In this week's cover story, Brian Hickey has assembled a virtual roundtable of Philly mayors, present and recent past. What I found interesting is how leaders like Wilson Goode and Ed Rendell look back on their days in office. For them, the standouts are the blue sky, big-ass legacy-makin' projects: the Vine Street Expressways, the stadiums, the Penn's Landings …

Whoops. I mean, Vine Street, the stadiums …

But the things city residents really care about are on a more humble scale. Which is why I was encouraged by Mayor Street's 2006 budget address last week. Not overjoyed, but encouraged, because it hits everyday concerns. More overtime money for cops to hit crime-infested "hot zones." More money for arts and culture programs. (Who knew that the word "blight" applied to the Art Museum?) More money to fix potholes. There's even more money for cribs for needy families, which is a far cry from the budget proposal last year, which threatened to close libraries.

These aren't instant ingredients for a world-class city. Too many people are getting shot to hell, and can't make ends meet. But they're steps in the right direction.

The question remains: Will Street have the political muscle to accomplish these things in the time he has remaining?

Hickey asked the mayor these questions directly after the budget address, and based on Street's frenzied and slightly defensive answers, it seems to be weighing on his mind a lot. Hear it straight from the man. And then read some advice from other experts on how the last two years of his term might be best spent.

… as you may have heard, will not happen. The hallucinogens the GPTMC slipped into the drinking water seem to have lost their potency. All is calm and good in the nation's fifth-largest city.

This copy of the City Paper you hold in your hands [sic] will be considered a vintage collectible in about a week. That's because we're sprucing up the joint—adding some new features, new voices, a new design, new comics. It's not a wild reinvention. A proposal for turning the entire paper into Japanese-style manga was shot down, as was the idea to feature scratch-and-sniff covers every week.

So what are we doing?

I don't want to get into too much detail now—otherwise, what the hell would I write about next week? But you should know that we'll be expanding one feature: the letters to the editor. I can assign all of the stories I want, but that's one section of the paper that depends on you. Write us at letters@citypaper.net.