From a press release from the Media Mobilizing Project:

Local residents urged to call Mayor Nutter May 21 and demand his administration block Earthlink from dismantling the city's WiFi network

When: Wednesday, May 21st 9AM-5PM
Phone Number: (215) 686-3000 or (215) 686-2250

Media Mobilizing Project and local broadband activists are urging Philadelphians to call Mayor Michael Nutter on Wednesday May 21, to demand that the city step in to save the Wireless Philadelphia network and keep digital inclusion as part of it's agenda. Earthlink plans to begin dismantling the $17 million network June 12, after failing to convince either the city or a non-profit to assume ownership.

It looks like the whole tax package will be voted on by City Council tomorrow. The deal that's been cut will apparently slow the elimination of the gross receipts tax to a 10 rather than 8 year timetable, and also slow cuts to the net income portion of the BPT. To accomplish that, and offer various goodies to Councilmembers, the Mayor will apparently spend down virtually the entire City fund balance now at approximately $200 million.

The other economy the Mayor is more than willing to make is to ditch the one part of the tax code that makes it marginally progressive, the wage tax rebate program pushed through by the late Councilman David Cohen at the end of his life. In deference to Councilmembers who chafe at voting for outright repeal, the Mayor is apparently proposing a one year postponement. That's a tactic that has already been used twice. If Council goes for it again, that will be a signal that it intends to let it slide forever into infinity. It is pretty outrageous that on a day that Nutter made it a point to appear at a press conference with John Edwards lauding an effort to fight poverty by, among other things, expanding the earned income tax credit, he is pushing an effort to deep six its Philly equivalent. While pushing tax cuts for Ford, Apple, Budweiser and most of the rest of the Fortune 500.

Wilson Goode is rumored to be unwilling to let this go without a fight. If you think it plainly immoral to let working people hang while giving tax breaks to multinational corporations, call your Councilperson now, and let them know. And, if this is really getting to you, come to Council tomorrow at 9:30 or so, and pigeonhole your favorite representative for a few moments while they still have a chance to do the right thing.

City Council voted 12 – 5 today to approve Inclusionary Housing in Philadelphia.

Councilman Darrell Clarke has been championing the idea that developers need to give back to the city’s working people—-who have been struggling to match their wages with the rapidly rising cost of homes and increased rents on apartments. This is a really important notion and one that Philadelphia’s economic development planning, such as it is, has shied away from in favor of tax cuts and tax incentives.

Legislating the idea of shared prosperity is something new and wonderful for Philadelphia city government. And treating developers and business like partners in building a sustainable city--who must be held accountable as well as feted--is also an important change.

Problem is, that when Clarke first wrote legislation to deal with this issue, he targeted a group of wage-earners who most would argue don’t need help as badly as others.

In a city where there is a need for 60,000 new units of affordable housing, any money or physical units set aside by developers need to be handed out to the people with the most need.

To his credit, bowing to pressure from the Philadelphia Housing Justice coalition, the bill that was voted on today focuses more exclusively on the lower end of Philadelphia’s wage earners (you may remember that Clarke’s original bill would have allowed developers to set aside units to people who earned as much as 150% of area median income which I think is like $100 k for a family of four).

The amended bill requires half of the units to serve families, on average, at 40% of area median income (which is more like $30 k for a family of four), although the upper income level is set at 80% of area median income (as Jennifer already suggested, read WCRP ED Nora Lictash’s op-ed in yesterday’s Inky if you want more details here).

Here’s the catch.

Today’s legislation won’t take effect until “developer incentives”, or cost offsets, are decided. So that requires another bill in the new Council next Spring.

What are "developer incentives?"

Well, for instance, when the bill is passed, a developer could build 12 stories worth of condos, and be required to set aside a certain number of units. Council could decide that the developer has to put the set-aside units on the market at a price that a family of four who earns $32,000 k can afford and just take that loss in return for the privilege of being allowed to build here.

To offset this “loss,” Council could offer developers a variety of things.

Like density bonuses, where the developer is permitted to build more units than the zoning code would normally allow. Or, maybe allow developed to build higher in an apartment building than normal, or allow smaller lot sizes or smaller set-backs.

In short, developer incentives are things that directly increase profit for developers to offset any "loss" they see from contributing to our affordable housing crisis, but doesn’t directly cost the city anything.

From a coalition press release:

“We’ve worked with some of the top experts from the field and talked with key market-rate developers in Philadelphia to understand appropriate developer incentives,” said Nora Lichtash, Executive Director of the Women’s Community Revitalization Project. “We stand ready to work with City Council next year to develop fair and reasonable incentives that will make Philadelphia’s Inclusionary Housing program a model for future policies.”

However, some developers will be lobbying in the spring to have the city subsidize some of their loss on per-unit sales to low income families--with cash money.

There is a rumor that some developers have already asked for 100% subsidization--this of course would defeat the whole purpose of the bill—shared prosperity—and it’s something to keep an eye on. Between city contracts, possible BPT cuts, and a whole new set of priorities from a new Mayor and Council, I doubt we afford to subsidize developer contributions to affordable housing. Especially when the whole point of a bill was to find creative ways to fund an urgent problem.

There is a also a big picture to keep in mind here: the Affordable Housing Trust fund is already up and running, and developers are submitting RFPs to it to get money to build new units of affordable housing, for both sale or rent. Coalition folks tell me that the new stream of money from the Inclusionary Housing bill will double the reach and impact of the trust fund.

What does that mean in real numbers? In total, we're talking about construction of about 14,000 new units of affordable housing and/or repair to existing stock over 10 years.

And the need is at least 60,000 units.

So, I am glad this bill passed, and I hope the discussion of developer incentives is smooth, easy, and fast, as Council and the Mayor have a lot more work cut out for them to create more affordable housing than just this one bill.

In the meantime, let’s savor the victory today not just for affordable housing advocates, but for everyone who believes that our city government can and should so what it can to bring shared prosperity to all Philadelphians.

For the record: Supporting the bill were Clarke, DiCicco, Blackwell, Campbell, Savage, Miller, Tasco, Goode, Reynolds Brown, Kenney, Greenlee and Ramos. Call to thank them!

No votes were Verna, Krajewski, O’Neill, Rizzo and Kelly. Call to express your disappointment with them. Contact info is here.

Too bad some of the "No" votes aren't the people leaving Council next month. And in the meantime, I wonder where those folks are gonna be, and the new Mayor, on passing a reasonable package of incentives for developers.

I am going to vote for Michael Nutter on November 6th, and he is going to win.

Despite the fact that he is not really a candidate anymore, and he already has my support, I do want to know more about how he thinks about the economic problems facing Philadelphia.

I have written about the future of Philadelphia’s economy here, here, here, and here and Nutter has demonstrated an intelligent response to many of the issues brought up in those conversations, He also comes to the General Election with the most equally balanced base of support in terms of race, ever.

However, no matter how good he is, or how good a job he does, or who supports him, his first few months in office will be challenging and I want to know what he is going to do to create a sustainable, local economy that benefits all of us.

Why?

Our city’s economy is in the midst of a major change that so far seems to be making quality of life worse for most of us. Our city has been through change before (think fight for independence, industrial revolution, the Great Depression, deindustrialization in the 1970s). In the past, the sheer size of these moments made it difficult for a local Mayor to do more than just react. However, the economic and cultural shifts we are experiencing now are different. An economy rooted in innovation, creativity, and service delivery (as opposed to industry, manufacturing, and concrete material products) is inherently more micro and local. Aided by the devolution of the role of federal government, there’s more power and responsibility in the hands of states and cities than ever before.

This big-pciture stuff has a particular and specific impact on us--young workers in Philadelphia. We are facing a really uncertain personal economic future. In the context of this very big framework, acknowledging Philadelphia itself can only do so much, I am curious to learn what Nutter will do, and more importantly how he thinks.

A few weeks back I wrote a post called “Back to Philadelphia’s Economic Future” that tries to describe what I am seeing emerge. I described an era in our nation and our world’s economic growth thathas yet to be named, but is characterized by increasing income inequity and poverty, rising violence. There I prescribed the formation of a plan for Philadelphia’s economy to help us navigate our way through this difficult era. I envisioned a detailed plan that could take advantage of the changes in our economy via local innovation, to take us to a new place of shared prosperity and increased opportunity. I talked to Dan about this in advance of my writing and he said:

I am not really a big fan of some huge master plan, because when you look back on master plans that cities have had before, they are really laughable in how stupid they are, or how out of time. I think what you are more talking about anyway is more like what I would consider a framework with a set of specific goals and outcomes.

Good point. Our economy and our city are too dynamic to make a plan that we must adhere to, but a framework, as Dan suggests, makes a lot of sense.

For instance, if you can prove to me that opening a new condo building with retail stores on the bottom will raise median wages, I’d support it. However, if you can show me that an investment in a green building trades apprentice program will ultimately raise median wages higher, than I’d rather prioritize that.

A framework (PHramework maybe?)—which might just start from a list of goals and ideas that are already out on the table—would help build a road map for local government practitioners to consult when they make any decision about municipal funding. If you are pushing green building, or increased CHIP funding, or affordable housing, or tax breaks, it should be obvious how any request to spend (or reduce the intake of revenue in the case of tax cuts) municipal funds will directly help to raise median wages or the reduce poverty.

What elements of a framework for Philadelphia's economic future can we all agree to?

Click "read more" below to see some ideas.