D R O P

Folks, this is a long one! My friend, Fefe, who I admire and adore, is pissed and said so in a Facebook post I read a few minutes ago. Now before we go any further I need you to know that this latest rant is in no way, shape or form meant to reflect poorly on her. She is merely the inspiration. My "muse" if I may be so bold!

Fefe is pissed, and rightly so, because the City of Philadelphia, of which I am a resident and she is not, is threatening to cancel an event which has been held for many years here in the city, that being the ABATE (Alliance of Bikers Aimed Toward Education) Toy Run For The Kids. The kids being referenced are young patients being treated for illness and accidents at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. ABATE, (I am old enough to remember way back when I joined ABATE in the 70's when the acronym meant "Alliance of Bikers Against a Totalitarian Establishment"). The organization, like me, has mellowed a bit as the years have passed. I still like the old name. Even though I was a cop for many years I like to think I still harbor a good deal of that "stick it to the man" attitude. Anyway, back to Fefe. The toy run, as well as a motorcycle run conducted by the POW/MIA awareness group Friends Of The Forgotten, are both the victims of the big time budget crunch that allegedly exists here in the City Of Brotherly Love. Fefe and many many others that I know who ride motorcycles for recreation and fun have been regular participants in these events and others like them over the years. Now these events are in danger of being scrapped because the City can not afford to pay the costs that the Mayor, Michael Nutter, claims the City incurs when these events and others like them are held. Its not just motorcycle events. Numerous civic and ethnic groups have been threatened with the cancellation of their festival or parade unless they come up with a big pile of money to reimburse the City for the costs. The whys and whens and hows and ins and outs and the actual numbers involved escape me at the moment (I will conduct further research to ID some specifics) but the bottom line is that the city is no longer able to fund the costs of police and fire and ems services, as well as the streets department who cleans up after the events and all the other city agencies who are involved in one way or the other when an event is held.

I know that the St. Patrick's Day Parade, a big time deal in Philly, was nearly cancelled until a group of corporate sponsors stepped up to provide the funding. Similar appeals were made for donations to allow several other groups to keep their affairs running. Several corporate and civic organizations helped with funding to allow the Gay/Lesbian Pride Fest to go on as planned. The GLBT Fest (please don't slam me if I'm not calling the event or group by its formal name, I'm just trying to make a point) like many others, brings a lot of visitors to the city. They spend money. Hotels, restaurants, taxis, you name it, all benefit from these events. No one group or organization is more important than the other, each and every one is important to the people who organize and attend them and rightly so.

Is there a point here, Bill? Yes! Its hard to take the whining and crying and moaning and hand wringing and the whole Chicken Little the sky is falling act seriously when you look at some of the blatant, bare faced scams and corruption being perpetrated by the people who are elected to govern and administer the City budget and make sure the money that the City does have on hand is being spent wisely. Ladies and Gentlemen I give you DROP. D R O P. Delayed Retirement Option Plan.

Without getting too technical and making your eyes glaze over too much, DROP was designed to offer senior, experienced and valuable employees an incentive to stay on the job for a couple extra years. An employee who was eligible to retire would, from the date he was originally scheduled to do so, remain on the job and all the money he or she would have collected in retirement/pension payments would be placed into his/her "bank". In four years (term could vary) the employee would retire, begin collecting the monthly pension and all the money accumulated in the "bank" would be paid in a lump sum with interest. So in that four years, not only were you still working full time and collecting your regular salary, you were also getting monthly contributions equal to what would have been your pension payments. OK, I've really, REALLY simplified this whole deal in the interest of saving time and space but that's pretty much the deal in a nutshell. Please, dear readers, feel free to offer any additions or corrections or better explanations of the program if you have them.

Now this is the part that pisses me off and should piss you off as well. Several members of our esteemed City Council, long a bastion of crooks, criminals and general scalliwags and ne'er do wells, discovered a loophole, an anomaly, a glitch, in the DROP program. Although the program was never intended to be for ELECTED OFFICIALS, several council persons realized they could get in on the goods. One of them, Joan Krajewski, a long time represenative of the area known as the "River Wards" (Kensington, Bridesburg, Fishtown...ring a bell?) enrolled in DROP, continued to serve on Council collecting the big bucks and perks. Retired. Retired for ONE DAY. UNretired, pocketed over $300K - that's three hundred THOUSAND DOLLARS - and then went back on council, continues collecting a regular council person's salary and benefits and walks around without a care in the world. Several other members of council are already enrolled in DROP, their "bank"is growing every day and they fully intend to do the same thing as Joan when their day comes. Council President Anna Verna stands to pocket well over half a million dollars. How would Dr. Evil say that? Half a m i l l i o nnnnnnnnnnnn dollars. Council members Frank Rizzo jr., Frank DiCicco, Marian Tasco and one or two others (its late folks and I'm writing this off the top of my head) collectively stand to pocket around two and a half million dollars.

The City closed swimming pools in rec centers all over the city. Thousands of inner city kids spent this summer sweltering on the mean streets where they spend all day worried about dodging bullets fired by rival thugs. I believe the average cost to open and operate a swimming pool for the summer is around 60 to 100 thousand dollars. How many pools could be opened with just the money scammed by Joan Krajewski? Mayor Nutter is threatening to lay off police officers, fire fighters, reduce trash collection to twice a month, he's already closed fire stations and reduced the number of paramedics on the street, he wanted to close libraries and the list goes on and on. And now the City wants to charge ABATE thirty thousand dollars to hold the Toy Run. Thirty grand from a NON PROFIT ORG. who charges no fees to attend the event, asking only that participants bring a Christmas present for a kid in the hospital. Where is ABATE going to come up with 30 large? Where was Friends Of The Forgotten supposed to come up with 13 thousand to hold their run?

The DROP money scammed by Joan Krajewski alone could fund TEN toy runs. The DROP money scammed by Joan Krajewski alone could have opened FIVE swimming pools for poor inner city kids. The DROP money already scammed and scheduled to be scammed could do a lot of good things besides line the pockets of greedy, self centered, do nothing, feckless, disgusting pieces of shit taking up space that could be occupied by decent people. Michael Nutter, who campaigned on a promise of "reform", has been out to lunch on this one, folks. A former council member, he lacks the balls to take them on and call them what they are (see above). He is spineless and gutless and a whole lot of people may see a whole lot of good things go away, good things that benefit people that politicians just don't give a fuck about. A whole lot of people who just want to come to the city, ride a motorcycle around and see the sights and maybe....just maybe make the day a little brighter for a sick kid. People like my friend Fefe.

Thanks for getting pissed off, Feefster! I don't know if I got all of the specific facts and figures right. I know I'm damn close. I'm not vouching for spelling, grammar or punctuation either. I don't know if I have any talent as a writer at all. But I do know that I've never written anything before in my little rant space here on The Mountain that I'm as proud of as this one.

Arlo Guthrie, in Alice's Restaurant, (and I'm paraphrasing not quoting) said if one person does it they just think you're crazy...and if two people do it they'll think you're weird ( I know what he really said....its a new time, people) and if more than three people do it then its a movement. Let's start a movement together. Let's drop DROP.

Thanks, Fefe. And thanks, Facebook. That's the View From The Mountain. I beg of you, dear reader (if there are any) PLEASE tell me your thoughts.