philly

On Tuesday, I went out to Lancaster, with Lady as my co-pilot, to scout the location of a wedding I'm shooting on Saturday. It was awesome. The venue is called the Country Barn Farm Market and it's a working farm complete with hogs, chickens, turkeys, cows, sheep, goats, rabbits and much much more. Above are two of the three turkeys we saw outside roaming the grounds. They "gobble gobbled" up a storm when I was by them.

Just wanted to share a quick photo of what's in store. I really hope that the weather holds out so I can take some photos outside on the grounds of the actual farm. The interior of the barn, where the party will be, is great looking too, but the animals are running around outside. The coolest part of the wedding itinerary? In between the vows and dinner is… a pig race. It's actually scheduled in. 5.45pm. Pigs. Racing. Awesome.

Last Friday morning, approximately 70 citizens trudged through the driving rain to the Klein Jewish Community Center in the northeast on the morning of Sgt. Liczbinski's funeral. Public Safety was on the minds of many of those in attendance of the fourth installment of the A City That Works Great Expectations forum. The crowd of citizens were all seniors (except for one twenty-something lady named Trina) and only a few had been to a previous Great Expectations forum. As a result of the funeral, the city's top brass who are normally present at the forums were not in attendance. Moderators Chris Satullo of the Inquirer and Harris Sokoloff of UPenn took on the responsibilities of answering questions regarding city services as best they could and collected note cards with yet more questions at the end of the meeting. District 10 Councilman Brian O'Neill dropped by for about 20 minutes before heading downtown for the funeral. While he couldn't stick around, one of his staffers, Bill Rapone, stayed behind to answer questions from the councilman's constituents.

The turnout was great and the interest in Public Safety was so great that two groups had to be formed. Sokoloff [above] picked up a marker and jumbo note pad and lead the group. But since I recently sat in on a Public Safety group, I listened in on the conversation with the Healthy and Sustainable Neighborhoods group. But before things got started, I was seated across the table from Harold who asked me: How will Philadelphia become the safest large city in America? He was reading one of the goals set by the Nutter administration. I told him that it would be a long process with a quarter of the city in poverty. He countered by saying that if people have jobs, there would be less crime as there would be less of a need to resort to crime as a means for survival. But where will those jobs come from.

The Neighborhoods discussion got off to a great start brainstorming as to what a healthy neighborhood looked like. One citizen called for a local spot to pay bills one citizen called for a local place to pay bills. She said that her family used to pay bills at a local Shop Rite; why couldn't a mini City Hall like the ones in the far NE and North Philly be opened in the area? A call for the local papers to act more as advocates for the citizens. But the conversation took a tangential stroll discussing litter - more trash cans, prettier trash cans, an argument over just cans or cans with plastic bags… I took the time to take a scan of the room to see what else people were talking about.

I saw Councilman O'Neill [above] talking with several constituents about things I was out of earshot to eavesdrop on. He had left by time I looked for him again later that morning but Rapone [below] remained and fielded questions.

Back to Neighborhoods and I heard Ruth wanting to see business owners intermingle with each other as well as getting more involved in the community. Another group member said that language barriers may prohibit such interaction. Ruth countered by saying everyone should learn English as immigrants in the past had done here in Philly. One group member said that her parents, who were immigrants, didn't want her to learn the language of her parents at all so that she wouldn't be at a disadvantage in school with the other kids; it's the opposite now she said. Arthur said that the Russians are the ones in the NE who are least likely to assimilate - why? Bernie hypothesized that the Irish and Italians were the same way when they first arrived, but now after being more comfortable in the area, are more open to intermingling. Just give the Russians more time he pleaded.

Satullo took to the mic after the brief lunch break to recap the morning and get the Q&A part of the meeting started. He asked each group what they accomplished and what they noticed when reading each other's notes. Maurice noticed people were all concerned with crime and traffic in the area. Beth, one of the Public Safety moderators, said that traffic was a large concern. With so many seniors in the area, crossing the large main roads was hazardous. The group complained that the traffic signals changed over too quickly and wanted the city to look into the issue. Satullo said that out of all the forums, this was the first time traffic came up as an issue on its own (I'm gonna guess a lot of people brought up traffic along with the casino issue too). Satullo's drive to the NE through the driving rain had him being a supporter of looking into the traffic situation in the area. Rapone, who at this point was not speaking on behalf of the Councilman, but as a fellow citizen (but slightly more in the know than the average Jane) said that traffic studies could be commissioned, but that they take a long time and could yield an unfavorable answer.

The Ethics group called for standards of service to be implemented across all departments. Satullo took the time between the groups reporting in and the full Q&A session to report on a trend in Philly in relation to the national economy. He said that Philadelphia tends to be a operate on a more even keel than the rest of the nation; when there are boons across the nation, Philadelphia's isn't as high and when a recession hits, Philadelphia doesn't get hit as hard. This, he said, was due to Philadelphia's very diverse local economy. To drive the point home even further, he reported that there weren't too many foreclosures in the city compared with the rest of the nation, but according to this Daily News article from the 12th, it may get much worse very soon.

Sticking on the subject of people's homes, Nate asked a rather touchy question, especially in front of an audience of fixed income seniors: Why wasn't the city performing a full valuation reassessment of homes for proper property tax collection? There was an audible near hiss from the crowd. Satullo answered the touchy question as best he could based on the response from previous forums. He said that the people in favor of these full valuations are usually those who would fare well and those against it are those who know they'll come out paying much much more each year. There were calls for protection for seniors if a full valuation taxation were to go into effect. Nate slunked down in his chair a bit.

Myles noticed lots of people concerned with the city needing more money and asked if the city would agree to an independent, outside of PA agency, audit of the city's books.

Rapone said that universities, newspapers and agencies perform such audits on their own dime from time to time, but it would be up to the mayor to ask for such an audit. I believe the City Council would then have to approve such an expense.

Warren noted that there were some $400M in uncollected real estate taxes owed to the city. He clarified that by saying the $400M was the deadbeats sitting on parcels of land and not the people living paycheck to paycheck falling behind on payments who need real assistance, not penalties. He wanted to see the city aggressively go after the deadbeats for a hunk of change which could possibly pay the salaries and pensions of hundreds of new cops. Rapone suggested that prior administrations had not gone after the monies because the city had enough money to not go after it. But now as the budget is tighter than in the past, the city needs the money more and Mayor Nutter may be the one to go after it in a more aggressive manner.

I had to leave a few minutes early due to my reading of the schedule incorrectly a few days prior to the event. Unfortunately, I had made a reservation for my PhillyCarShare to end before all was said and done. Off I went, back into the rain, but I'll be at another forum in North Philly to hear what's on the minds of another group of Philadelphians looking to make the city a better place.

I took a trip up to the incredibly beautiful Morris Arboretum on April 27th with Andi. It was the 75th Anniversary of the arboretum as a public garden and they were opening their doors to all comers for free. And as a special treat, they were allowing, for the first time, they were allowing people into the Bloomfield Farm section of the arboretum complete with a tour of the old Grist Mill. It's an incredible place and I'll surely be back there, $10 admission and all. Above is a photo of dawn redwood trees in the arboretum. Yep, that's right - Philadelphia has redwood trees. Crazy.

The arboretum is large, but not so large that you can't cover it all in a day's walk. Paths are well laid out along with ADA-approved accessible routes. Lady and I have become more and more interested in Kingdom Plantae recently and it was great to see all the great things that grow in the region. It as also great to walk through the place with Andi who knows quite a bit about flora. It's places like this that make me want to get a macro lens. Head over to Andi's post which is chock full of macro shots from the trip.

As an added bonus, we met up with Tony and Anne in the Bloomfield are of the arboretum for the Grist Mill tour. Always great to catch up with them and even better in such an incredible setting! I highly recommend the trek out there to visit. Come July the roses will be in full bloom.

And here's a flickr set of photos from the trip.

My new nephew as of 11.31a Friday. Dylan came in at 8lbs. 5oz. and according to my mom, my sister had a relatively easy delivery.

My brother, and the rest of my family, went to see him yesterday and MMS'd the pic above to me in the afternoon. I can't wait to see him in person.

At 11.30a today a fire broke out at a University of the Arts metal foundry studio at the northeast corner of 15th and Pine Sts. According to UArts Chief Communications Officer, Paul Healy, artists in the studio use wax to create bronze sculptures. The casts are placed in a kiln where the wax melts off (lost wax casting). Normally, the wax is burned in the fire of the kiln, but in this case, wax accumulated underneath the kiln, overheated, and caught fire. One person was in the studio at the time of the fire, but got out safely. Onlookers said he ran back inside, twice, after realizing there were several liters of highly flammable liquids still in the studio as the fire department had not made it to the scene at the time.

Approximately 4 ladder companies, 1 snorkel company, 1 SQRT company and loads of EMS crews were on hand to put out the blaze and help anyone in need. Above are firefighters opening up the roof of the building.

By 12.10p, most of the blaze was out after the roof was opened up, but additional water was poured in to cool everything off.

By 12.30p, the fire crews were packing up while the last of the water was poured onto the roof.

There was no word as to how much of the foundry was burned or if it would be reopened anytime soon.

It's time for another set of Great Expectations forums! This time around, it's a set of forums called "A City That Works" held, once again, in each of the 10 district councils. At each stop, a set of city officials from the mayor's office, performance office and budget office will be present. A post from the first forum in South Philly is already online. About 50 people were on hand for last night's forum (including about 10 staffers). The Inquirer's Chris Satullo told the crowd that this was approximately the 100th forum and the 4th one at the John M. Perzel Community Center in the NE. Satullo polled the sizable crowd to see how many had been to previous forums and you can see above that most of the crowd knew the drill pretty well; I saw a lot of familiar faces from previous forums.

Assistant Budget Director, Julie Wertheimer, went straight into a slideshow presentation [.pdf] on the 2009 budget. Not the most engaging stuff (numbers, numbers, numbers), but learning where our tax money goes and where the rest of the money comes from and where it's all spent is very important. For the number crunchers out there, a .pdf of the FY09 Operating Budget, the FY09 Budget in Brief and the Five Year Plan. The second half of the slideshow was condensed to a business card handout: the plan for Philadelphia to be all that it can be and improve the customer service aspect of governance in Public Safety, Education, Jobs, Healthy & Sustainable Neighborhoods and Ethics. The larger group was split off into groups with those categories serving as topics. I tagged along with the Public Safety group; being a Center City resident, I was very interested to see what residents of the NE were concerned with.

The Public Safety group was lead by Beth who kept the group moving very well (an incredibly hard task from what I've experienced in the past). The first step was for the group to identify certain things that are problematic and what success would look like for the problem. The group had some of the typical crime related requests - overcrowded prison/jail system, assault weapons ban, better/updated police equipment, more police on streets, police around schools. But the group also had some requests that weren't at the top of my list - bring back horse-mounted police for parks, a city wide sound ordinance for car radios like there is on South St, rehabbing dilapidated rec centers (the Perzel Center is top notch). Bob, from the Upper Holmesburg Civic Association (which was well represented with 3 members in the group of 8, simply wanted to be able to go outside of his house at 3am and not expect to be mugged.

It was great to have the 3 city staffers going around to listen in to each of the groups. They offered first-hand insight to certain issues. Above is Deputy Director of Performance Management Patrick Morgan discussing the 311/PhillyStat program which is to launch by 12/31/08. One concern people had was the cost of 311 calls. A group member noted how 911 used to be free, now it costs $1/call. Would 311 be free or how much would it cost? Morgan later said that the system would be free for the foreseeable future (I'm assuming it'll be taxed). The group also wanted increased transparency within the workings of the city's public safety program: progress reports from the police on crime issues and a published historical graph of crime from the last 3 years to witness progress towards the Mayor's goal of 25% fewer homicides. Morgan said that the police is currently working on an online system of crime statistics which should be online in the next few months. Susan from NE Philly was concerned about those without internet access; Morgan said that with so much information going into databases, this was an immense first step and that publishing data in the papers would hopefully follow down the line.

Morgan dropping into the Neighborhoods discussion, held down the hall from the rest of the groups, in what seemed to be a computer lab.

Before reconvening as a large group again, UPenn's Harris Sokoloff asked that everyone go around the room to see what the other groups had come up with. Above are Sokoloff, Beth and Satullo looking at the extensive notes from the Public Safety group.

An attendee basking in the glory of some notes from the Ethics group.

The panel of 3 city reps were seated up front with Chief of Staff, Steven Kennebeck, at the first seat. New to the city (he's been here for all of 3 weeks after moving from D.C. for the gig under Nutter), this was his first Great Expectations forum. The group was asked what they noticed from looking at each other's notes. 311/PhillyStat was on every single sheet in the room. Why? The personal contact, the convenience (there are currently 300+ numbers to call for issues), the accountability via ticket system. An attendee wanted to see a public face to go along with the 311 number; a person who would be in the neighborhoods and would be held responsible for the success of the program.

Satullo asked the panel what struck them about what they saw in this forum and the others they'd been to. Wertheimer said she was particularly struck to see how each neighborhood behaved like a family (in a good way!) caring for each other, organizing and taking care of problems.

Morgan took this time to explain the PhillyStat program a bit more. The PhillyStat meetings, held every Monday and Wednesday at 1pm at 1515 Arch St, 18th floor, are completely open to the public which is different from other cities with a PhillyStat-like program where meetings are closed. Morgan was hopeful that down the line, there would be more interaction with the public which is unheard of in previous incarnations of the system. The meetings are broadcast the night of each meeting at 8pm on channel 64; the city hopes to be able to stream it live off of the website at some point. As for the call center itself, it will be housed in Room 153 in City Hall. There are even plans for a walk-in desk (I can't imagine what the waiting room will look like). Alan asked about the transparency of the 311 statistics. Morgan said that some of the software automatically spits out good raw data that can be worked into publicly available databases, but that's down the line. Not all service requests will be available at the 12/31/08 launch, but by Spring of 2009, more software will be purchased and put into place. Every single other PhillyStat-like program has strategically rolled out services and Philadelphia will do the same. Skip asked if 311 would have an online presence as well - currently, no. But down the line, people will be able to go online and submit requests like over the phone. Finally, Morgan added that when PhillyStat goes live, there will be a city wide education program and hopes that the Great Expectations project will be integral in getting out the message.

Kathleen, from right around the Perzel Center neighborhood, wanted to know if other areas of the city felt left behind as people do in the NE even with their mini City Hall. Wertheimer said that's common for every party of the city to feel that way, but they're all treated the same. One attendee enthusiastically reeled off several neighborhoods and said they were all treated equally poorly in the past.

Kennebeck's pet project will be the mini City Halls. He recently visited the NE Philly MCH as well as the one in North Philly (the only 2 in existence). He said the North Philly had a lot to improve upon and that NE was performing it's duties well. Morgan added that what the MCHs are being asked to do haven't changed since they were created and it may be time for an overhaul of the services provided. Kennebeck added that one idea being kicked around was a mobile City Hall which would stop at congregation areas to perform basic duties on the go.

Bob asked the question which got the crowd clapping in support: what is this administration going to do about collecting monies due to the city from PGW and the water department. Wertheimer said that she knows there are plans in place, but didn't know the specifics and unfortunately couldn't comment futher.

Another great forum came to and end and the group quickly broke into pairs to brainstorm ideas which came up during the course of the evening. I can't wait until the next 2 events I'll be covering in this leg of the Great Expectations project.

A flickr set of 44 shots from the forum. As a slideshow.

My new buddy OzO, a painter, DJ, producer and all around artist, invited me to check out her set at Haru in Old City all of 3 days after I first met her. She told me that there was going to be a troupe of African belly dancers there. How could I resist? Pictured above is one of them striking a pose in the middle of a routine. Check out her henna'd palms.

I shot many hundreds of images (700-800 or so) in a little over two hours. The crowd wasn't as large as OzO had hoped, but we made the most of it and it was like a private photo shoot with a drinking audience! Check out a set of 27 shots from the night here.

Yesterday afternoon, I went to see an incredible photo show. It was Zoe Strauss's I-95 Show, year 8 of 10. I got there around 12.45p, 15 minutes before the show officially opened. I wanted to get there a little early to say hi to Zoe and see some of the show before the masses showed up (and on a lovely 70° day, they sure did). As an added bonus, I got to see the incredible streak of light which pours through the cracks of I-95 onto the floor below. It stretches the entire length of the "gallery space" just after 1p each year. It lasts all of 10 minutes or so before the sun moves out of position. It happens every sunny day, but only once a year during a world class art exhibition.

Before I finished walking through the 231 incredible images, I became a part of the show briefly. 231 images. That's a lot. Zoe shoots so much and so much of it is good, it's not the hardest thing to fill up 231 spaces in a show. I'd be lucky to fill 231 slots in a show with photos I'd mostly consider a 2 on a scale of 5. She fills the show with 4s and 5s. Take a look at this grid for her photos. That gives you a sense of the space. A 1/4 mile stretch of space approximately 150' wide.

Walking through the concrete pillars, you dance with the space. You waltz with the other people circling the pillars in clockwise and counterclockwise motions. Sometimes in sync with your temporary partner, sometimes in opposite directions. From east to west, from north to south the dance continues. Along the way, people walking their bikes; people biking through; people on skateboards; people in-line skating; neighborhood kids roving in packs; are all a part of the space.

And then you reach the north wall. #73 is also somebody's home. Two pillars over, and anchoring the show once again, is Mattress Flip which is, for me and many others, the quintessential "Zoe shot" and a good shot to gauge as to whether or not somebody will like the rest of her body of work.

There were a few shots I was sad to see not make it into the 2008 show like this one which was one of my favorites from the 2006 show I went to. But with 67 new photos in this batch (from last year's show which I missed), there are bound to be several great shots replaced by others. I was rooting for this shot and this shot to be there too, but no dice. There were so many incredible shots with so many incredible stories behind them. I'm always drawn to Monique's photos and story - the woman in the photos here and here. The first shot of Monique would be the other shot I'd pair with "Mattress Flip" to show people, if I had to choose just two, to give people a taste of Zoe's work.

Above are buddies Steve, Andi and Brad showing their scores. I had a great time hanging out with them at such an incredible show. I also saw Steve who posts on Brad's site, Jill with her hubby and a host of other photogs who were taking in the show. They all made off with some wonderful shots. It was a very hard choice to pick just one, but I did. I was thinking of this shot which had so much oomph to it. It just kicks you in the face with energy. I just loved the attitude and gaze in this shot which was one of the shots Zoe used to promote the show. That shot was one pillar over from the one I ended up snagging. I grabbed the Camden salt pile shot and slapped it on a big piece of cardboard (which was 1" not big enough!). A gorgeous laminated archival inkjet. I think it looks like an urban glacier. I love it. Lady approved too when I showed it to her after the bike ride home.

And a shot of the Wonder Woman herself signing the shot of Monique for a fan. That gigantic bulbous thing sticking into the frame at top is a boom mic. There was a crew of 3 or 4 there filming a documentary about Zoe.

A flickr set of Zoe's 2006 show. And a set of the 2008 show - more photos will be added later. And shots from people at the show will be in this flickr group pool - jump in!

I have so many photos to edit, but I had to get this writeup posted first. I'm indebted to the work Zoe's put into her craft. It's inspirational. Please follow her work on her blog and her flickr stream. You won't be disappointed. Now it's off to bed for an early next 3 days which will each be concluded with editing my backlog of photos starting from the week of April 26th.

So the smart cars have hit the ground here in the past couple of months. I've seen at least half a dozen different smarts running around town and PhillyCarShare has 3 themselves. I think that they're outrageously expensive ($11,500 - $18,000 depending on model/options) for the amount of car it is and that they don't get great gas mileage (33mpg city) for their minuscule size. On the other hand, I think they're a move in the right direction for within-the-city transportation.

At 8'10" long and 4'11" wide, this thing is tiny. If you were to cut open an average sedan, you could hide a smart car inside it. It is quite roomy inside though - much roomier than a Mini (I don't like Minis). But there's no trunk space. Maybe enough room for 5 shopping bags. Maybe enough for 2 camera bags, but I doubt it. One thing's for sure though - it turns heads almost as quickly as a Ferrari Enzo (you can hear an Enzo several blocks away so it's a little unfair).

It also gets the attention of the PPA I guess as you can see above. Some smart owner decided to not only park perpendicularly to the curb (right on Walnut St a 1/2 block east of Rittenhouse Square where I'm sure tons of drivers were oh so happy to wait), but right next to a sign which says 'No Stopping' - not so smart eh? They got slapped with a ticket. I'm sure it's illegal to park perpendicularly to the curb no matter how golf-carty your car is. I didn't cross the street to see the damage of the ticket though or the particular infractions ticked off.

The scene above was observed April 23rd.

Those evil oil companies made out big time (yet again) last quarter. Through the roof profits are pouring in like it's a monsoon of moolah:

• Chevron: $5.17B - 10% increase [source]
• BP: $7.62B profit - 63% increase [source]
• Shell: $9.08B profit - 25% increase [source]
• Exxon-Mobil: $10.9B - 15% increase [source]

At this time last year, oil was selling, on average, for $58/barrel. Now, it's $100 [source].

In the United States, the political attention has been increasingly focusing on the impact of high energy costs on the economy and on pocketbooks. The Senate blocked a $15 billion extra tax on oil companies late last year but calls for a windfall profit tax are likely to re-emerge this year.

I'd say that it's pretty fucking likely that the windfall profit tax is unlikely to pass. And on the slight chance that it does pass, the oil execs will first wipe their asses on the check before handing it over.