Pawlowski's Campaign Soliciting

Ed Pawlowski published the above post last Thursday, the fourth day of his federal trial for corruption. I don't know if he has unshakable faith in his defense attorney, or if he is plain nuts. But at any rate, this post is about a contributor to his senate campaign. A week or so before the FBI raid at city hall, Pawlowski phoned a Democrat I know and hit him up for a contribution to his senate campaign.  This fellow sent in his check shortly before the raid. I bumped into him a few days later, and when I asked him for his opinion about the raid, he told me about his contribution. Trial notes  indicate that Pawlowski knew what was coming down the pike, and was actually soliciting contributions at that time for his upcoming defense, not a senate race.  I think that such deception speaks of his character.

Although Pawlowski is sitting in court every day, all day,  his early morning facebook posts imply that he is still involved in running the city.  I suppose that they are directed at his current supporters who voted for him last November;  Truth isn't an important  point with them.

The Boat Landing

Getting to the Boat Landing, for six year old boys who lived above the park in 1953, was quite an adventure. There were three other wonderful WPA structures to navigate on the journey. Unfortunately,  poor foresight by a previous park director has erased some of the WPA's monuments in Lehigh Parkway. As the postcard from the mid-50's above shows, the Boat Landing (my name for the structure) was a source of pride for the city and park system. It is located at the end of the park,  near Regency Apartments. I use the present tense because remnants of this edifice still exist,  buried under dirt and debris. Other attractions lost in that section of the park include the Spring Pond near the Robin Hood parking lot, and the bridge to the "Island", plus the mosaic inlaid benches which were on the island. ( Island halfway between parking lot and boat landing). Neither the Mayor or the Park Director knows that these centerpieces ever existed. These are irreplaceable architectural treasures well worth restoring.

UPDATE: The above post was written in May of 2009. Later that year I organized a small group of volunteers, and we unearthed a portion of the boat landing. The next year I prevailed on the Allentown Water Shed Foreman, Michael Gilbert, to expose the remaining stones around the Spring Pond and remove the growth hiding the Miniature Bridge.

Trexler Smiles, Landing Revealed

I believe that today, for the first time in decades, General Trexler had something to smile about. Most people never understood why three steps were near the lower entrance of Lehigh Parkway; they seemed to lead nowhere. This morning eight people joined a grass root effort to unveil, for the first time in decades, the structure I called the Boat Landing.

Buried under the dirt and grass were several more steps leading to a landing. Chris Casey was the first to arrive and cleared these steps and the first landing himself. A second set of steps led from the landing to the main landing on the creek. These second steps had a foot or so of ground and plants.

The quality and condition of the stonework is excellent, as was all our WPA icons. I will be polite and say only that it was a crime to have let this neglect occur. On the main landing the accumulated earth was two and half feet thick. The crew dug out the curving retaining wall several yards in each direction, and cleared off the top of the wall.

Eight people working four hours managed to reveal about one third of the landing at the bottom of the steps. It was a thrill to realize we were standing at creek's edge as the WPA architects had envisioned. I stood there often as a boy. There still remains a large portion of dirt to remove at the steps base, but you can now experience the Boat Landing.

The retaining wall and the landing continue for fifty feet or so in both directions. Unfortunately a huge tree has grown on the landing to the right, but the left appears reclaimable.

We who worked there today, hope to return and clear off the remainder of the dirt at the bottom of the steps.

Perhaps others will be motivated to clear off the remaining portion of the landing to the left. Now that might even be an idea for the City; imagine restoring an irreplaceable icon instead of buying something from a catalogue. I'm most grateful to all those who helped today, and will reveal their names with their permission.

ADDENDUM:Michael –

I just wanted to thank you for organizing today’s cleanup at the “Boat Landing” in the Lehigh Parkway. It’s not often that one gets to help unearth a treasure while barely leaving home, but that’s exactly what happened today.

It was truly impressive what big difference a small group of people can make. I can’t even estimate the amount of dirt that was moved with nothing more than a few shovels and a lot of hard work.

We can only hope that the City and the Trexler Trust will become aware of this location and start giving all the great structures in the Parkway the care they deserve.

However, the best part of the story for me came after we all left. I got home and my daughter Lucy (age 7) wanted to know how things went. We hopped in the car and soon we were walking up to the stairs leading to the landing. The sun was shining, and the sunlight trickled through the trees and onto the freshly-exposed stairway.

Lucy asked if she could go down to the landing by the water and next thing I knew we were both there at the waters edge, standing on what had been buried only a few hours earlier and marveling at the beauty of the location.

We spent a few moments there - a father and daughter both enjoying something completely “new” to us (even though the landing is over 70 years old). We talked briefly about what was – and more importantly what could be again.

Thank you for making that moment possible, and I hope many others take the opportunity to visit the landing in the near future.

Mike Schware

P.S. – After visiting the landing, Lucy and I walked further upstream and saw the remnants of the bridge to the island (near the water fountain). The remaining supports of the bridge confirmed what you had told me earlier about the island being much smaller years ago.

I organized the excavation shown above in 2009. We did return and remove the remaining dirt at the bottom of the steps.
reprinted from two separate posts combined

Award Shows Getting Tired

I'm not much for the pretty boy and girl awards.  There is no end to the red carpet of these self promoting shows.  The Academy Award, The Golden Globe Award, the Screen Actors Guild Award,  the I'm So Lucky Award That They Picked My Pretty Face Over Thousands Of Other Pretty Faces Award.  Now I don't watch such nonsense,  but see the articles about them.  I know that Meryl and Oprah were upset at the last show that some men mistook their younger sexy counterparts as sex objects. Meanwhile on the screen,  it's hard to find a production without nudity and guns.

These awards are of course intended to keep these lucky pretty faces in the public's eye.  In the most recent, Melania Trump was snarked Sunday night for not doing more about cyber-bullying.  While that criticism was totally unnecessary, it shows that Hollywood feels empowered to promote their liberalism and that hatred of all things Trump.  This hate-fest didn't receive its full audience because it was competing with the Philadelphia Eagles.  However,  the next one will be soon enough, and you can bet that the theme will again be that Trump is bad and that women are treated like sex objects.  Expect more low cut black dresses.

Pawlowski Is Allentown's New Billy Joel

Francis Dougherty, Pawlowski's former Managing Director, minced no words yesterday describing how Pawlowski steered city contracts to those bidders who could help him most with his political ambitions. While this comes as no surprise to we who watched him operate for the last decade, what does this say about Allentown's future? If he is convicted and taken away, we're still left with about a third of the voting population who were not fazed by his questionable ethics. His supporters now serve on numerous boards and commissions.

Those supporters were not deluded about his innocence,  they were simply hoping for a small piece of the plunder.  Although it would be nice to think that justice will prevail,  and that Allentown will be purged of these parasites,  the truth is that we will never again be the city pictured on postcards.

Billy Joel was a lightweight compared to Pawlowski tainting Allentown's reputation.


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 Could Walk

The first day of the trial went very well for Pawlowski.  It was determined that Pawlowski can indeed testify in his own defense.  In stage presence, the prosecution seems no match for Jack McMahon,  Pawlowski's high power Philadelphia lawyer.  While the judge did demonstrate that he wouldn't allow McMahon to bully,  his extensive courtroom experience was never the less apparent.  Although the tapes played clearly showed that Pawlowski was annoyed about how little some contributors ponied up,  there was no quid pro quo arrangement demonstrated , which is necessary for a conviction.  Although Pawlowski's expectations about contributions was clear enough, again from a legal threshold, the statements were implicit, short of a required explicit arrangement.  Even the Eagles victory worked for Ed yesterday, with the Philadelphia media being a no-show for day one.  If it had been a one day trial,  Ed would have walked.  While it is not a one day trial,  it was a very important day, the jury's first impression.

I did NOT attend yesterday's proceeding.  This report is based on feedback from several people whose power of observation I know and trust.

illustration for The Morning Call by Bill Ternay

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