Needless to say, many in the city are opposed to the move, and Citizens for a No-Kill Philadelphia are organizing a protest of the signing at the Novacare complex at 11 a.m.
On November 4th, voters will be asked to abolish the Fairmount Park Commission and merge it with the city Recreation Department, placing the whole under the mayor as a standard city department. The Inquirer looks at some of the arguments for and against.
The Philadelphia School District is suffering from a high number of teacher vacancies, which experts say points to systemic problems in the hiring process.
A second-grade student at Harrington Avery D School in West Philly brought a bag of marijuana to school yesterday and showed it off to his friends. A classmate notified the teacher, who notified police, and the cops then searched the home of the child's father, where they found more marijuana and crack cocaine. He was arrested and charged with endangering the welfare of a child and narcotics offenses.
Authorities issued a warrant yesterday for Dorien Oberlton's arrest in the case of Tuesday's vicious beating of Eric Derrickson in an underground subway concourse. Several witnesses came forward to identify Oberlton, who apparently had a long-standing grudge against Derrickson for supposedly stealing his girl.
43-year-old Tarriq Ali, sentenced to a life term in Delaware, was being transported from California back to Delaware by a private prisoner transportation service when he escaped at Philadelphia International Airport. He is still at large.
Philadelphia School District counselor Veno Leigertwood, 31, was shot once in the neck shortly after 6:30 a.m. on Saturday in front of his Yeadon, Delaware County home. He died of the injury. His wife, Raven, and 7-month-old daughter, Nichole, were sleeping inside at the time. He was about to get his M.B.A. and had just received a promotion at his job. Leigertwood had no known enemies, and only his cell phone was taken.
Some kids got sick at Council Rock High School North in Newtown, Bucks County yesterday after taking a drug called Snurf. We'd make fun of the Daily News for doing their research on Snurf at the Urban Dictionary, but really, that's where we'd probably end up, too.
A Philadelphia police officer was responding to a call to assist another officer around 1AM this morning when his police car collided with another car at a downtown intersection. The officer is listed in critical condition, but his prognosis is good.
Despite an eventful week at the Olympics, Phillyist focused on local, Philadelphiateams.
Seattlest, freshly aware of their "Junior High Readability Level," implemented a new weekly feature spotlighting a local they’re totes crushing on. First up, a guy they met at the Seattle Tattoo Expo.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Mayor Nutter's recent press conference in which he angrily criticized DHS left some workers upset. He spent yesterday trying to placate them in a series of closed-door meetings.
"Nine months after the 10,000 Men movement was launched with great fanfare, the organization that vowed to mount a massive campaign to retake Philadelphia's crime-ridden streets has fielded only four patrol units totaling about 200 men."
Due to the recent loss of $1.4 million in federal funding, and accreditation problems, the Berean Institute, a North Philadelphia landmark that has provided vocational and business education to African-Americans for 109 years, could go out of business as early as Friday. The state is also evicting the school from the building it has occupied since 1973. Berean supporters are calling for a rally at the school at noon Thursday.