My father had two meat markets, one in Allentown and one in Easton. After I got my driver's license, I spent Saturdays and summers working in the Easton market. I would have lunch in the square, where there were several restaurants. Although the businesses in the square have changed hands many times over the last century, the buildings and atmosphere has stayed the same. Easton was just designated a finalist in The Great American Main Street Awards for 2025.
Meanwhile, someone returning to Allentown would be hard pressed to recongnize Hamilton Street from their youth. While almost all the buildings have been replaced, the crowds of shoppers are gone...actually all the shoppers are gone. So while Pennsylvania has pumped a $Billion dollars of diverted state taxes onto Hamilton Street, Easton gets the award.
If the return on investment mentioned above isn't ironic enough, factor in that all the new publicly financed buildings in Allentown are privately owned. A former state senator devised the real estate scheme called the NIZ, and the buildings are owned by his childhood friend. That former senator is now Pennsylvania's Director of Revenue, and he refuses to release the NIZ facts and figures. A subpoena has been issued for that information through the efforts of state senator Jarrett Coleman.
Haven’t heard any updates in the Sen. Coleman request. If new information including actual financial data is received, I’m pretty sure the Morning Call will work hard to hide it.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure of that. Although the paper certainly was complicit in the early NIZ shenanigans, both the involved real estate and personnel are now gone.
Delete"A subpoena has been issued for that information through the efforts of state senator Jarrett Coleman."
ReplyDeleteThis is a basic information request that should have been quickly answered in full. That it hasn't should be a daily headline in newspapers across the state, including the Morning Call.
My assumption is that Browne is refusing to release the information because it will show some sort of wrongdoing on his part or the part of his cronies.
The bigger question is why would Josh Shapiro, who has presidential ambitions, allow Browne to withhold the information? What is Shapiro hiding, or who is HE trying to protect? Has Shapiro personally (or Shapiro's campaign committee) somehow benefitted from the NIZ?
Much like in the Pawlowski case, the "real" press seems fairly disinterested. I would say there might be a Pulitzer waiting for whichever journalist is willing to dig into this and get to the bottom of it.
Browne, on the way out the door as a state senator, tied things up very tightly for himself and his beneficiaries. A law was passed to insure NIZ privacy, because the figures involved so few people, he claimed that it would be an invasion of tax privacy. That convoluted nonsense was endorsed by the state supreme court. As for being on the NIZ case since the beginning, send the prize to me.
DeleteI understand the NIZ privacy law, and agree it is convoluted. But transparency is a hallmark of good government, so I don't know why Shapiro doesn't order HIS revenue secretary to be open with the taxpayers.
DeleteLet those with something to hide take Shapiro to court to keep it a secret. If the NIZ is good government and as successful as touted, why would Shapiro want to the information out there for all to see? He could also be advocating for the NIZ privacy law to be changed by the legislature. That should be an easy exercise in bipartisanship, since both parties always CLAIM they want to be transparent about everything.
I also don't understand why Shapiro chose to hire Browne in the first place, unless Shapiro had something to hide also. It certainly couldn't be Browne's multiple DUI's that got him a leg up on ALL the other qualified individuals in the state.
As far as you getting a Pulitzer, if they handed them out to blogs, I suspect you'd have a wall of them by now.
Allentown corruption has been in Harrisburg since fast Eddie Randell was making the state hospital a done deal. They all are just covering for theft of not only state monies but also theft of services. It's so simple because it's personal gain of a few greassing one another's personal purse.
ReplyDeleteWe live in one of the most corrupt states in the union. Insider favoritism is the standard for doing business in PA. They no longer work for us, now we work for them and our servants have become our masters, what's more is that we don't even seem to care.
ReplyDeleteI too am surprised that ambitious Shapiro, who took on abuse in the Catholic Church in Pennsylvania, hasn’t moved on this. He’s usually fearless about going after obvious fraud. Hamilton Street now has the charm of an empty shopping mall. It wasn’t great before, but it’s cleaner now. You can see that— as you’re driving through. But there still is no reason to stop on your way to the arena. I think there is more foot traffic on Main Street in Hellertown.
ReplyDeleteHellertown is fortunate enough to participate in a regional public school system (Saucon Valley) that is one of the best in the Lehigh Valley. If Allentown had had that advantage, the middle class would not have fled to the suburbs and you'd have people on the sidewalks downtown.
DeleteExcellent point. Let's call it 'trickle-out' citizenry. That's exactly what's happening in NYC and across the country. The middle class (often defined as conservative but includes lots of liberals) is fleeing in droves.... leaving their cities with nothing but leeches. Soon they will find there is no longer a 'host' for the leeches to feed off.
ReplyDelete10:44 - You're making a chicken or egg argument. Allentown and the ASD are not in the condition they are in because the middle class fled to the suburbs, people fled to the suburbs because of the decisions made by the leadership of City Hall and ASD.
ReplyDeleteAllentown has been chasing grants and "free" money for half a century. It turns out that "free" money comes with a cost, and people (white, black or Hispanic; conservative or liberal) don't want to live in places that cater to the poor, and they don't want to be treated like ATM machines by every politician implementing a new vote-buying scheme. Most of them move out as soon as they are able.
Your reference to other areas being "fortunate enough to participate in a regional public school system" infers that ASD is somehow underfunded. It's not. It's just mismanaged. School Board leaders in ASD (and therefore those hired to run ASD) don't look at public education as something that should competently teach our children the basics (at a minimum) and prepare them for life ahead. They look at the school district as a jobs program that needs to be protected at all costs.
If you want to change things in the Allentown School District, they have to put the kids first. If you want to make things better in Allentown, lower the EIT for people who live here (or at least to the point where it's EQUAL to what outsiders pay), and stop putting purposely misleading questions on the ballot so you can fleece your own residents even further. Start protecting neighborhoods and the investments people have made, instead of trying to over-populate the city (and lowering the quality of life) through poor zoning revisions.
If you want to attract the middle-class back to the city, do those things to make them feel welcome. What we have now is the exact opposite.
By the way, some of those regional school districts are making the same mistakes Allentown and ASD made, they're just about 20 years behind. If you need an example, look no further than Emmaus and East Penn SD. Adding Allentown to any of them would only further their decline, not save Allentown's.
All your comments are true & legit,but unfortunately the people responsible don't give a damm!!
ReplyDelete