Annette John-Hall: Shelter scarce for Nutter and youths

Must be hard for Mayor Nutter to stay focused on city business this week when he's had mammoth messes to clean up - and new ones kicking up.

First Hurricane Arlene blows through, leaving a path of destruction and sweeping up hundreds of thousands of dollars.

I'm guessing the former superintendent has already wreaked more havoc than Hurricane Irene ever will.

Truth is, until the mayor comes clean and identifies the anonymous benefactors who contributed $405,000 to Ackerman's get-to-stepping fund, it doesn't matter how wrong Nutter says she is. Until and unless that is known, the damage in the wake of Hurricane Arlene will be irreparable - especially to the mayor's supposedly transparent administration.

As usual, floundering underneath the debris are the children. Why are they always the ones who have to suffer?

Which, sadly, brings us to mess No. 2.

Talk about a tempest: two recreation-center shootings in three days this week, the latest at Mill Creek in West Philly Wednesday night.

The weary mayor was in no mood for diplomacy Wednesday afternoon when, after a storm of gun violence wounded six people Monday night at the Kingsessing Recreation Center, Nutter sent a loud and clear message to the gunman.

It was sheer luck that no one was killed. At least 500 people - adults, youths, babies - had gathered at the outdoor basketball court to watch an adult league playoff game when a knucklehead in a baseball cap fired into the bleachers 11 times.

Offering a $20,000 reward for information leading to the perpetrator ("someone who ain't worth a nickel," a Southwest activist huffed), Nutter said that, street culture aside, community culture was violated any time somebody decides to open fire in a safe haven.

"We will not tolerate this kind of insane, asinine, idiotic behavior in any of our facilities," the mayor said. "They are safe havens. . . . We will not stand for it.

"We're going to find your little butt and lock you up."

I've said it before: It's a shame when a whirlwind of bad behavior casts a cloud over all the good things young people do in Philly.

Nutter seemed downright giddy Saturday night when I ran into him at a skating party hosted by the city's Youth Commission at the Elmwood Rolling Skating Rink.

Earlier that day, he had acknowledged the Philly Youth Poetry Movement's slam team, which took first place at the prestigious Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam Festival in San Francisco last month.

But the young poets - like the kids at the skating rink, who made it clear they had never been part of anybody's flash mob - get little if any publicity, Nutter said.

Which was why the mayor hoped his presence and those events would generate some.

"Just good clean fun," Nutter said as he took a picture with an inquisitive, bespectacled boy who probably reminded the mayor of himself when he was that age. "I used to skate here when I was a kid."

As teens reveled around him, Nutter revealed a talk that he'd had with a young resident last summer. Sure, there are plenty of things for young kids to do, she asked, but what about for teens?

Since then, Nutter has worked closely with the Youth Commission to come up with answers.

"Are teens using the rec centers?" he asked his staff. "If they aren't, what would make them want to come? We've spent a fair amount of time and efforts focused on this before what happened in July [with the flash mobs]. The negative things gave us more of a sense of urgency."

Now, just when he thought he had made some headway comes more violence.

Still, Jordan Harris, the Youth Commission's 27-year-old executive director, isn't ready to duck for cover.

"This issue must be addressed now and head-on," Harris said, "and it will take everybody."

Otherwise, more violent storms will threaten on the horizon.