commissioners, and submit the amendment to the voters for approval.

But then we'd have to go somewhere else to find those jaw-dropping examples of stereotypical patronage waste that we bloggers love to go on about (like, for example, the offices of the Clerk of Quarter Sessions, the Register of Wills or the Sheriff).

And whatever office replaces yours might forego those cool secret passwords that you gave Dan and just make election results available to the general public.

Ugh. Where's the fun in that?

If the political class stops owning elections, who will own them? The people? In Democracy's Hometown?

Already missing the easy targets,

Sam

I think it was Donna Shalala who said, "50% of all YPP readers are thinking of running for office, and the other half lie about it." I know someone reading this right now is thinking about taking up the mantle of someone somewhere and running for something in 2010. So here's my idea for you and your first press conference: tonight, get Philly Car Share pick-up truck and take all the yard signs you can get your hands on.

Have you looked around this city? It's absolutely blanketed with lawn signs, as it is every election, and as far as I know there isn't a campaign out there who takes responsibility for picking them up (well, okay, in '06 we would tear our opponents's signs down all campaign long, but that was a different set of motivations). But you could pick them up. You could be the candidate that thinks ahead and fills up your garage with OTHER campaigns' unneeded lawn signs.

Then, before your announcement party, get big stickers printed up, stickers the size of a lawn sign. Put them over the top of the old candidates' names and logos on all the lawnsigns you stole. You'll save a lot of plastic and metal that way, and you will use less energy in your printing process.

When you have your announcement party, you can say that you were the green candidate for reusing all those lawn signs. You'll probably save your campaign a ton of money, too, since you won't have to pay for those wiggy metal stakes or the labor of putting the lawn signs on them.

Don't thank me. Don't even credit me. Just steal this idea and save the city some space in the landfill. Every election is a litter fest, after all, but you could take the lead in making it a little cleaner!

(Cross-posted at The Notebook's blog)

As a parent, I’ve never been a fan of the policy to close school on election days – a ridiculous practice that has been going on since the Vallas administration.

But the latest news that the City is forcing schools to add two extra days to the school calendar because they want to close schools for the May 19th election has me particularly irritated.

First and foremost, the primary function of schools is schooling. Period. Since when did certain city officials get to determine that 168,000 children should be somewhere else on a perfectly legitimate day during the year for their own convenience?

Second, I think it’s great that most schools are polling places. As a former teacher, it used to be one of my favorite days of the year – a built-in civics lesson on participatory democracy. Classrooms across the city used to engage in mock elections, mock polling, brushing up on elections both big and small. What educator would cede that opportunity with children?

Election day, for most people, is also the only time during the year that they have a chance to step into their neighborhood school. And I, for one, think people ought to see schools living and breathing with the very kids who go there. Erasing the children from the picture removes the very purpose of the essential role schools function in our communities.

Finally, I’m particularly irritated by the claim that city officials want to close schools because they worry about children’s safety. For decades schools have remained open during election day. I’m stunned that these unnamed city officials feel like Election Day has suddenly become a political legacy no matter the cost to hundreds of thousands of children, families and school staff in the region. In addition, it’s not exactly cheap to open 268 school buildings and pay staff to hang around in supposed professional development seminars.

The March snowstorm took us all by surprise, but our kids and parents shouldn’t have to pay for two extra days at the end of the year, when a perfectly valuable educational opportunity awaits us on May 19th.

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Mobilize.org is an all-partisan network dedicated to educating, empowering, and energizing young people to increase our civic engagement and political participation. We work to show young people how public policy impacts our lives, and more importantly – how we can impact public policy.

I am still blown away (esp with the secret service saying McPailin's rheotoric increased death threats on Obama) by the overt racism in McCain's campaign, and the disgust I felt motivated me to support Obama the most yet. Indeed, the fact that many white people (I head 55% of whites voted McCain and 45% Obama) rejected this crap... This very fact is what I am excited about, but I am still cautious, and I think the most obvious thing that we need to do, is continue to harness all the positive energy of the Obama campaign, and take this as far to the left as we can... At least some New Deal stuff, you know.

Well, I hope you enjoy this new essay by Philly writer David Love. I like his perspective, much like Mumia's as in coming from a radical background, Love does acknowledge much of the good of Obama being elected... but also recognizes that we now need to battle to get the most from it.

A new video posted to Youtube shows McCain/Palin supporters spewing racism and hate at peaceful pro-Obama demonstrators outside a McCain/Palin rally Oct. 27 in Pottsville, Pennsylvania.

One older gentleman early in the video shouts "Bomb Obama!" at the videographer and Obama supporters. Asked by the videographer what that means, the man says, "Get rid of him," then gestures indicating this means assassinating Obama.

A younger man holding a "Democrats for McCain" sign says, when asked why he supports McCain, "I'd never vote for a black man."

Below here is a very interesting article by Philadelphia Journalist Dave Lindorff, where he argues:

It is likely that instead of the famed “Bradley Effect” (named after the Mayor Tom Bradley of Los Angeles, who famously lost a race for California governor which the polls said he would win handily), according to which some white voters supposedly tell poll takers they are voting for the black candidate in a race for fear of appearing racist, while in fact they plan on voting for the white candidate, the opposite is going to occur. That is, there are probably many white racist voters like the one in this small Pennsylvania town, whether in some northern suburb or village, or in Southern states like Virginia, North Carolina or Georgia, who are fed up with the Bush years, want a change, and are planning to vote for Obama, but would not want their friends to know they were voting for a black man. Call it the “Obama Effect.”

*NEWS RELEASE * 9/29/08

*Clean Water Action Endorses Congressman Patrick Murphy*

*/Environmental Group Cites Water Record/*

*Philadelphia*: Clean Water Action today announced its endorsement of Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-08) in the 2008 General Election.

"We are pleased to announce today that Clean Water Action officially endorses Patrick Murphy for the U.S. Congress," said Myron Arnowitt. "We are confident that he will continue work to protect Pennsylvania’s lakes, river, streams and drinking water sources as well as the health of our families and communities.”

Patrick Murphy has championed the Clean Water Restoration Act, which would restore lost protections for all rivers, streams and wetlands. In his first term in Congress, he voted with the environment 100% of the time. He also took action to increase the gas mileage of cars and trucks.

Some new ammo to use against Palin? Check out today's article by Philly's Linn Washington: http://phillyimc.org/en/node/75216

Washington writes that: "Alaskan blacks fault Palin for not hiring African-Americans, dismissing blacks from government posts, spurning repeated requests to meet with black leaders to discuss issues of concern and refusing to attend that state’s major African-American celebration."

----
For background on Washington, and his long history in Phila, here is a video, featuring Washington speaking at a press conference the Mumia supporters organized in March, after Mumia was denied a new guilt-phase trial:

I just got this email from Democracy Now! What an outrage! Check out the Video of Goodman's arrest below:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 1, 2008

Contact:
Mike Burke: mike [at] democracynow.org

**UPDATE**

Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar Released After Illegal Arrest at RNC

Goodman Charged with Obstruction; Felony Riot Charges Pending Against
Kouddous and Salazar

ST. PAUL--Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and producers Sharif Abdel
Kouddous and Nicole Salazar have all been released from police custody
in St. Paul following their illegal arrest by Minneapolis Police on
Monday afternoon.

Check out these new writings from local prisoner Leonard Peltier:

Leonard Peltier Sends Message to Obama and the DNC Protesters

Our effort to bring the City Commissioners into the 21st Century has hit the Daily News:

Philadelphia taxpayers have spent $20 million over the last five years to upgrade the city's voting machinery, permitting a rapid, computerized vote count on election night.

But the general public has little to show for it.

On election night, there's no public access to the vote count. News organizations pay hundreds of dollars to the city to see voting returns on a password-protected Internet site. But dozens of political VIPs get election-night access for free.

The three city commissioners, in charge of the city election machinery, have been providing free Internet passwords to a group of public officials, political-party bigwigs and others with the right connections.

On the night of the April 22 primary election, they got to see unofficial, ward-by-ward returns - information that the city commissioners still have not posted on their public Web site, more than two months after the election.

State Sen. Vincent Fumo got 10 free passwords - at least twice as many as he needed, according to his office. Councilman Jim Kenney got five and attorney Kevin Greenberg, who represents the commissioners in a federal voting-rights case, got six.

John Dougherty, the electricians union leader who ran to replace Fumo in the Senate, got one free password, and the union's political director, Bobby Henon, got two.

And the Commissioners tell us, that jeez, its hard to put these things online:

"It's not as easy as it sounds," said Deputy City Commissioner Renee Tartaglione, daughter of commissioners' chairwoman, Margaret Tartaglione.

She said that the city's vote-counting equipment, manufactured by Danaher Controls, allows Internet access to no more than 150 people at once, requiring the city to limit the number of passwords it provides.

"That's a really, really goofy excuse," replied Urevick-Ackelsberg. "You could pay a [tech-savvy] kid $12 an hour to come up with a fix to that limit, just taking those results and spitting them out onto a public Web site."

150 passwords. Ten Passwords for Fumo, none for you... That is the thing: Not only is it a goofy excuse, it sort of misses the point. Because if you are looking for a section of law that says 'ol Vince and Co. should have super duper special access to our elections, keep looking, because it doesn't exist.

As the article notes, Jim Kenney has a bunch of those passwords, too. To his credit, Jim has been the only person in office to try and help us. I sent my first request to a million different politicians, and most people didn't bother to respond. He did, within a day. His office talked to Marge and Co., and found out about the magical 150 number. And he offered to get us whatever numbers we needed. While his offer of help was most appreciated, seeing election returns really should not have to fall under a constituent service.

We will have more later today, including the letter the Commissioner's Office sent me (where they would not even tell me how much they charge), and the magical list of passwords they gave out. We will also have a way that anyone who is interested in this can help force their hand. In fact, members of Philly for Change started that process just last night.

On Monday night, I got this message on my machine from a friend:

I just got my new voter registration card though the mail. I am seeing that I’m not registered with either party, And I don’t know what to do to change it. And I thought maybe you would know.

Uh-oh. I called the Commissioner’s office, just to be sure, but the deadline for changed (as well as new) registrations was definitely Monday.

As of November of 2007, there were about 100,000 registered independents on the city of Philadelphia—about 10% of all voters. Because PA has a closed primary system, none of them is going to be able to vote for Clinton or Obama, or in any other tight local race in the April 22nd election.

Even though the city is majority Democratic (by far), the number of independent voters in the city has grown by about a third since 2001. (Source: PA State voter reg data). The growth of independent voters can be attributed, in part, to the fact that more and more people our age are registering independent as a part of their distaste for party politics.

Which means in local elections, we’re losing the ability to turn out votes from a natural constituency for progressive change (young voters) because of antiquated laws. In New Jersey, and many other states, you can vote in a primary regardless of primary status. You just decide which party primary contest you want to vote in when you get to your polling place on Election Day.

This is a real problem for progressive organizing in Philadelphia. So, shouldn’t we have open primaries here? Or maybe even better, same-day voter registration?

Well, we could, but it'd require a change in state law. Rep. Babette Josephs, Chair of the State Rules Committee, is the one to talk to. Her email is bjosephs@pahouse.net. While I think Jospehs is likely to be supportive of such an effort (I know there’s talk that she is working on a bill right now that would allow non-excuse absentee voting in PA), both Democratic and Republican leaders statewide may not.

As we all know from the special election process here in Philadelphia, some party leaders prefer to consolidate power by reducing participation in primary elections as much as possible.

What else can we do? Don't we all know people who have registered independently? The reality is many of them wouldn’t if they knew how much they were giving up in local elections.

Well, there are always the City Commissioners. There are three people elected in Philadelphia to oversee elections: Marge Tartaglione, Anthony Clark, and Joseph Duda. These folks have a staff and a budget. They could have been calling up non-profits and civic groups with a non-partisan message explaining the way a closed party primary election works. They also could have sent a mailing to all independent voters. They could have gone on Action News. Etc. Etc.

Their office is chartered, after all, to help by:

• informing candidates, political party committees, the media and the general public of the voter registration and election process; and,
• encouraging Philadelphians to register and vote.

Of course, we have talked about reforms the Commissioner’s office could implement before without much success, like:

• The Commissioners could send a postcard in the mail or an email reminding voters about Election Day. It’s been done before, in 2004 and to some extent in 2006, but not in Primaries and not in the 05 General. That’s one way to drive up turnout.
• Another idea: why don’t we take advantage of Wireless Philly and create a secure, online voter database so that Philadelphians could go to any polling location in the city rather than just the one in their ward and division? People live busy lives, and using technology to make tasks like voting simpler is a no-brainer.
• Same-day voter registration is another concept that has helped boost voter turnout in other states. This will require a change in state law, but how can we ever expect a change in state law to occur if election officials in Philadelphia and other large counties don’t get more aggressive and ask for one?
• Vote by mail, public advertising, partnering with utilities to print election info on bills (do you know how easy it would be to print your polling place location on your gas or water bill?), an updated website, and many other ideas are all available to the Commissioners to use to boost turnout.

So while it is important to hold especially Commissioner Marge Tartgalione accountable by calling her at (215) 686-3460, the reality is significant changes in Philadelphia’s voting infrastructure are not going to come from this office, or even the state.

Which like so many other problems for progressives means we need the Mayor and Council to invest some political capital in this effort.

Mayor Nutter has said he is committed to reforming not just government, but the political process in this city too, and implementing some of the changes listed above is a great way to start. We also have some “activist” members of Council now, and voting reform and voting rights issues seem like a win-win issue for all, especially as we are ramping up to a huge presidential election in the fall.

No matter where the solution comes from, fixing our voting system will create some increase in voter turnout. It won’t solve the whole problem, but when less than 50% of all Philadelphians are likely to come out and vote in April, it’s obvious that something must be done to make change.