The Good Ship Allentown Losing Credibility

The blogosphere has been buzzing since yesterday afternoon about Sara Hailstone leaving, and the budget being delayed until after the election. Although, The Morning Call associated her with the $billion dollar Reilly development, she had absolutely nothing to do with it. Although director of the paper tiger NIZ board, that too is just a legal requirement for the Reilly Development Company. Her departure, like the police chief, is a hope to be gone before they bring in the handcuffs. What we need to discuss here;   How can a city with a $billion dollars of new development needs a tax increase? Making Reilly's empire has not been cheap for the taxpayers. The development required considerable infrastructure improvements, and police protection. Need a cop, there's almost always one present by the Artwalk, along by Shula's and the new stores there. Although he does you no good, shut up, and pony up two more mills in city tax. Reilly is being treated to a $billion dollars worth of real estate at taxpayer expense,  while the same taxpayers get a tax increase?   By the way, that tax increase will not be announced until after the election, as to not hurt the Pawlowski endorsed candidates on Tuesday. Those candidates would be Glazier and Affa for City Council, and Koval for Controller.   Only in Allentown,  pass the arena popcorn please, we're paying for it.  

The Pawlowski Bitch Slap

Who's your Daddy now?

We, who write and read blogs, overestimate the general public. We assumed that Pawlowski's support with his PAC in the spring, would come back to haunt those candidates, after the FBI investigation. I pretty much dismissed that logical reasoning, until today's article in the Morning Call, by Emily Opilo, FBI cloud darkens Allentown election. The article makes that logical reasoning public, making it a reality, seven days before the election. The article associates Thiel, Glazier, and Affa with the Pawlowski/Fleck/FBI fiasco. Then again, I may now be overestimating the influence of the Morning Call's article. But, at the very least, it's a well deserved bitch slap at those who gladly kissed Pawlowski's ring last spring.

The Cedarbrook Myth

It's funny that with one week to go before the election, candidates are now suddenly supporters of Cedarbrook. Understand, that as a registered independent, I don't get most mailings sent out to the party faithful. One mailing I did receive was from Dan Road Warrior Hartzell. As someone who has addressed the County Commissioners on Cedarbrook, I don't remember seeing Dan there. That's another funny thing, seeing some candidate attend a meeting or two for the first time, after they decide to run for the office. Dan also claims on his card that he used to cover the meetings for the Morning Call. I assume that he did, but I don't remember that, and I remember too much. Anyway, the only thing sadder than Dan's funny card, was the Republican Results Team card. The team, Holt, Osborne, Northstein and Mazziotti, also pledge their loyalty to Cedarbrook. Results Team is dedicated to contining Cedarbrook's mission of care and excellent services in a fiscally sustainable manner with a clear and measurable strategy. In reality, the record shows that they apparently never found a clear and measurable strategy, as they voted against every reasonable proposal to modernize and save Cedarbrook.

ADDENDUM: As often the case, I get a message from some candidate I criticized, asking if I would kindly phone them, so that they could more fully explain their position, which perhaps I misunderstood.  In the case of the Republican Results Team, allow me to elaborate on my condemnation.  When you decided against remodeling the D wing for a profitable rehabilitation unit, you demonstrated your lack of commitment to Cedarbrook.  When you stated that perhaps instead you should get even more studies, or build a new nursing home, you demonstrated just how disingenuous you are on the topic.  That said,  I will host any comment from any candidate.  

photograph by K Mary Hess

The Business of Cedar Park

As an advocate for the traditional park system, I find commercial companies leasing Cedar Park a complete exploitation of the park.  On Saturday, the park lent itself to the second for profit company this year, The Color Run. (The first was Slide The City) These companies donate a small portion of the proceeds to a local cause, creating the misconception of community benefit, while the traveling shows are actually for their own profit.  Slide The City was really ironic, considering that Cedar Beach Pool was closed because of neglect.  After a long season of one scheduled event after another, one would think that the Rose Garden neighborhood deserved a respite, but not in this administration's commercial mind. I cannot tell you exactly from where the music was being broadcast early Saturday morning, but you could hear it from Cedar Crest Blvd. to 17th Street. These commercial add on events may be fine for a park system with no scheduled recreation, but that's not the case in Allentown, especially Cedar Park.

I don't write much about Pawlowski's trouble with the FBI, that's above my paygrade, but I can tell you I consider him a park criminal. His main crime against the parks is the neglect of the WPA structures, resulting in the collapse of the Lehigh Parkway wall.  Allowing the Wildlands Conservancy to demolish the Robin Hood Dam, to garner a grant, was another crime.  While the park system infrastructure crumbles, Pawlowski brags about people paying to be sprayed with colored powders.

Allentown's Pawlowski Girl

When Louie Belletieri ran in the 2005 Democratic primary against Pawlowski, he was supported by his fellow business person at 12th and Chew, Candida Affa. When Pawlowski won the primary, Candida switched her loyalty to him, and has never looked back. Pawlowski, in turn, has rewarded her devotion with numerous appointments, and she has never failed to support the company policy. This year she was recruited to run for City Council, and supported by the Pawlowski PAC, until political manager Mike Fleck disappeared, in the Pawlowski-Gate scandal. While other candidates are trying to distance themselves from Pawlowski, Candida doubles down. "What the mayor needs now is more support..." It's unclear to me if it's blind loyalty, or she may be oblivious of current events. I believe that in all the years of pushing Pawlowski agendas, she has only attended one council meeting. She personifies what's wrong with Allentown politics.

Downhill On Lehigh Street

During the early 1970's, Allentown demolished the entire neighborhood between Union and Lawrence Streets. It was, in a large part, home to the black community. How ironic that we destroyed the cohesion of a neighborhood, but renamed Lawrence Street after Martin Luther King. The only remnant of the neighborhood is the St. James A.M.E. Church. Going up the hill today we now have a vacant bank call center on the east, and the Housing Authority Project on the west. A whole neighborhood existed in from both sides of Lehigh Street, including black owned shops. The houses were old and humble, but people owned them, many for generations. Some blacks at the time wondered if the project was Urban Renewal or Negro Removal?

 reprinted from January of 2011

2nd and Hamilton

Up to the mid 1960's,  before Allentown started tinkering with urban redevelopment, lower Hamilton Street still teemed with businesses. The City had grown from the river west,  and lower Hamilton Street was a vibrant area.  Two train stations and several rail lines crossed the busy thoroughfare.  Front, Ridge and Second were major streets in the first half of the twentieth century.  My grandparents settled on the 600 block of 2nd Street in 1895, along with other Jewish immigrants from Russia and Lithuania.  As a boy, I worked at my father's meat market on Union Street.  I would have lunch at a diner, just out of view in the photo above.  The diner was across from the A&P,  set back from the people shown on the corner.  A&P featured bags of ground to order 8 O'Clock coffee, the Starbucks of it's day.
please click on photo
photocredit:Ed Miller, 1953
reprinted from November 2011

Leasing Allentown Municipal

I know nothing about golf, last time I was on the city course was as a 11 year old caddy.  However, I know something about Pawlowski. The problem with leasing the course golf, simply put, is that Pawlowski and this administration doesn't have the trust to continue making such decisions. Even before the recent FBI investigation, the golf course restaurant lease was political. While the administration justifies the proposal because the course lost $163,000 in 2014, please remember that we paid Atiyeh $1.4million for land that we didn't need, to expand a park system that we can't take care of, as is. The current pro, under job duress, is an interested bidder in Pawlowski's quick lease scheme. I'm sure that if council nixes the leasing, that gentleman will make sure that the course is in the black next year. However, that would involve council doing something new for them, saying no. After ten years of Pawlowski, that's a power that they seem to have forgotten that they process.