Pawlowski Pre-trial Musings

Today Mayor Pawlowski's long awaited trial actually begins. As I scanned the defense witness list I wondered what would motivate most of these people, besides the subpoena,  to cooperate on Ed's behalf.  Then it occurred to me that it was an opportunity to publicity disavow any knowledge of any wrongdoing.  Now there are a few of these people who consider themselves friends of Ed,  and  would  testify for Ed's sake.  Alan Jennings would be among that group,  but I believe most on the list are on the public disavow side.  I suspect that at least one person, who was propelled into the public money income stream by Ed, wants to show that she can be counted on to be discreet.

On a city issue facebook site,  a reader wondered why people complaining about Pawlowski re-elected him?  Actually, most people aware enough to participate on such a site, didn't directly vote for him. However, many did write-in the name of a third candidate, which resulted in Pawlowski's victory.

In my previous post I discussed the psychology of  Pawlowski's facebook posts.  I would think such insertions by him violate the intent of the court order for him not to discuss the case.   Convicted or not,  prison assigned or not,  a good therapist might be in order.


Welcome to Molovinsky On Allentown.  This blog is produced every weekday to illuminate local politics.  I am an independent monitor and an occasional activist, when necessary.  Your comments are welcome and your readership is appreciated.  

Pawlowski On Facebook

I find Ed Pawlowski's posts on facebook rather remarkable. He seems to have two kinds; One version is his activities in Allentown, completely ignoring his upcoming trial. Understand that I have anxiety even over a haircut appointment, much less federal prosecution. His second kind of posts deal with the law. Although the law has changed since the investigation began into his shenanigans, and he could be acquitted, nine people already pleaded guilty to abetting him in his intent, which was alledgedly  to shake down contributors.

His facebook posts are indeed quite a pyschological profile.  The election is over, and the jury was selected in Philadelphia. Pawlowski took his wife and children along to Philadelphia,  where she was admonished by the judge for chatting up potential jurors.  One must wonder who he is trying to convince with his facebook posts?  Perhaps himself.

Chris Kocher Reneges On Pledge

Chris Kocher's letter to the editor,  which appeared in The Morning Call on December 7, 2014, assured the public  that the Wildlands Conservancy will respect certainly whatever decision South Whitehall Township makes about the (Wehr's) dam's future.  It was of course just a public relations gesture, knowing full well how much influence his organization welded over the township.  In reality, the Wildlands have written the township's Master Park Plan, which called for the dam's demolition.

When the Commissioners were presented with over 7,600 signatures, actually collected at the dam itself, they felt publicly pressured not to give the Wildlands permission to proceed with the demolition.  However,  they declined to proclaim the dam saved, or grant it historical designation. Likewise,  despite Kochers gesture in his letter, he made no subsequent statement.

The Commissioners then decided to hold a public referendum on funding the dam's repair, believing that the public would never vote themselves a tax increase to save the dam.  Once again they underestimated the public's regard for the beautiful historic structure.

Although Chris Kocher publicly stated that the Wildlands would back away from the dam's demolition if the Commissioners voted to save it, he never has afforded the residents of South Whitehall the same respect.  On the contrary, the Wildlands has written the state, claiming that the dam is in poorer condition than the state inspection indicated. It is now morally incumbent upon the Wildlands Conservancy to respect the wishes of the public, as affirmed through the referendum.  After writing his letter to the editor back in 2014,  hopefully Kocher has the integrity to now publicly repeat his commitment to the residents of the township.

reprinted from May 2017

photocredit: K Mary Hess

A Crime By The Wildlands Conservancy

photo by Tami Quigley

The top photo shows the Robin Hood Bridge, before the Wildlands Conservancy demolished the little  Robin Hood Dam, just downstream beyond the bridge. The dam was only about 10 inches high, and was built as a visual effect to accompany the bridge in 1941. It was the last WPA project in Allentown, and considered the final touch for Lehigh Parkway. Several years ago, the Wildlands told the Allentown Park Director and City Council that it wanted to demolish the dam. The only thing that stood between their bulldozer and the dam was yours truly. I managed to hold up the demolition for a couple weeks, during which time I tried to educate city council about the park, but to no avail. If demolishing the dam wasn't bad enough, The Wildlands Conservancy piled the broken dam ruble around the stone bridge piers, as seen in the bottom photo. I'm sad to report that the situation is now even worse. All that ruble collected silt, and now weeds and brush is growing around the stone bridge piers. I suppose the Wildlands Conservancy considers it an extension of its riparian buffer.

reprinted from June 2016 and earlier

UPDATE JANUARY 2018: The Wildlands Conservancy should be made to remove, piece by piece, all the rubble that they piled around the bridge piers, despoiling the bridge's beauty. City Council should refrain from ever again permitting The Wildlands Conservancy to alter our park designs.

The Morning Call Inadvertently Enables Deception

The Morning Call continues to inadvertently  support deception by one of its favorite sacred cows, The Wildlands Conservancy.   Last year I provided documentation to the paper demonstrating that the Wildlands was working with South Whitehall Township to ignore the voters referendum saving Wehr's Dam.  The paper continues to ignore this violation of the voter's trust,  and refuses to print my op-ed on the topic.  Yesterday,  the paper had a story about road salt getting into our waterways,  and  once again presents the Wildland Conservancy as the local authority on the problem, and the corresponding solutions to it.  The Wildlands recommends riparian buffers to help filter the salt from the streams.  What the Wildlands fails to divulge is that they get grants to design buffers in the parks, but that the storm sewer systems are piped directly into the streams,  bypassing the buffers.  This is the sort of  omission  and deception regularly used by the Wildlands to justify the grants that they use for these projects.  They are allowed to use a percentage of the grants for administrative purposes,  providing a revenue stream for their salaries.

The consequences of their distortions have been substantial.  Lehigh Parkway lost its beautiful decorative Robin Hood Dam, which was the last WPA construction in the park.  The removal of the Fish Hatchery Dam resulted in a massive trout kill during the next major storm.  They continuously cite current generalized environmental trends, but ignore the specifics related to a particular site.

In fairness to The Morning Call, circumstances help the Wildlands  pass off these deceptions. For instance, the Wehr's Dam controversy which stretched out for two years, was covered by five different string reporters.  There is no regular reporter assigned to the South Whitehall Township meetings. Allentown has City Council members, a park director, and a mayor who are not native Allentonians,  nor are they very familiar with the park system.  Never the less, the paper should be committed to protecting our icons,  before promoting any organization's agenda ahead of our history.

photo of former Robin Hood Dam, demolished by The Wildlands Conservancy

The Saga Of Ed Pawlowski

Tomorrow the corruption trial of Ed Pawlowski starts in Philadelphia, where a jury will be selected. The trial itself will then take place in Allentown.  Although Allentown will be a media circus for the trial,  this blog will not be covering the trial details.  In my mind Allentown has already been rightly found guilty.  What does it say about a city that elects someone with fifty four counts of corruption filed against him?

I suppose that the trial will be good for downtown business.  All those reporters to feed and house, while Ed's lawyer proclaims his innocence. Although I will not report on the trial per se, I may opine on the accompanying circus.

Allentown's new construction will finally get the exposure which it craves.  Although the Morning Call has been promoting the NIZ, its reach was limited.  Credit Ed Pawlowski for bringing the national press to town.

Sheftel & Malenovsky

In 1920, two brother- in-laws bought a truck and started dealing in cloth scraps from the many sewing factories in the Lehigh Valley. By 1950 the firm was called A. Sheftel and Sons, but scattered throughout the valley were still buildings with the older Sheftel and Malenovsky banner painted on the side. Other families also traded in the by-products from the large local needle trade industry, mainly the Levines and Pearlmans. Although the sewing factories declined locally, the Sheftel sons grew the business nationally, and today it is operated by the third generation. In the minds of old timers, the Sheftels and Malenovskys are still linked. By coincidence, less than 24 hours after a previous posting concerning my maternal grandfather's citizenship paper, I received a call from the Sheftel family. They had no real knowledge of me, much less my blog. They had discovered that in their possession was a copy of my paternal grandfather's citizenship paper, Aaron Moloviensky. My family in the 1930's had attempted to "Americanize" our name, by changing it from Moloviensky to Molovinsky, it didn't work. Apparently, at sometime in the past  after a local Jewish History exhibit, someone had placed the Moloviensky document in the Sheftel-Malenovsky folder.

reprinted from 2007 and 2010

Urban Renew, A Temporary Solution

Urban renewal projects are nothing new to Allentown. Every couple decades some Mayor thinks he has a brighter idea. In a previous post, I showed the historic Lehigh and Union Street neighborhood, totally destroyed by city planners. Today, an under used Bank calling center sits awkwardly alone on that Lehigh Street hill. The picture above shows another hill of merchants and residents, fed to a mayor's bulldozer. The picture is from 1953, and shows Hamilton Street, from Penn Street down toward the railroad stations. At that time we still had two stations, The Lehigh Valley Railroad and The New Jersey Central. The current closed bar and restaurant occupies the Jersey Central. Everything on Hamilton Street, west of the bridge over the Jordan creek, with the exception of the Post Office, was demolished up to Fifth Street. Government Center would be built on the north side of the street, and a new hotel on the south, to accommodate the many anticipated visitors. Recently we had to remove and replace the facade of the county courthouse, which leaked since it was constructed. The hotel is now a rooming house.

Unannounced plans are underway for a new hotel to service anticipated visitors to Pawlowski's Palace of Sports. It will be up to some future blogger to document how that hotel becomes a rooming house.

reprinted from December of 2013 and 2011 

ADDENDUM JANUARY 2018: Reilly's new NIZ funded Renaissance Hotel doomed the former Hilton Hotel at 9th and Hamilton, once a new jewel in a former urban renewal scheme. The hotel, most recently with a Holiday Inn designation, is now in Reilly's vast City Center Real Estate portfolio.