Yo, Philly in the News

• The latest on the violence in our schools: first, the 15-year-old charged with ultimately breaking the neck of that Germantown High teacher has admitted his part in the assault. Second, things continued to be pretty insane at West Philly High yesterday. The day began with the arrest of a student caught with a nail file at the metal detector, then continued at 11AM with a fire in a locker that led to an evacuation of the school. Two students were arrested for setting the fire, and two other students were cited by police for disorderly conduct during the evacuation.
• Sunday was Philly's annual St. Patrick's Day parade, which is the second oldest of its kind in the country, right behind New York's (we'll beat you some day on something, New York!!). Luckily the weather was perfect for a parade and thousands turned out to watch.
• The Inquirer asks, is having so many forums with the mayoral candidates actually a bad thing? And answers, as usual with questions like this, "Maybe." We think perhaps fewer forums and more Thunderdome matches are in order. Two men enter, one man leaves!
• Bob Brady's got a plan "to use the city's Percent for Art program to create an endowment providing annual funding to all arts and cultural groups." More money for the arts always sounds good to us!
• There were more deadly fires in the area this past weekend. It's getting to be a strange and disturbing epidemic.
• The Daily News has a story about a pair of 51-year-old twins who own Santini Contractors and have been scamming seniors out of their money by promising work in exchange for a deposit, then never doing the work and making off with the deposit.

Image Credit: Flickr user kmw7339