Also this issue: A Fight to the Death Despite surprising opposition from the GOP, Governor Rendell says capital punishment is fine by him. -Daryl Gale War Path -Daniel Brook Retention Dimension How can newspapers keep minorities from leaving? -Deborah Bolling Bad Form? -Mary F. Patel The Bell Curve City Paper's weekly gauge of Philly's Quality of Life

May 1- 7, 2003

hall monitor

Safe Street?

The mayor’s anti-drug program has been successful. But is it enough?

by Daryl Gale

As this week’s City Paper hits the streets on Thursday morning, Mayor John Street will be holding a press conference in North Philly to celebrate the one-year anniversary of his pet project, Operation Safe Streets.

³The program was aimed at moving drug dealers and buyers from city corners and reclaiming neighborhoods for residents,² crows the self-congratulatory mayoral press release. ³The program has been immensely successful and shut down more than 300 known drug corners.²

While the 10 a.m. press conference at 12th and Huntington is open to the public, a special police department briefing on Safe Streets statistics at noon is not. It may just be a coincidence, but the timing of the administration"s reluctance to talk real numbers and policy with the public about Safe Streets is pretty interesting when backdropped against next week"s City Council hearings, set to investigate the mayor"s methods and systems for dealing with drug abuse, including Operation Safe Streets.

Council wants to talk openly about a less-than-flattering report released last July by the Philadelphia Police Department"s Integrity and Accountability Office (IAO). The report examines ³the policies and practices of the narcotics enforcement operations of the Philadelphia Police Department to insure that these efforts are conducted legally, ethically, and within Departmental guidelines,² and concludes that the department falls woefully short in these areas. Among the IAO"s findings: that officer training in narcotics law is inconsistent, that the Narcotics Bureau is lax regarding the handling of evidence and that the department"s internal auditing of the Narcotics Bureau is sporadic at best. The report goes on to assail the Philadelphia Police Department"s record-keeping and data collection procedures, its process of selection and promotion of narcotics officers, and the fact that officers are actually encouraged to ³cut constitutional corners² in the enforcement of narcotics laws. All in all, not exactly the kind of rain the mayor wants on his Safe Streets parade.

³It"s not really an indictment of Safe Streets,² says City Councilman Angel Ortiz of the Council hearings, scheduled for Wednesday, May 7. ³I think Safe Streets is a great program, and the mayor deserves all the accolades he"s getting for the idea. But we have to look at how we"re fighting the scourge of illegal drugs in the city and we can"t overlook the findings of the IAO study. We"re still the East Coast"s drug warehouse despite Safe Streets, so obviously more is needed.²

Ortiz, a political gadfly whose own working relationship with the mayor has been rockier than a Hollywood marriage, is also fighting for his political life against at-large challenger Juan Ramos, who"s been endorsed by the city"s three Latino ward leaders and, incidentally, by Mayor Street. Still, Ortiz says that his aim, and the aim of the Council hearing next week, is to develop a better working relationship between the mayor, the police department and City Council.

³We need to put our political differences aside and work hand in hand,² Ortiz says. ³If the mayor and Council can"t work as a team on this issue, all the good of Safe Streets will go out the window because the program will die.²

To make things more problematic, Ortiz"s partner in pushing for the hearing is City Council"s other pain in the mayor"s butt, David Cohen. Cohen is dismayed at the conclusions of the IAO report and speculates that the celebration for Operation Safe Streets could be premature.

³It"s hard to celebrate something when we know so little about it,² says Council"s grumpy old man. ³There are just too many unanswered questions on Safe Streets, and we haven"t been furnished with adequate information. If the mayor wants City Council and the public to support his program initiatives, he has an obligation to keep us all informed.²

While discussing the lack of public disclosure that he says is the hallmark of this administration, Cohen flips out when he hears that the police department briefing on Safe Streets is closed to the public.

³This is exactly what I"m talking about,² he grouses. ³That kind of thing has got to stop. I keep hoping the mayor will one day realize that good government doesn"t work in the shadows, and that he"ll stop acting as if city government is his private domain.²

It shouldn"t be that hard, Cohen insists, to have a narcotics unit that enforces drug laws while simultaneously protecting the constitutional rights of citizens. And since it"s a given that Safe Streets and the city"s response to illegal drugs will be a campaign issue, the wizened councilman muses, it would behoove the mayor to get his ducks in a row now, before it starts to get ugly after the May primary.

Cohen is right on some things, but wrong on one thing. It"s true that Operation Safe Streets will probably become a contentious campaign issue for the mayor, and it"s also true that Street, whom Cohen says he supports for reelection, will have a tough row to hoe this campaign season. But he"s wrong about the primary. This is Philadelphia, and politics here is ugly 365 days a year.

Daryl Gale’s weekly radio show, Dialogues, with co-hosts Rotan Lee and Bill Miller, is burning up the airwaves Fridays 7-10 a.m. on WURD (900 AM) in Philadelphia.