Luke Ravenstahl Still Waiting For Valentine's Day Card

Despite it being two days ago, Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is still waiting patiently for a Valentine's Day card from someone.

The Mayor has been vigilantly watching his hand made Valentine Mailbox at his desk hoping that someone would drop in a card or perhaps some candy. Despite checking nearly every 15 minutes, his construction paper box remains empty.

Mr. Ravenstahl had earlier expressed an expectation that the Rooneys, Ron Burkle, and Snoop Dog would all send him a card. To that end, he made his mailbox twice as big as normal "to fit all the cards" he was going to get from all of his friends. As of 7 PM Thursday evening, however, it remained empty.

His Chief of Staff Yarone Zober expressed concern over the Mayor.

"We had a big party, you know, and everyone was passing around Valentines to each other and I guess we all just didn't get Luke a card. I kind of feel bad for him. I mean that's got to crush him to know that no one is willing to even get him a card."

The Mayor's Press Secretary Joanna Doven said that the Mayor is fine.

"OK, Luke's a weird guy, you know. We can see him picking his nose and wiping I under he desk. And there was this one time when he called Darlene Harris "Mommy" and wet his pants in front of Council. But, that doesn't mean we hate him... He's just not Valentine material. Now Ed Gainey? He's dreamy."

Other members of the Mayor's staff have secretly tried to persuade City Government employees to take pity on the Mayor and send him a Valentine, but to no avail thus far. Certain members of he Finance Department are still a little creeped out after Ravenstahl hung out in heir offices for weeks after they got him a Birthday cake last year.

"It's kind of sad and I'd like to do something for him," said Zober, "but I don't really like the guy that much.

City Council Votes to Cut Off Nose to Spite Face

Pittsburgh City Council has given preliminary approval to a bill that would assist itself in cutting off its own collective noses to spite its collective faces.

"There are days when we look in the mirror," said Councilman Rev. Ricky Burgess, "and we think, 'Gosh, we're just so dangled ugly; we need to punish our ugliness.' We believe that this bill will resolve our problems once and for all.".

Following the release of new City of Pittsburgh Beauty Standards, citizens have complained en masse that Pittsburgh City Council is just too damned ugly and that "something must be done.".

The bill was sponsored by new Councilman Corey O'Connor, whose father had successfully sponsored a similar bill back in 2001. As a result of that bill, Jim Ferlo lost a significant quantity of blood, which led to his run for state Senate the next year.

The legislation would offer a bulk rate deal to Council members and their staff who are angry about how how they look. In all, a team of nearly a dozen surgeons will be on hand to assist.

Council has budgeted $150,000 for the procedures.

A final vote is scheduled for next week.

Assessing Re-assessments

If you're like me, you're 5' 11", named "Steve", live in the city and received a notice of Property Reassessment from Allegheny County as a belated Christmas present this week.  (Frankly, I would have much rather received the three French Hens or the eight maids a-milking, but the County's on a shoe string budget, so I won't begrudge them for that.)  If you're even more like me, you opened up your assessment and noticed two things: (1) that you now the proud owner of the Taj Mahal (or at least close enough for tax assessment purposes) and (2) the County is in absolutely no way responsible for this *COURT MANDATED* reassessment. 

Indeed, if you don't have him on your junk mail list already, you probably also recently got a letter from Hizzoner Luke Ravenstahl informing you that he had nothing to do with the reassessments, so don't blame him when your taxes go up and he is forced by the Courts to roll around naked in the resultant piles of windfall cash.  I'm sure that Luke is just sobbing himself to sleep every night with the thought that his short term budget problems are temporarily relieved. 

Even more not to blame are the folks like Dan Onorato who fought so hard to keep assessments from incrementally ticking up so that one day in the future when he was out of office, the whole damned thing would blow up in everyone elses' faces.  (Note to Highmark: make sure that any golden parachutes handed to Danny Boy are long term pay outs.)  But you know, hey: at least they can say that they never raised property taxes. 

Even even more not to blame are all the people that paid $X for houses who are now shocked and appalled that the County believes that their homes are actually valued at $X like their deed transfer tax said they were.  Where does the county get the nerve to trust that the amount that a buyer is freely willing to pay for a good is actually indicative of its value?  Are we in some sort of Communist dictatorship where market value is determined by some all controlling "invisible hand"? 

The message here is clear: please ignore all economic and political realities and just be outraged. 

Particle Man Eyes Candidacy for County Controller

Local politician Particle Man said that that he is "actively considering" a run for Allegheny County Controller.

"I am very serious about running for Controller, and doing the things a Controller does," said Particle Man.

Although he has yet to make an announcement himself, it is suspected that Particle Man's political nemesis Triangle Man will also vie for the seat. In previous elections, Triangle Man has beaten Particle Man.

"Nobody knows Particle Man," said Triangle Man in a written statement, "Is he a dot? Is he a speck?"

(Particle Man has replied in the past to such questions, "What am I like? It's not important.")

The winner of this contest will most likely go on to face the Republican nominee either Universe Man or Person Man. Universe Man is a well known powerful man, while Person Man is a local vagrant.

Yarone Zober did not comment on this article.

A Park by Any Other Name...

What's in a name?

The Grandview Scenic Byway Park that winds though Mount Washington and Duquesne Heights would be renamed Emerald View Park under legislation introduced in Pittsburgh City Council Tuesday.

Councilwoman Theresa Smith said in a news release that the new name for the 235-acre park created in 2005 is "symbolic both of Pittsburgh's growing green identity" and the "green rebirth" of the park itself, plus the spectacular views available there. The proposed name came from a community process run by the Mount Washington Community Development Corp., Visit Pittsburgh, and a renaming committee, and will be the subject of a council hearing prior to a vote.

I find "Emerald Park" to be less than inspiring; it brings to mind poorly planned public housing, nuts or Winkies. Might as well just skywrite "SURRENDER DOROTHY" over the damned thing and be done with it.

I suppose it's better than the names they rejected:

Washington Park

Guyasuta Park

Guy Lombardo Park

Karma Sutra Park

Eaton Park

Highmark/UPMC Park

Doctor Richard Florida's Cavalcade of Flying Magical Mystery and Fantasmagoria Park

Steve

MacArthur Park

Cabrini Green

No Parking on the 4th of July Park

Frack Park

Luke Ravenstahl Memorial Park

Yes, those are all terrible names.

The Devil in the Budgeting Details

OK so there's this odd little kerfluffle going on in Council which piqued my interest:

Pittsburgh City Council president calls URA allocation attempt 'sleazy'

That headline buries this piece of information:

Council President Darlene Harris said the measure to transfer money out of projects in East Allegheny, Observatory Hill, Brighton Heights, Troy Hill and Squirrel Hill neighborhoods...

So it sounds like the URA is asking Council to reallocate money to other (as they said about the stimulus) "ready-to-go" projects.

So what are these mystery projects? I can't make heads nor tails of it, but it's on page 281 of the .pdf, and it's labeled as a "new" project, whatever that's worth. That makes it sound like a special allocation by the Council to the URA for specific actions in specific neighborhood.

Could it be that someone on Council has tried to squirrel away money for her or his district's pet projects and is not willing to let it go to other districts? Any idea whose Council District contains East Allegheny, Observatory Hill, Brighton Heights, and Troy Hill?

(Hint: I already mentioned her name.)

The Verbanac-Zappala Fiiiiiing List

By now, everyone knows about this:

Eight hours later, he got a response -- but not from Mr. Hassinger. An e-mail from Mr. Zappala read: "Are you fiiiiiing kidding me! Put him squarely on the list."

As Bram suspected, our diligent minions have been scouring every waste paper basket from here to Cranberry to find the "List", and we're happy to report that we think we've actually come up with it:

The Fiiiiing List
Michael Lamb
Ted Arneault
Ohio’s Bureau of Worker’s Compensation (BWC)
Don Barden
Greg Zappala
The City of Chester PA
Catherine Baker Knoll
The corpse of Bob O’Connor
Clifford Levine
Kevin Acklin
Rich Lord
Hunt's Catsup
The Pitt News
Tommy Smothers
Toner Cartridges
Brown People
The Letter "M"
Nattering Nabobs of Negativity
Oscar Schindler
Paul Newman
George McGovern
That "Urkel" Kid
Miley Cyrus (but not Hannah Montana)
Ticket Master
Windows 7
Nickels
Carbon Paper
Yarone Zober
Bloggers
Mt. Washington (New Hampshire)
Mt. Washington (Pittsburgh)
The Ampersand
Prime Numbers greater than 2749
Wall-to-Wall Carpeting
Alpacas

Oh, and Bram: because you asked about "The List," you're now on "The List."

Surprise Endorsements from the ACDC

If you were paying attention to the Allegheny County Democratic Committee nominating meeting yesterday, you would know that some guy's brother and some woman who lost her last race got nominated for something or other.

If you weren't paying attention, you would know about the following nominations:

* Nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay: The Onorato for Governor Campaign

* Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film: SEA Arena Bond Issuance

* Nominated for Best Makeup: Melissa Hart

* Nominated for Best Director: John Verbanac

* Nominated for Best Animated Short: Teresa Smith

* Nominated for Best Sound Mixing: Doug Shields

* Nominated for Best Original Song: That Grinding, Whirring Sound in the Recorder of Deeds Office

* Nominated for Best Supporting Actor in a Tragedy: Yarone Zober

* Nominated for Best Gaffer: Cyril Wecht

* Nominated for Best Boy: Luke Ravenstahl

Of course, I may have fallen asleep watching the Oscars...

Night of the Living Wages

I had been kicking around another post about the prevailing wage brouhaha and just hadn't gotten around to it, so it seems Bram has beaten me to the punch and I suppose that gives me a good enough segue into beating a dead horse:

The debate over a prevailing wage ordinance was retread by the public in City Council today -- but the specific cons popular with the Trib and with some anonymous commenters here seemed conspicuously absent.

Dewitt Peart, president of the Pittsburgh Regional Alliance, told council he was "not stating an opposition to what you want to do, it's just how you went about it.

"We feel that the private sector was really not engaged to the extent that it should have to make sure that this legislation is the best that it could be," he said, asking for time to "review the legislation, so we don't have negative impact." (P-G, Rich Lord)

This bill was formally introduced two months ago, and had been in public circulation for far longer than that. You haven't reviewed it yet? Don't have anything concrete yet to offer? Just say you don't want folks in Pittsburgh who receive taxpayer subsidies to be made to pay their service workers at least the industry standard. That's an honest argument.

Well, to this point the answer is: those that are pushing this bill (*cough* SEIU *cough*) don't actually have a lot of answers about what this bill is going to do to development in the City. Sure, in a place like LA or NYC, you can implement this kind of legislation, but in a weak market City... well, who knows? The results of the legislation may be no jobs versus shitty jobs, and that doesn't help anything. Not to mention that no one out there can actually tell you what the "prevailing wage" of some of these job classifications are for the City. For all we know, this is a lot of huff and puff about nothing, but we don't know that yet.

And the second point: well, Patrick Dowd did offer a number of (never entertained) amendments to clarify the bill, which should be a modicum of evidence that the bill, as written, may have some *ahem* issues.

Moving on:

One councilor pointed out during last week's fracas that activating Living Wage, as it is now written, will require even small non-profits who do business with the city such as Just Harvest -- not to mention the city's seasonal youth life guards -- to greatly increase everybody's compensation to $24,000 per anum. It sounds like the old bill needs some deeper, concentrated work. Other members hold the view that scheduling a tentative vote not until Feb. 17 is a crime on par with the Holocaust.

And Bram sort of hits on the nub of the Living Wage bill: This is a bill designed to fail. See, on one hand you have a bill demanding that developers pay a prevailing wage; on the other, we have a bill demanding that the City pay a living wage. The arguments against the City paying the living wage are EXACTLY THE SAME as the arguments that the developers are using against the prevailing wage. The Living Wage bill is not meant to pass; it's supposed to a rebuke against anyone or any group who is saying "do as I say, not as I do."

But, hey: maybe maybe the Living Wage bill will in fact pass, only to have the State overseers striking it down later. Who knows?

Again, it's not that the opposition is actually opposed to anyone getting a Living or a Prevailing wage. It's just that no one has actually sat down and done the number crunching on the impact of these bills on jobs in the City. The only voice that's being heard right now is from SEIU (who, let's be fair, stands to gain immensely from its passage, not only here, but across the country) with no one really putting up data from the opposing side. One would think that between nine councilpersons we'd be able to assemble a half an economist, who could parse through all of the rhetoric.

Or is that asking too much of council?

John Verbanac Responds to Acklin Debate Allegations

Cranberry businessman John Verbanac today denied allegations that he was, in fact, exerting influence on the Ravenstahl administration.

In a televised debate last night, candidate for mayor Kevin Acklin suggested proof that Mr. Verbanac was a Dark Lord of the Sith, as evidenced by emails intercepted by Bothan spies.

"Such accusations are baseless," said Verbanac in a written statement, "I am just an old man and a Senator from the Sovereign System of Naboo."

These denials were immediately rebutted by the Acklin campaign, who has evidence that both Verbanac's aprentices were slain by Jedi in mysterious circumstances: former advisor Dennis J. Regan was found sliced in two at the bottom of a shaft on Mr. Verbanac's home planet, and Patrick Ford's severed head was found after a confrontation with Chief of Staff Yarone Zober. According to Acklin, both had become "extraneous" to Verbanac's plans, and were allowed to die.

Kevin Acklin today released a statement indicating that Verbanac held key influence over the hiring and firing of city employees, the crafting of city policy, and is secretly creating an "ultimate weapon" in the form of some sort of moon.

Several Jedi have anonymously offered their opinion that the Mayor has been under the influence of a Dark Lord for some time, although they say that the dark side is clouding their vision of who this Dark Lord actually is.

Emails released make a veiled reference to an "Order 66," which was to be carried out should the Mayor win the November election.

Pittsburgh City Council has begun hearings on the issue, and is expected to refer the matter to a committee.

Allegheny County Names Ego After Cyril Wecht

Allegheny County has officially renamed its County of the Second Class Ego after forensic pathologist, local Democratic Party fixture, man about town, and former coronor Cyril H. Wecht.

Earlier this year, federal prosecutors dropped corruption charges against Dr. Wecht, 78, who had been accused of using his former county staff for personal gain. A criminal trial in the case had previously ended in a mistrial, although it was repleat with the phrase "cadaver stealing".

When reached for comment, Dr. Wecht said it was "a great honor, although, frankly, Dr. Cyril Wecht was hoping for a bigger honor, for me, Dr. Cyril Wecht."

Under Commonwealth statute, municipal entities are entitled to egos once they reach second class status, and become unbearable once they reach first class status.

ADB Responds to Proposed Public Drinking Ordinance

Hey Bruce Kraus! You don´t know me! You don´t know any of me! Why should I, when you with your hair, and your big words look after and I when I knew you before... You used to be cool man! you used to be cool! And then, you with you and your coming down and... this guy, this guy, I mean... shit man. Shit.

It´s like, society man, with all of the stuff and their street paving things, you know?

That one time when we went off and ggreat with weio dfio lk jdio gin & tonic over apple watter sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Five dollars? Get out of here!

Adventure Capital

And then there's this:

Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said today that he expects the new funds to put nearly $4 million into the hands of new or expanding businesses...

The city's Urban Redevelopment Authority will run the Pittsburgh Entrepreneur Fund, which will start with $1 million in federal money and may soon be boosted to $2 million, Mr. Ravenstahl said. Geared toward start-ups in the information technology, life sciences and environmental industries, it will be able to lend against intellectual property, like patents, unlike existing URA business development programs.

Guidelines aren't final, but it will probably lend as much as $200,000 for around five years at interest rates that will depend on the level of risk involved...

Which is all fine and good and everything. I mean, it's nice to see that the City is taking an active interest in developing technologies in the Region. Two points, however:

First, not to disparage my fellow City Bureaucrats, but is the URA really in a position to judge "winners"? Put simply, you're (hopefully) going to have a bunch of entrepreneurs out there applying for these loans, the nature of which may not be immediately understandable to an organization that's comfortable with giving conventional loans. Is the URA going to be able to underwrite these loans correctly, or are they just throwing darts at a wall.

(For the record, I'm in favor of dart throwing.)

Second, the phrase "guidelines aren't final" stuck out in my mind, mostly because Hizzoner is announcing a new program, in the way that I'm announcing my brand new deck... which still is missing railings, stairs and a floor. Why do I think that the guidelines will show up mere days after the primary election and then be forgotten about forever?

Oh: cynicism, that's right.

This Post is a Waste

From Dr. Goodhair, courtesy of the P-G:

Councilman Patrick Dowd outlined what he called $20.2 million in "wasteful spending" by Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's administration today...

• $19 million in costs and fees -- mostly for insurance -- the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority incurred on a complex $414 million debt deal last year...

• $518,000 of the $977,550 the city is spending on ventilation systems for firehouses...

• $252,500 spent on 250 new trash cans.

• $91,000 that the Urban Redevelopment Authority could have received, but didn't, when it changed the rules after soliciting bids to manage parking lots.

• $337,000 in payments to police Commander Catherine McNeilly, former URA Executive Director Pat Ford, and former Operations Director Dennis Regan, each of whom were involved in thorny personnel issues...

• $45,000 in free parking along 4th Avenue provided to members of City & County Government that could have otherwise been used by the public.

• $500,000 in excess water bills from a faucet in the Mayor's Office that Luke never shuts off when he's finished.

• $757,385.68 in lost productivity from employees scanning local blogs for mentions of their names. $723,000 of that amount alone comes from Yarone Zober.

• $30,638 in mailings announcing mailings which will be coming shortly, all of which have Luke Ravenstahl's face on them.

• $38,345 in "Un-Deasying" Council Chambers.

• $150,000 for promoting city living to Pittsburgh residents.

• $450 in Doug Shields noise dampeners.

• $58,298 for the 2nd Council District.

• $.75 lost in that stupid vending machine that's always out of Fresca.

The Mayor's Office offered no comment to this report, except to say that it'll fix the Fresca machine during the next budget round.

Re: Contracts

With the contracting brouhaha that surfaced in yesterday's Post-Gazette, the consenting opinion from the de facto leader of the opposition, and the rebuttal from the incumbent, I got to thinking. My sense is that there are those in the local political establishment that are suffering from some sort of cognitive dissonance, not quite understanding that, whether they mean it or not, when contributors to their campaigns receive lucrative contracts it reflects badly on them and implies that there has been some sort of a quid pro quo. Some of the people you've elected just don't get it.

Of course, in a disturbingly small city like this, it's sometimes very difficult to differentiate between one's friends, one's contributors, and other qualified professionals. So, when your circle of "experts" is limited by the people you are in contact with (and often contribute to your campaign), it seems only logical to you that they should be awarded government contracts and that you should be the one to help them.

Then again, there are the other times when there's plain outright corruption.

The immediate, shoot-front-the-hip response has been to stop non-competitive contracts, which is more of a pain in the ass for those in the Bureaucracy who have to administer the contracts than an actual remedy to the problem. The problem can't be solved with limiting campaign contributions either, however; contractors will just find something else of value to do for the elected representatives (name a building after them, fund a charity, lobby other similar contractors, etc.). You can shake up the box, I think, but there are always going to be some old school people trying to game the system.

So, I'm generally pessimistic about this whole thing.

An Observation

I was thinking random thoughts while walking by the Greyhound Bus Terminal, when it occurred to me that we haven't talked about the whole LED Billboard kerfluffle in awhile. It further occurred to me that we haven't talked about contracts, take home cars, Ron Burkle, street paving, media blackouts, purges, community benefits agreements, tax breaks for non-profits that contribute to the Pittsburgh Promise, Pat Ford, interdepartmental mergers, ethics boards, vacant "interim" positions, operating efficiencies, getting arrested outside Heinz Field, more purges, city sponsored campaign advertising, casinos, missing meetings, demotions, and Dennis Regan in awhile either.

Apparently "trashcans" are in now... until the next big thing comes around.

Or until we forget about that too.

Reflections on the 2008 Pittsburgh Mayorial Race, or "Dowd or Dowd not; there is no Try"

Whether you want them or not, here are some thoughts on the Pittsburgh Mayoral Race. I advise readers to save these in a shoebox under your bed and perhaps over the years, they will appreciate in value, allowing you to exchange them for cash, or gold, or food stamps, or ammunition, as the economy seems to be heading that way.

The announcement by Patrick Dowd that he was going to run was really no surprise. Once Peduto was out, then Wagner, then Sheilds, the path to challenge the Mayor was pretty much down to Dowd alone; no other remotely viable candidate is really out there.

The advantage that Dowd has is that he already defeated a very connected incumbent once (Len Bodack, who had the distinction of being present at Council meetings), so Dowd definitely has some experience with long odds. The secret to his win was a strong ground campaign and an extensive get out the vote effort, which got more voters out from the pro-Dowd areas of the Council District (Morningside, Highland Park) than the other areas (Lawrenceville). If Dowd expects to win, his ground game needs to be near perfect.

Additionally, there is still pent up campaign energy from the November election, especially in the African-American and "Progressive" areas of the City. Dowd could use both the momentum on the ground and the experienced campaign workers to create a fairly strong anti-establishment machine.

Another advantage that Dowd has, if you can call it that, is that voters don't necessarily like the Mayor. They aren't whipping off their shoes to fling at him, that's for sure, but there's this general malaise about the voting public. Voters don't hate Ravenstahl, and he's the default option, but outside a small base no one is really gung ho. Dowd, with a little work, could flip enough people to supporting him instead of blindly voting for the Mayor.

That being said, there are enough problems to make the Dowd campaign a long shot:

(1) Right now it's a three way race: Ravenstahl, Dowd, and Robinson. Dowd and Robinson split any anti-Ravenstahl vote and Ravenstahl wins.

(2) Luke has $1,000,000 in his war chest. Dowd has $31.27 and a bit of string.

(3) No incumbent Mayor has ever been defeated in the history of the City of Pittsburgh since the dawn of hyperbole.

(4) Voters in the other parts of the City hate politicians from the East End.

(5) Ravenstahl has the bully pulpit and the office to make rain prior to the election. Expect a news conference every day announcing a new program that will benefit residents of the City of Pittsburgh and which will be forgotten about by May 31, 2009.

(6) Ravenstahl needs the job. It's not like there's anywhere else for him to go right now, and with a wife and kid at home, he needs the money.

(7) Dowd was on the Pittsburgh Public School Board - a body so historically incompetent that it makes City Council look like a bunch of Philosopher Kings.

(8) The "Progressive" movement in the City seems very localized. The Southern and Northern neighborhoods are much more conservative, and probably reflect more of the voting public, in general.

So, Dowd, in my estimation is a long shot. If he can mobilize a strong GOTV effort, especially outside his East End base and in African-American neighborhoods, he may have a slim chance.

I'm not betting my food stamps or ammunition on it, though.

Shit Canned

The Trib is getting its collective panties in a bunch over a bunch of trash cans.

[The Mayor's] office used $252,500 from state grants to buy 250 steel trash receptacles that display "Taking Care of Business" above Ravenstahl's name and title on black-and-gold metal placards.

The slogan emblazoned on each $1,010 garbage can heralds Ravenstahl's seven-month-old campaign to beautify 50 city business districts. Some question whether it's ethical to deploy expensive, taxpayer-funded endorsements on curbsides, months before the May 19 Democratic primary...

Tim Potts, co-founder and president of nonprofit government watchdog group Democracy Rising, said Ravenstahl's campaign committee owes taxpayers a refund.

"It's plain self-promotion. It's not promoting the city, it's promoting him," Potts said.

The article points out, of course, that Ravenstahl isn't the first Mayor to attach his name on public works projects. Tom Murphy put "Mayor Tom Murphy's City of Pittsburgh is Picking Up" or something like that on all the garbage trucks. Pete Flaherty emblazoned trash cans with "For Pete's Sake" as part of his anti-litter campaign; Sophie Masloff put "Sophie's Choice for a Clean City" on all of her trash cans, seemingly trying to equate garbage with the Holocaust.

Even Bob O'Connor tried to co-opt the Redd Up campaign with "reminder" billboards peppered with his image, which was later picked up by his young successor.

Richard Caliguiri put his name on the Great Race, while Mayor Joe Barr managed to get his name on U.S. Currency for a time.

While not Mayor at the time, David L. Lawrence managed, as Governor, to have Smith County renamed "Lawrence County" in a brazen display of political bravado.

Cornelius D. Scully made all City employees wear buttons with his picture on their lapels.

William A. Magee rearranged the streets in the Lower Hill District to spell out his name. The street grid was later destroyed by the building of Civic Arena.

James Blackmore insisted that every cobblestone in every street bear his name. (Every sewer line was similarly carved with the name of his rivals on City Council.)

Ebeneezer Denny mandated that every child born in the City be named "Ebeneezer," regardless of sex. This was systematically ignored by the residents.

So, as you can see there's a history of this kind of crap; let's just be thankful we're just labeling trashcans and not, say, feral cats.

A Bureaucrat's Question

So, how many candidates do you have to have in a city council race before it ceases to be a race and just becomes a clusterfuck?

And who exactly is the "power bottom" in this race?

About That Special Election...

So there's 25,071 eligible voters in Council District 2... and (unofficially) 2,609 of them decided to show up today for its special election. That's a turnout of about 10% if anyone's counting.

More people read this blog.

Congratulations to Theresa Smith who, I hope, will show the same kind of leaderhip as Dan Deasey.