With Pennsylvania and New Jersey both thinking about privatizing their lotteries, anti-gambling advocate Paul Davies takes issue. Among the potential consequences:

• Politically connected hacks take on the lucrative business
• Privatization likely equals expansion and more marketing, meaning more people gambling their savings away
• The move won’t actually make any money for the states, especially if you take into account increased demand for social services from problem gamblers
• Why are we promoting gambling as public policy in the first place?

Casinos/ lotteries/ other forms of sanctioned gambling are essentially ways for cities and states to gain revenue without having to say they raised taxes. See, it’s not a tax if people choose to flush their money into a slot machine and directly or indirectly it ends up in the treasury. Which is true, after a fashion, but ultimately, a white flag that we are incapable of creating rational budgets that don’t rely on taking advantage of people’s vices and addictions.

I admit when I heard of the plan to dissolve the Philadelphia School District and start over, my first thought was, “It’s about time.” The district as it currently stands neither effectively educates children, nor keeps them safe, nor is run with anything close to fiscal sanity. It feels like every other week another eight-digit hole is blown in the budget, with no relief in site. Maybe a fresh start is the only thing that can get the teetering bureaucratic monstrosity back in shape– deciding priorities using zero-based budgeting, which is something our local, state and federal governments could all use, too.

However, a number of very intelligent people have brought forward some thoughtful, well-spoken criticisms of the plan, questioning the tone and scope as well as asking whether the whole thing isn’t merely another step forward in the plot to privatize public education. Listen and learn:

• Author, professor and former federal education guru Diane Ravitch makes the point that the district restructuring, based on similar plans being enacted throughout the country, is essentially smoke and mirrors: “What is so maddening about the reformers’ promises is that they are not based on anything at all: Trust us, they say,” Ravitch writes. “Turn the public schools over to private managers, inject competition into the system, close low-performing schools, and student scores will go up. But nothing in the plan says what they will do to improve teaching and learning.”
• Former Philadelphia principal Frank Murphy savages the notion that critics of the dissolution should just “grow up and deal with it,” in the words of Mayor Nutter. “This new plan for reshaping the school district is taking advantage of a bad financial situation in order to move forward a privatization agenda,” he says. “Education funds are in short supply in the School District of Philadelphia. But this doesn’t mean that the district is broken. It speaks more to the poor financial management of prior leaders, the budget cuts of a new governor and to the ill effects an economy that isn’t doing as well as in the past.”
• Dan Urevick-Ackelsberg of Young Philly Politics takes offense at the idea that the district should live within its means in lieu of receiving more resources and support, comparing the statement to telling starving children they will just have to starve. “Our schools do not have enough money to function properly. The radical restructuring contained in this plan, which does not close most of the deficit, ignores that ugly truth, and provides zero paths to accomplishing that,” Urevick-Ackelsberg writes.
• Helen Gym of Parents United for Public Education, probably the most active, informed and credible voice in the city on district matters, tells district Chief Recovery Officer Thomas Knudsen, “You’re not speaking to me,” over the dissolution plan, branding it “disaster capitalism.” “You’re not speaking to me when you invoke language like ‘achievement networks,’ ‘portfolio management,’ and ‘rightsizing’ our schools – and say not a word about lower class sizes or increasing the presence of loving support personnel or enriching our curriculum,” Gym writes. “I believe in the value of the public sphere and the responsibilities it owes to the most marginalized of communities — our immigrant students, special needs populations, and young people struggling with disciplinary issues . . . I believe our communities have always been there to pick up the pieces after administrations of hubris pass on. And I believe our public schools are worth fighting for.”

And the outcry grows louder, with a meeting last night where church leaders and other community activists trashed the district plan. This is going to get ugly.

Hi Philadelphia. Did you know that the nuclear plant in Limerick, just up the Schuylkill River from us, accidentally released 15,000 gallons of radioactive water into the river in March? And that the Schuylkill supplies about 40 percent of the city with drinking water?

No? You’re not alone. The whole thing was kept pretty hush-hush. Three weeks after the accident, plant officials finally posted a public notice, and the Pottstown Mercury picked up on the story. No mention in our local papers, though. (The Inky did note last year that the power plant was trying to run an end-around standard safety reviews.)

Don’t worry, the state Department of Environmental Protection knows all about it, and decided that it’s nothing you need concern yourself about. The DEP told Counterpunch that the radioactive water was not an “Event of Potential Public Interest.” Why not? As it turns out, the plant routinely discharges wastewater into the river.

Claims by plant operators and state regulators that all of this is perfectly safe notwithstanding, somehow this seems like something the public would be interested in.

If the city continues to offer only 202 new properties a month at sheriff sale, it would take 45 years to bring each tax delinquent parcel to the auction block, and many more years if new delinquents continue to be added to the rolls.

So, everyone else, get your checkbooks out. Or don’t. Chances are no one will notice.

Concerted efforts to destroy public education in Philadelphia and use our tax dollars to line the pockets of private school operators continue with a nasty state representative race in West Philly. City Paper hits the nail on the head with this story: Nonsensical attack flyers are proliferating in the neighborhood, trashing state Rep. James Roebuck for the failings of Philadelphia public schools. Since their failings are clearly all his fault. No, in fact the flyers are an effort to win votes for challenger Fatimah Muhammad, who is part of the Anthony Williams “pro-voucher” camp funded by shadowy hedge fund operators who want to get their cut of the trillion dollar public primary education industry.

Williams has already destroyed any credibility he might have had for an expected 2015 mayoral run by selling out his entire political agenda to three wealthy Main Line “school choice” supporters.

The big difference between public schools and the rival charter, private and parochial schools is that public school have to educate everybody. That’s why they are publicly funded. Unlike charter, private and parochial schools, public schools can’t turn away disruptive, special needs and stupid children. Soon, that’s all that will be left, but with no money to educate them since it will have all been diverted to charters and privates.

The other difference is it’s not as easy for politically connected operators to get rich through public schools. Better to take the money where there’s less oversight.

The important thing to remember here is whenever anybody says they are acting in the best interests of the children, they are lying. Politicians and school operators alike are acting in the best interests of their pocketbooks.

If the voucher plan goes through, your taxes can go to pay for kids to go to Catholic schools and get molested. Yay!

New Media Technology Charter School founder Hugh Clark admitted to stealing $522,000 in taxpayer funds as well as $339,000 from a bank in order to bankroll his non-school related business interests, according to this story in the Philadelphia Inquirer. Is anyone surprised?

While many charter schools do a good job and are an appealing alternative to escape the wreckage that make up district-run Philadelphia public schools, the city’s rush to embrace the charters has resulted in wanton and reckless transfer of public money to private individuals with little oversight. Be prepared for more stories like this one.

The last two grafs in the Inky story are damning:

The school is the fourth Philadelphia charter school whose administrators or board members have faced federal fraud charges in the past decade.

New Media is among at least 18 area charter schools that have come under federal investigation since 2008, according to sources with knowledge of the probes.

George Miller is killing the Jimmy Bins beat: This week he caught Binns, an attorney with strong ties to the Philadephia Police Department, actually dressed up like an officer and riding a Harley with unofficial police insignia.

Miller’s podering: Isn’t this impersonating a police officer?

Last we heard from Binns he was using an official police business card to park his car illegally and sit in coffee shops.

Ben Franklin Bridge

Well, the dealings at the Delaware River Port Authority are just as dirty as you thought they were. So says a new report by the New Jersey comptroller that finds the DRPA “has wasted millions of dollars of toll payers’ money through mismanagement and political cronyism.”

In a sentence: DRPA leadership used toll money to buy nice things for their friends and family. But you already knew that.

There’s also a nice little payout to the insurance company owned by George Norcross, the Democratic Party boss who also hooked up Cooper Hospital with some sweet connections, and is part of an ownership group that is about to buy the Philadelphia Media Network.

If we had a real controller in Philadelphia who did real audits, we would learn about essentially the exact same shenanigans going on at the Philadelphia Parking Authority as we speak.

At least two of the school district employees are committee people, another was Butkovitz’s campaign treasurer, and another lives outside Philadelphia city limits. In theory, all that will change thanks to the solicitor’s ruling.

The next step would be to remove the employees from the cash strapped school district’s budget entirely and get them on the city payroll (not that the city is exactly flush with cash, either). We’ll see.

Here’s a classic tale of how politics and money work together: Cooper Hospital in Camden has turned into an economic and political powerhouse, thanks to the help of New Jersey Democratic strongman George Norcross.

The hospital’s growth rests on a financial tripod that all revolves around Norcross’s influence:

• Enormous sums spent on lobbying
• Receives a large amount of public money
• Big donors and politically connected firms win lucrative contracts with the hospital

Replace public money with tolls and parking fees, and it could be a story about the Delaware River Port Authority, or the Philadelphia Parking Authority. It’s ugly, but it’s the way things work.