Kenney and Williams have a sitdown - with hollandaise sauce

JIMMY AND TONY. Friends again? Maybe.

A source tells us Jim Kenney and Tony Williams - er, sorry, Anthony Hardy Williams - had their first face-to-face meeting on Wednesday since the ex-councilman trounced the state senator in May's Democratic mayoral primary.

This is what members of La Cosa Nostra would call a sitdown.

Williams and Kenney met for breakfast at Sabrina's Café in Powelton, according to a source in the restaurant.

West Philly. Williams' turf. Interesting.

We were hoping it was like Robert De Niro and Al Pacino getting coffee in that scene from "Heat." Veiled threats, Freudian dream analyses and whatnot.

But our source said the meeting "appeared cordial," with both men ordering bacon and eggs - an alleged splash of hollandaise sauce for Williams - and "laughing at times." They sat alone. No staff.

We called Kenney spokeswoman Lauren Hitt for details. She confirmed the meeting, in her typical freewheeling, colorful, shoot-from-the-hip manner of communicating:

"Jim very much enjoyed meeting with Senator Williams and he looks forward to continued conversations about how to best move the city of Philadelphia forward."

We don't pretend to understand the intricacies of Northeast Philadelphia politics, but the Democratic schism in the 55th Ward is getting out of hand.

It has resulted in, essentially, an entire Bizarro Ward in Mayfair - complete with a Bizarro Democratic ward leader, Bizarro chairman, three Bizarro vice chairs, a Bizzaro secretary, Bizarro assistant secretary, and two Bizarro sergeants-at-arms.

Each member of the original 55th Ward Democratic Executive Committee, from ward leader Robert Dellavella on down, has a Bizarro Ward version of themselves.

This is so Northeast Philly.

The doppelganger ward calls itself the Active 55th Ward. It came into existence last year after Democratic committeeman Dennis Kilderry, a former member of the original/old 55th Ward, and his allied committee people failed in a bloodless coup to oust Dellavella and his crew.

Political pressure was exerted. Allegiances shifted at the last minute.

"It was pretty ugly," said Kilderry, 40, the renegade wardlord and member of Insulators and Asbestos Workers Local 14.

Kilderry said his faction challenged Dellavella in the four-year ward reorganization election because they got fed up with Dellavella living outside the 55th Ward.

"We had a problem with him not living in the ward and not being active in our neighborhood," Kilderry said of Dellavella. "When the ward system is run correctly, it's supposed to be help the neighborhood and get people involved and create a better atmosphere for everybody. Bob does none of that."

Dellavella, an attorney, told us Wednesday that while he does not currently live in the 55th Ward, he owns three businesses there and is in the ward most days of the week.

"They formed their little rump group," Dellavella said of Kilderry's organization.

This whole mess came to our attention before the primary when Dellavella sent a letter to candidates telling them that if they sought the endorsement of Kilderry's Active 55th Ward or attended its meetings they "would risk losing not only the 55th Ward's support, but many other wards throughout the City this year and in future years."

Damn.

"Chairman [Bob] Brady will be happy to confirm this statement," Dellavella added. "I hope this clarifies any misunderstanding."

Not really. Who is the real ward leader? Can we put Dellavella and Kilderry in separate rooms and ask them a question only the true ward leader would know? Of course not. So we called Brady, chairman of the Democratic City Committee.

"We recognize Bob [Dellavella]," Brady said. "We don't recognize the splinter group. I'd love to have them come back in and work together, but that didn't happen. It is what it is."

Kilderry knows how ugly politics can get. He had his name dragged through the mud last year when he ran unsuccessfully for state representative, challenging Mike Driscoll, the party-backed candidate. Information surfaced about a car break-in when Kilderry was 18 years old and a pending warrant in Canada from a 2011 traffic accident.

"That was a tough ordeal I went through last year," Kilderry said. "That's why regular people like me don't run. They put you through all this crap."

But Kilderry, whose grandfather was a ward leader, says he's not backing down. There are 22 elected Democratic committeemen in the Active 55th Ward, he said. (Although they are probably former committeemen now.)

"I'm just a regular dude trying to make a difference in the neighborhood. It's a group thing, it's not about me," Kilderry said. "We're fighting the system here. We're just a bunch of people that live in the neighborhood. We're not anything special."

On that point, Dellavella would surely agree.

In a Clout item last week about the carpenters union flying banners along the Jersey Shore about the Pennsylvania Convention Center lockout, we wrote that the strategy makes sense, "since a large number of city residents - and elected officials - head downashore every summer."

But due to a late-night editing error, computer glitch or vast right-wing conspiracy, that word somehow appeared in the Daily News as "downahore."

We regret the error. (Not really.)

- Staff writers William Bender

and David Gambacorta

contributed to this report

Blog: www.philly.com/philly/blogs/cityhall

On Twitter: @wbender99

Phone: 215-854-5255