Right Questions, Wrong Answers
by Vince Daliessio
You know it's bad when the Daily News admits that the corruption in the current government of the City of Philadelphia is endemic. Yet, true to form, in their proposal to clean up city government, they mindlessly repeat the same old tired mantra of "Campaign Finance Reform" that failed so comically in the recent national election (You know, our first BILLION dollar election?). Their cutesy "Top Ten" list of reform proposals starts out this way;
1. Tighten limits on campaign contributions...
2. Limit campaign spending; provide public funds to help pay for elections...
3. Enforce campaign-finance laws...
OK, so the top three suggestions are worthless - let's move down;
4. Create a serious city ethics agency...
5. Empower independent watchdogs...
Halfway through the list, and the Daily Noose is still advocating worthless fig-leaf proposals. Any city ethics agency will be beholden to the government, while "independent watchdogs" are easily bought off by professional corruptors like those in Philadelphia City Government. Continuing on;
6. Ban the free lunch (gifts and gratuities to city officials)...
7. Expose lobbyists' inside deals...
Finally, something substantial. Gifts and other kinds of "soft" bribes are a common way to swing billions of dollars of "city" business from one company to another, so this could be useful, assuming it would be enforced (a generous assumption). And lobbyists and others use inside information all the time to benefit themselves and those who help provide the access. But both of these proposals presume the current level of city control of the flow of money through its jurisdiction, which means they are rather conveniently overlooking the common-sense solution of simply getting the city out of the business of (name it)...
8. Require competition for city contracts...
Well, DUH.
9. Let the public see all city documents...
This presumes the city fathers won't just falsify documents or stop creating them altogether.
10. Replace Minority Business Enterprise Council with something that works...
Finally something we can agree with. Replace the "Street Family Fund" with open, head-to-head competition for all city business. But this is really no different than proposal 9.
So basically, out of ten points, the Daily News has proposed two that would have even a token effect on the corrupt patronage machine that is city government in Philadelphia.
Next time: I propose a list of ten real proposals for reform that, unlike the ones listed above, will actually work.