Jimmy From South Philly, You’re On The Air

fevereiro 28, 2022 Postar um comentário

Jimmy From South Philly, You're On The Air

When Mayor-elect Kenney picked the Eagles for his starting time fight, it raised the question: Did we elect a WIP caller to exist mayor?

Dec. 24, 2015

Shooting from the lip is a fourth dimension-honored Philly tradition, and nowhere is the art form in more frequent practice than on the airwaves of sports talker WIP, where the phones lines calorie-free up on a daily footing with tirades of equal parts passion and misinformation. Listening to the daily drama—and information technology is a drama, the American male person soap opera—yous have to wonder: Does anyone take a breath around here? It'south thrilling and terrifying all at once…Shouting trumps reasoned discourse and proper name-calling renders civility a quaint trait of the past. (A fourth dimension-honored tradition of Angelo Cataldi's Forenoon Evidence is to bestow a "Weasel of the Calendar week" honor, usually upon some twentysomething athlete who is non trying to embarrass himself on the field of play.)

At present, based on the final calendar week or and then of headlines, I'm wondering if the aforementioned will be said of our politics in the new Kenney era.

If you haven't caught the headlines, Mayor-elect Jim Kenney made a head-scratcher of a choice in a city with crumbling infrastructure, struggling schools and unfunded pensions when he decided to pick his first public fight—with the Philadelphia Eagles. The saga provides insight into the many faces of Kenney and raises all sorts of questions as to what kind of mayor he'll exist.

First, the background. On December viii, the Philadelphia Business Periodical bankrupt the news that Kenney is opposed to Temple University building a football game stadium on its campus. "If the Eagles were living upwardly to their delivery to Philadelphia and our public university, merely equally the Steelers live up to their delivery to Pittsburgh past renting their stadium for free to Pitt's football team, there wouldn't be a need for a stadium at Temple University," Kenney told the Business Journal. And then he went all Jimmy from South Philly: "There'd too be a winning squad down at Lincoln Financial Field for a refreshing change."

Whoa. Temple promptly put its stadium plans on agree. And—even though Kenney'due south facts were wrong, which we'll get to—the Mayor-elect doubled down on his position last week.

"The Eagles are frustrating to me," he said. "They are not…as community-committed as the Phillies, Flyers, and Sixers are." Temple pays almost $1 million in hire to the Eagles, who reportedly want $12 1000000 up-front end and $two 1000000 per twelvemonth in rent for a new 30-twelvemonth lease. "In that location is nothing I tin practice to force them to do the right thing," Kenney said. "They have a very solid and stubborn attitude about the relationship between Temple and the Eagles."

Needless to say, the Eagles felt blindsided. Christina Weiss-Lurie penned an op-ed earlier this calendar week, detailing all the great work the Eagles Youth Partnership does for the city of Philadelphia.

Okay, now permit'due south do some unpeeling:

Kenney misstated the issue. There is a legitimate contend to exist had over whether Temple should build an on-campus stadium. David Tater of the Daily News has done the best reporting on this, showing pretty conclusive proof that anytime large-time college football game programs (or those that aspire to the big-time) finance and cock on-campus stadiums, it's the students who end up paying for it.

Kenney made a caput-scratcher of a choice in a city with aging infrastructure, struggling schools and unfunded pensions when he decided to pick his first public fight—with the Eagles. The saga provides insight into the many faces of Kenney and raises all sorts of questions equally to what kind of mayor he'll exist.

Just Kenney's not making that example. No, Kenney links Temple's plans to the country of the school's charter with the Eagles in a mode that Temple does not. Temple doesn't desire to play at the Linc anymore; President Neil Theobald has made it articulate that, as he says, athletics are the front porch of a Academy, and the manner to attract students is to get a sports powerhouse. It'south a dubious proffer, simply the theory is you do that by having on-campus facilities to help recruit All-American athletes, as opposed to playing the bulk of your games before sparse crowds in a gigantic crosstown stadium.

Part of me wishes that Temple actually does want to play at the Linc, and that Kenney'south comments were actually Machiavellian—designed to assistance Temple by putting force per unit area on the Eagles. That would be taking a page from his long-ago mentor, Vince Fumo, who was the master of such misdirection. (Fumo was the main reason the Phillies don't play in a Centre City ballpark today). Just the WIP caller-like shot about the Eagles' losing record and the singling out of the Eagles as somehow lacking in customs delivery when compared to the other sports teams speak to the truth of the matter: Jimmy from South Philly is an emotional guy, he's pissed off at all this losing—similar that fourth-and-1 play call into the line confronting the Cardinals!—and he simply doesn't similar Chip Kelly's team.

Kenney Got The Facts Wrong. Turns out, Pitt does pay rent to the Steelers. More egregious was Kenney'due south condemnation of the Eagles as somehow lacking in delivery to the community. Lurie'southward op-ed ably maps out the slap-up work washed by the Eagles Youth Partnership, just she barely touches on all the initiatives performed past Eagles' players similar our own Connor Barwin, nor does she mention that the Eagles are All-World among sports teams in terms of environmental sustainability. They're so committed, they've been known to load up the team aeroplane with their trash afterward away games in lodge to make certain their decline is properly disposed of.

But the unfavorable comparison to the other sports teams in town is where Kenney really goes astray. I'chiliad a longtime, and long suffering, Sixers fan, and in detail I'm an admirer of Sixers CEO Scott O'Neil. But Kenney must not know that the Sixers, lured by ridiculous incentives from Trenton, are moving to Camden—taking some 250 jobs and the accompanying wage taxes and multiplier effect economic impacts with them across the river. I'k not mad at them—hey, I only want to win already, and so if this gets u.s.a. in that location, I'll help load upward the buses—just it's hardly an example of "customs commitment."

Tin can y'all shoot from the lip and govern? Most observers believe that City Quango President Darrell Clarke, whose Fifth Councilmanic District includes Temple, will ultimately be supportive of the university's desire to build a stadium. And ane of Kenney's core constituencies—the building trades—stands to reap the benefits of a Northward Philly stadium. The only constituency his Temple stance seems to play to are the progressives like those in 15 Now Temple, the grouping that organized a protest on campus to fence that the schoolhouse should raise its employee wages instead of building a stadium.

Did he think most the politics of his position before speaking? Kenney exhibited great skill in putting together a fragile coalition of diverse interests in society to go elected. Simply taking a position that is likely counter to some of his allies interests before fifty-fifty being sworn in might exist a sign that keeping a coalition together is significantly harder than forming it.

Every bit the imbroglio with the Eagles flared, one insider noted of our Mayor-elect, "he'due south kenneying all over this." That's the danger, that "Kenneying" becomes a verb, conjuring images of a stampeding bull amid our political china.

Talking tough. Over at Philly Mag, Patrick Kerkstra has penned a smart piece positing Kenney as the "anti-Nutter." But there is at to the lowest degree one way in which the two men are strikingly akin.

Both are historically risk-balky politicians with a trend to talk tough—when it doesn't cost anything. So Nutter scores points for calling Donald Trump an asshole and for telling young African-American kids to pull their pants up, when the truly gunslinging act would accept been to spend some political capital letter early on in his tenure to accept on poverty or pensions.

Similarly, it's pretty easy for Kenney to play to the 700 level by lambasting our underachieving pro football team. The real measure out of Kenney's toughness volition come when we find out if he'll be able to say "no" to his supporters when negotiating with the city unions. (Don't forget that it was Kenney's 2007 bill that pandered to city workers by removing the fiscally responsible rule requiring the pension to exist funded at 76 percentage in order to warrant worker bonuses; we're currently funded at 48 pct, but thank you to Kenney, that didn't cease $60 million in bonuses from going out earlier this year.)

Someone assistance Jimmy be Jimmy. Over the terminal week, as the imbroglio with the Eagles flared, one insider noted of our Mayor-elect, "he'south Kenneying all over this."

That'southward the danger, that "Kenneying" becomes a verb, conjuring images of a stampeding bull amid our political red china. Those who have long known Jim Kenney marvel at how the campaign kept his intemperate inclinations from bubbling to the surface.

Whether he's calling Chris Christie a "fatty assed…pitter-patter" on Twitter or dressing upwardly as an elf, Jim Kenney is all eye. That'southward mostly a skillful thing. Last month, I was among those asked to read to schoolchildren at the Clara Barton Elementary School in Feltonville to help kick off the "Right Books" entrada, an effort to raise $iii.5 one thousand thousand to stock classroom libraries. Before going to our corresponding classrooms, there was a press briefing featuring Kenney, Superintendent William Hite and Donna Frisby-Greenwood, CEO of the Fund for the Schoolhouse Commune of Philadelphia, the District'due south nonprofit philanthropic arm. Young students sat cross-legged on the floor to the right of the podium. As Frisby-Greenwood spoke and the cameras rolled, Kenney stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Hite behind her; soon, he started leaning back behind Hite to make centre contact with the kids on the flooring. He'd scrunch up his nose or comically smack his lips, eliciting giggles from the kids, before catching himself and looking forwards, straight-faced. Moments later on, he'd lean dorsum and exist at it again, playing to and playing with the only constituency in the room without a vote…that likewise happened to exist the only constituency in the room that actually matters. It was charmingly boyish, affectionate and, virtually important, existent.

"I saw you making faces at the kids, that was pretty cool," I said afterward.

"Oh, I had young ones in one case," he said, grin. "You gotta play around with them."

Afterward eight years of a competent merely bloodless technocrat in City Hall, it will be great to have a living, breathing, passionate personality leading the urban center. Isn't it possible to exist outspoken, provocative and authentic while still being smart and loftier-minded? Kenney didn't offer proof of that hypothesis these final 10 days. Only, despite the messiness, I'k hoping he figures it out. Then don't count me as among those who want to encounter Kenney muzzled. I just want to see him prepared.

Header Photo: Flickr/Ron Reiring