"The doors at City Hall are now open," he said, in a silent nod to the strained relationship prevalent during the Street administration. "You will always have a friend at City Hall."

In return, Nutter asked for companies to step up efforts to lower the poverty rate and make the city safer.

"Give a person a job. Help them with education skills . . . Some people need a second chance in life," he said in his first mayoral address to the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce.

Specifically saying that employers should also make it easier for workers to attend daytime parent-teacher conferences, he said: "I'm asking the business community to help us help ourselves."

The mayor's 50-minute speech at the Sheraton Philadelphia City Center Hotel was interrupted by frequent applause.

"The sense of resurgence will only grow now based on his remarks," said former Gov. Mark Schweiker, now president of the Chamber of Commerce, referring to a general upbeat mood he had felt in the city since Nutter's election.

"What most impressed me was the genuineness . . . the specificity of the mayor reaching out to the business community. It was not rhetoric. It was real," said lawyer Mark Alderman, chairman of Wolf, Block, Schorr & Solis-Cohen in Center City.

Nutter declined to offer details about the tax cuts - for both the gross receipts and the net income portions of the business privilege tax - he would propose in the budget he is expected to unveil in City Hall this morning.

He largely sounded themes familiar from his campaign, such as making government more transparent and accountable. And he stressed that he would be helped in achieving his goals because of the easier relationship he seems to have with both City Council and Harrisburg lawmakers, compared with the difficulties of the Street administration.

"No longer will we spend all our time fighting," Nutter said.

At times humorous and others serious, Nutter was also humble.

Following a 10-minute video that was shown celebrating his election, Nutter walked to the lectern and stood there awkwardly for a few moments.

"It is tremendously embarrassing to sit and watch one of those videos," he said, before pausing for effect. "Can I get six more?"