I have been a supporter of local outsider politics for decades. These are the people you see at the meetings, week after week. They are the ones that fight the battle for everyone else. They are the ones who speak out for the many who remain silent. While a few get elected and become mainstream, most remain unelected, and unrecognized for their commitment. Reporting their accomplishments has always been an honor for this blog.
Shown sitting with Trotner is City Council candidate Jessica Lee Ortiz and School Board candidate Phoebe Harris.
reprinted from February of 2017
ADDENDUM AUGUST 4, 2025:The two gentlemen, Lewis Shupe and Robert Trotner, are both still at it, and at it again. Although they never stopped their activism, they're putting coffee in the cup again at a physical location. You're welcome to join them tomorrow night(August 5) at Starbucks, 645 Hamilton Street at 6:00PM. I recall years ago meeting Josh Siegel at such a meeting, before he ever ran for any office.
After eighteen years as a daily, MOLOVINSKY ON ALLENTOWN will be produced semiweekly, on Mondays and Thursdays.
Not sure who most of the people mentioned above are, but Phoebe Harris and Josh Siegel?
ReplyDeleteIf Mr. Trotner and Mr Shupe are responsible for either of them being in office, I can only hope that they’re enjoying life the Allentown they helped create.
anon@6:07: you're making a political statement on the people mentioned....I'm just referring to a pipeline.. The local Republicans could use a pipeline, I can't think of one new person in their stable.
ReplyDeletethe man in yellow is not lewis shupe.
ReplyDeleteSiegel is the single biggest narcissist in Lehigh County politics. He’s always all about himself.
ReplyDeleteYes, Trotner championed him since the beginning of his career. Shame on Trotner for that.
This post is about grass roots, not partisan opinions. I will not be printing any more such comments on this post.
DeleteThe fellow in yellow is Kristian Anderson, who expired in 2017 or so.
ReplyDeleteLou @ 8:37, I adjusted the post accordingly.
DeleteThe grass roots throws up some excellent emerging talent, it also produces some very toxic personalities. To point this out when it’s exhibited in the extreme has nothing to do with partisanship.
ReplyDeleteanon@10:17: Au contraire, the people who voted him to office, and likely will again, would disagree.
DeleteAllentown voters have rejected some phenomenal Republican candidates for Mayor and City Council in relatively recent memory.
DeleteThe Republican Party is now MIA.
Sadly Allentown is a tribal one party town and that party has lost the ability to weed out the imposters, liars, wacky woke and the mentally unstable at every level and every turn.
Allentown is the hole in the Lehigh Valley donut and that hole will continue to grow. All the NIZ buildings in the world won’t change this.
The PP&L tower is a monument to pending decline. There it sits, abandoned as a looming monument
to a failed urban center.
anon@1:04: I agree that in Allentown some quality R candidates were ignored, never the less, the Republican party should do better than MIA.
DeleteThe PPL tower supposedly is being converted to apartments, which hopefully will bring some life to Hamilton St.
I hosted a small group of independents this morning, who like myself, still think Allentown is worth our efforts.
Look for the PPL Tower project to enjoy the same level of success that the NIZ rental units have.
Delete“Build it and they will come.”
I believe that it will be successful...they will have unique views, the best in the valley...Also, their own parking deck.
DeleteAs someone familiar with the local Republican party I can say with certainty leadership prefers no Republicans run in the city due to their mistaken belief that if they field candidates in the city it will increase city democrat turnout and hurt their county candidates. They are fools to think this way. Big swings to the Republicans only happened in the city last year not in the suburbs. Stupid is as stupid does. Meanwhile Allentown has been orphaned by the local Republican party.
DeleteHonestly, a Republican canidate has a snowball's chance in July of getting elected to any political office in Allentown. Be it the school board or city council.
DeleteEven a mayor who is woke and pushes ethnic division in the city has a better chance of election versus a Republican. The Democrats have flooded the zone with those who rely on government checks over the producers in society who have left the city for the townships over the past 40 years or so.
anon@9:18: Ed Zucal is in a unique position. He's on the ballot on the 'Republican column, but he is a Democrat. (He got there by write-in). Being less than the candidate on the Democratic column is a disadvantage, but it's better than being. an independent, and much, much better than being a write-in for the general. Although I note your betting analysis, I won't be putting up more comments repeating the same sentiment.
DeleteHistory is abundantly clear, many a toxic narcissist, black and white, men and women, have been elected by an inexplicably misguided electorate.
ReplyDeleteLet the state of the ASD Board and Council, serve as just two examples.
Allentown has been electing nuts, self serving tools, frauds and felons for some years now. That these individuals are elected makes them no less corrupt, incompetent or fraudulent.
Harris would have had Pawlowski still in city hall. Siegel would have slashed the APD and demoralized those who remained.
ReplyDeleteThese positions aren’t partisan, they’re lunatic.
I sat next to Robert Trotner day after day during the entirely of the Pawlowski trial in the Federal Court House, Harris was there almost every day too, sitting up front with the hardcore Pawlowski dead enders on the opposite side of the court room.
ReplyDeleteThe grassroots has produced some extraordinarily dedicated community activists, some who have successfully gone on to political careers, others who have not. It’s also produced some of the many political opportunists and incompetents who have been complicit in driving Allentown into the desperate situation it now confronts.
A healthy civic and political culture does not exist in Allentown. The third largest municipality in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is in free fall (consider the condition of the ASD) with no relief in sight.
mj adams
Is it Thursday yet?
ReplyDeleteanon@2:49: I do feel, and it's only day one, like a warhorse put to stable.
ReplyDeleteanon@3:29: That is my understanding of their being MIA. Meanwhile, Ed Zucal is on the ticket...his pedigree as R or D means nothing to me, I'm concerned with public safety, and will consequently support him.
You just touched on the key point!
DeleteIt is now foolhardy to simply see voting as just a matter of Republican or Democrat. Individual performance in office by each Incumbent needs to be judged on his/her own merit, NOT only due to the label found after their name.
Vote as your personal statement of RIGHT or WRONG.
Allentown is absolutely in decline. Examples everywhere! If you do vote in Allentown, and believe this statement, there can be no complaining unless you vote into office different decision-makers, regardless of their party label.
MM 4:59 am said: “I do feel, and it's only day one, like a warhorse put to stable.”
ReplyDeletePossible solution: Take a few weeks off during the year where you only publish twice a week or don’t publish at all.
It doesn’t strike me that you’ve run out of things to say, and we all know that City Hall continues to provide new material to write about.
Just a friendly suggestion from a long-time reader.