Using the Senate's bully pulpit to try to defuse a bitter dispute between the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Philadelphia Housing Authority that could cost the PHA more than $40 million, Sen. Arlen Specter yesterday announced that the Senate wants HUD to continue the funding.

He also said that should HUD reject the request, which is embedded in a Senate resolution passed early yesterday, he is prepared to push harder.

HUD says the funding is in jeopardy because Philadelphia has not complied with public-housing requirements to provide access for the disabled.

The PHA, which has filed a federal lawsuit in the matter, says HUD's action is retaliatory because director Carl Greene rejected a proposal from a developer close to HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson.

In addition to the acrimony, there are suggestively worded e-mails, unearthed in legal discovery and made public this week in leaks to the press.

In one exchange, a HUD staffer mused about making "life less happy" for Greene and a staffer replied that it could be accomplished by taking away his federal funding.

"We found a series of e-mails which showed [HUD assistant secretaries] were trying to put pressure on PHA. . . . On the same day, Jan. 12, 2007, they cut the funding. That's a little too remarkable to be a coincidence," Specter said yesterday.

The resolution, passed after midnight as a "sense of the Senate" amendment attached to unrelated legislation, is cosponsored by Specter and Sen. Bob Casey. It asks for a one-year extension of the flexible-spending program that the PHA values at more than $40 million - a sum it stands to lose unless HUD relents before March 31.

Because the Senate's action is nonbinding, HUD can ignore it. In a statement yesterday, the agency implied it might.

"We strongly encourage the Housing Authority to do what's in the best interests of the residents they serve by signing the current agreement," which would renew Philadelphia's flexible-spending status for 10 years provided it agrees to comply on access for the disabled, HUD spokesman Steve O'Halloran said.

He declined to say directly whether HUD would comply with the Senate's request for the one-year extension.

Specter said the extension could provide "a cooling-off period" so the parties could settle rather than litigate, costing taxpayers millions. He warned that if HUD did not agree to the extension, he was prepared to squeeze harder.

"If HUD doesn't do it, I put them on notice, I intend to bring it up with the appropriation bill" for the entire HUD budget, Specter said.

Specter said he did not know all the intricacies of HUD's claim about Philadelphia and disabled access.

"I do not know whether all of the technicalities have been complied with," he said. "But I do know that when you have a dispute of that sort, people sit down and work it out."

Specter said he tried to resolve the matter, which he characterized as "frankly, nasty," when he met twice with the parties late last year.

"All they did was hurl insults at one another," he said.

What sort of insults?

"I don't like to repeat them," Specter told reporters. "There may be children listening."