Anne Dicker & Joe Vignola Face Off
Neighborhood Networks held their candidate forum for the 1st PA Senate District Thursday night at the Italian Bistro on the Avenue of the Arts. The invited candidates were incumbent Sen. Vincent J. Fumo and challengers Anne Dicker and Joe Vignola. In addition, Jack Morely, seeking the Republican nomination for the race, was in attendance. Sen. Fumo, who was present at the 5th Ward dinner earlier that evening was not in attendance. If you click on the map above or here, a new window will open with a Flash-enabled drag/zoom map of the gigantic district with approximately 250k constituents. A .pdf of the map is available here via Committee of Seventy.
Head of South Philly's NN Chapter, Damon Roberts, was moderator for the night and briefly introduced everyone to the candidates and the seat at stake. He also announced that on February 28th there would be a PA House candidates forum/debate at a time and location to be determined. He briefly spoke of Sen. Fumo who took office in 1978 and has not lost an election since. Fumo, who is arguably the most powerful politician in the state, even after a federal indictment, has brought billions to Philadelphia in the decades he's served as Senator and former chair of the Appropriations Committee. He was also the Senator responsible for inserting the language which allowed casinos to be placed in Philly. Dicker, who almost won the 175th PA House race in 2006, is a grassroots organizer who is probably best known for co-founding Casino Free Philadelphia. Vignola is a former City Councilman, former City Controller and former PICA director. I knew absolutely nothing about him going into tonight other than that he was running. Morely was given a moment to describe himself and noted that he'd received more votes than any other challenger to Fumo and that he was the pro-choice and pro environment Republican in the race. Damon cleared up why Morely wasn't a part of the proceedings in that NN only endorses contested races and as of now, the Republican side of the race was uncontested.
After the intros by Roberts, each candidate was allowed to talk and say why they wanted to run. Dicker was up first. She pressed that it was Fumo who let the casinos into Philly with Act 71. He pressed that Harrisburg's leaders don't listen to the people, but that she'd represent the people and listen to them along the way. She wants to get people active in politics once again. Above, is Dicker thinking for a moment before speaking.
Vignola stepped up and spoke of 30 years ago when Fumo took office: there was no I-95, City Hall was the tallest building in Philly and he had a lot more hair (as he's indicating in the photo above). A lot has changed in Philly and now, he said, it was time for Fumo to leave the Senate. He called the 1st the most important district in the state.
After the introductions, the floor was open to the 40 or so people who came out to ask questions to the candidates. The first questionwas what the candidates would do to stand up to the NRA and improve the reckless handgun situation in Philly. Vignola said he'd be for enabling the home rule ability for cities to make and enforce their own laws. Vignola said the fight for stricter gun laws would not be easy, but it is a fight that must be fought. (I just noticed Vignola is wearing an original 13 colonies flag lapel pin)
Dicker said that most of the illegal guns in Philly come from outside of the city. She'd go to the conservative districts in the state and meet the gun owners there and get them on her side for gun control. Dicker is also in favor of a database for lost and stolen guns [WOOHOO!]. I'd love for the assault weapons ban to be renewed and for all semi-automatic weapons to be outlawed as well. Hunters can have their rifles and the number of 9mm handguns on the streets would be reduced in conjunction with a good database enforced with penalties for firearms not reported and later used in a crime.
Question 4 was on coal plants and whether or not the candidates would be for or against new coal burning plants in the state. Vignola wouldn't be against all coal-burning plants. He said that "new coal" can be a cleaner source of energy one of the ways being retrofitting with scrubbers. He said the state could mitigate the need for new plants in general by educating people on conservation and more efficient energy usage. Vignola looked to the future with renewable sources like geothermal, wind and solar energies will play a big part of the future of PA.
Dicker countered by saying that there is no such thing as clean coal, only retrofitting. She knows from a firsthand source, her father, who was recently retrofitting scrubbers onto exhausts. Dicker pointed to the pink Bicycle Coalition pin she wore on her lapel and said increased bicycle usage must be a part of our future along with more conservation in general. She did note that along with the renewable sources Vignola mentioned, that unfortunately nuclear may also play a part. Dicker recounted recent trips to England with her husband, Simon, and seeing the triple pane glass and other energy efficient and conservation minded efforts everywhere. Why? Because it was the law. She said that the state must also legislate for progressive environmental change.
Question 5 was on the candidates' opinions on healthcare. Dicker said she supported Senate Bill 300 which calls for healthcare for all PA in the form of universal, single-payer coverage. That would cover all of the 1.7M people currently uninsured (including me!) in the state. She noted that this would put the state, and in turn it's largest and most economically enticing cities, in a favorable position for getting corporations to move in. Foreign companies who are used to host countries paying for coverage would find PA a welcome change to the rest of the country. It would also make PA even more enticing for US-based countries who don't want to foot the bill.
Vignola said that single-payer was not necessarily the right thing for PA. He favored the universal coverage plans already in place in Massachusetts and California. He noted that Gov. Rendell has stated he'd actively campaign against any candidate, Republican or Democrat, who was not for some form of universal coverage.
Dicker added that what Vignola was talking about wasn't truly universal coverage and it would still leave insurance in the hands of private insurance companies which have incredibly high overheads and are not accountable to anyone but their private shareholders. She added that Rendell's plan is wrong. Vignola retorted that it was naïve to think that there would be no administrative costs with a public system.
Question 7 was on the recent decision to toll I-80. Dicker disagrees with tolling I-80 and said that she thought it was politically incorrect for her to say so. She thinks Rendell should've added a gasoline tax to fund public transportation instead of tolling the highway. She added that she thought this decision divides Philadelphia and Pittsburgh from the rest of the state in a fight for money. Instead, we should work with neighboring counties to work on a solution.
Vignola also disagreed with the tolls on I-80. He said that there is a definite need for permanent, dedicated funding for public transportation. He noted some act (didn't catch the name) which provided such funding, but it was repealed at some point. Vignola said that currently, a gasoline tax to fund public transportation is illegal according to the state constitution and that it would have to be changed before such a tax were to be discussed. He favors NJ Gov. John Corzine's toll plan. He added that the state must more efficiently monetize I-76.
The 9th and final question of the night was on real estate taxation and education funding. Dicker cited a study which stated Philadelphia needs $1B in funding for its schools. She said that the surrounding counties spend $20k/student and Philly needs an additional $5k/student to match that number. She said that education must be the #1 issue for Pennsylvanians and that a $1B is worth it. In a previous question on school district control, she stated some facts: there are 1800 fewer teachers in Philly than 3 years ago; there is a 33 - 1 student - teacher ratio in Philly and a 20 - 1 ratio is needed for students to really learn let alone flourish; the School Reform Commission is not accountable to anyone now, if she were Senator, she'd make them accountable to her.
Vignola said that relying on the inequalities of the current taxation structure isn't the solution (I may have misheard him as I'm not sure what this means). He said that gaming was to provide the funding (this was the closest the debate got to the issue of casinos and I'm assuming with this answer that he's pro-casino I've been told by the campaign he is not pro-casino*). He added that there are currently 501 school districts across the state resulting in incredible administrative costs. He said that maybe the state should convert to a county school district method. This answer seems to butt with his disapproval of the single-payer healthcare model which would eliminate the incredibly high administrative costs (as high as 33%) of private insurers.
In closing, Vignola said he was looking forward to working together going forward and that he'd be committed to a full term as Senator and he would not seek higher office. He hoped that there would be additional forums before the primary election. Dicker wished Sen. Fumo was present as he is at the center of everything at stake now. She said she was committed to knocking on 30k doors in the district and she had the blisters on her feet to prove it - she sat for much of the debate as a result of her sore feet. She added that there is so much corruption presently and that we need change echoing the sentiments of the national debate. Republican candidate Morely was given a chance to speak once more and reaching out to the greens present (which I'm assuming was 99% of those present) that he was working to promote an energy bill in the state Congress for hybrid energy and that he'd be around afterwards for those interested in helping out.
After the debate, I caught up with a friend in attendance and asked if he had heard of a phone poll asking constituents of the 1st District about a possible run by City Councilman James Kenney. I had heard of the poll from a friend of a friend who received the call a few weeks ago. He doubted Kenney would take the pay cut and would want to travel to Harrisburg everyday. He added that Fumo hasn't decided to run as a Democrat and that he could run as an Independent in the primary and go up against Vignola/Dicker and Morely in the general election. I hadn't thought of that one.
The recap from NN.
Disclaimer: I will be volunteering for Anne Dicker's campaign in collecting signatures for her to appear on the Democratic primary ballot
*UPDATE: From the Vignola campaign: In a perfect world, [casino's would be] out of Philadelphia. In reality, he shares positions with Anne….at least 1500 feet away from a home, playground, school or place of worship. He specifically advocates for the house bill sponsored by Mike O'Brien that would remove the requirement that these casinos sit beyond 10 miles from those in neighboring counties. Removing that requirement would allow us to place these casinos in places like the airport and in the industrial, non-residential zones of southwest Philadelphia, etc.
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