Brett Mandel for City Controller

THIS POLITICAL season, much is being made of the district attorney's job as the second most powerful in the city, after the mayor. That may be true, but a close third is that of city controller. Given the city's history, and the kind of fiscal crisis it often finds itself in, the controller - the city's fiscal watchdog - is critical.

The city doesn't completely lack for fiscal oversight: It answers to the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority (PICA) and City Council approves departmental budgets. But the controller is the only person elected by citizens to make sure each department of the city is fiscally responsible.

The controller must check the books and identify fiscal mismanagement for every department, every year.

We endorse Brett Mandel for this job.

Mandell spent eight years as a financial analyst under Controller Jonathan Saidel and went on to create Philadelphia Forward, a civic outgrowth of his stint as a driving member of Mayor Street's Tax Reform Commission. He is dogged (his campaign even features a bulldog) and says that the motivation for auditing departments should be to improve their operations, not just call attention to problems.

That goes to the heart of his difference from current controller Alan Butkovitz, whose audits and reports seem designed primarily for headlines.

We respect Butkovitz, but we have respectfully and publicly disagreed with the way he has defined his job almost from day one. Soon after taking office, he took the odd step of calling for safer crosswalks on Roosevelt Boulevard. That nonfiscal foray was in the same category as other questionable reports he has released, such as one suggesting that the school district was contributing to SEPTA crime by issuing transit passes to students. He has done some laudatory audits, but a 2006 report on school- safety conditions underscores the problematic way he works: The report itemizing health and safety violations was released the day before school opened- without informing the district of its release. Given that he's two years behind on some department audits, it's hard not to question the political motivations of his "gotcha" reports.

Mandell contends that he is more interested in not just finding problems in city departments, but in making sure they get fixed. Sometimes that would mean working with departments before racing to issue reports. He acknowledges that auditing every department every year may be unrealistic, especially for smaller departments, but he says that the bottom line of the auditor's job should be a better functioning city.

He'd return the controller's function from "gotcha" into "watch ya." *