The mayor's lost opportunity

By NATHAN R. SHRADER

BEFORE Mayor Nutter pops the cork celebrating the passage of his coveted sales-tax increase, we ought to assess the four major problems that plagued his position on raising the sales tax, his threatened budget cuts to core services and the shoddy public-relations campaign his administration employed in weeks past.

For starters, it was hard to gauge the true seriousness of the proposed "Plan C" cuts to public safety, libraries, recreation and public health.

Would a mayor with any political sense facing re-election in two years actually slash $44 million from the police department and leave the city with 972 fewer cops? Everyone, including the press, the public and the political community, seemed to do a poor job of assessing whether the mayor would actually carry out these draconian cuts.

THE PROPOSED public-safety cuts were especially capricious considering the Daily News report on July 25 that the city's murder rate was down 30 percent from 2007, with decreases also in homicides, shootings, and rapes. The mayor's plan would surely have reversed these gains, leaving him badly damaged with voters. It's hard to imagine Nutter actually signing off on this plan if the standoff with Harrisburg continued.

Second, the mayor misinterpreted the political geography of the state and the General Assembly. He used the Doomsday Budget plan to rally Philadelphians to his side in opposition to a legislature dominated by members from counties very different from ours. Sending out notices to citizens announcing the suspension of weekly trash pickups and posting "closing soon" signs at libraries and community centers were not effective ways of sending the message of urgency to non-Philadelphia legislators.

Philadelphians angry about cuts for cops can't vote to defeat legislators from the hinterlands in 2010. Legislators from places like Monroe, Mercer and Mifflin counties don't face Philly voters and aren't kept up at night worrying about their popularity here.

The mayor cast his political public-relations net too wide and too deep by not concentrating on bringing non-Philly legislators to his side early on - rather than publicly taking the switch to them at every opportunity when it seemed like they were hedging on his rescue plan.

Third, on the policy front, the plan to raise the sales tax continues to lack common sense in a down economy with soaring unemployment and a poor business environment. The Inquirer reported on Sept. 13 that local merchants were on edge about the sales-tax hike, pointing out that a consumer buying a $3,600 plasma TV would save $72 simply by crossing the county line. The last thing Philadelphia needs is a crushing tax on consumers that will cause pain and agony in the business community. Unfortunately, that's what's coming our way on Oct. 8.

Finally, you'd think that someone with Nutter's experience and savvy would've known that in politics you don't get something for nothing. He went to Harrisburg asking for a no-strings sales-tax hike and was caught off guard by the Senate's amendment requiring a necessary restructuring of the city's costly pension system. He seemed more interested in sniping rather than supporting a reasonable compromise.

Throughout this process, the mayor was clearly worried about his image, his chances for re-election, his legacy and the future of Philadelphia. But he lost the chance to prove his ability as an innovator by offering a reform agenda in a time of crisis.

He should have tackled the city's status as America's most overtaxed metropolis, created a plan to privatize and contract out the most expensive city services, permanently reduced the number of political functionaries on the city payroll and followed the Senate's lead to reform the pension system for the 21st century.

Instead, the mayor tried his best to scare citizens by talking of dramatic cuts, rejecting pension reform, protecting political patronage, mishandling the art of coalition-building in Harrisburg and straining relationships with those in public safety and law enforcement.

Although Nutter may have prevailed politically, it will be the citizens and businesses large and small bearing the burden of his victory.

Nathan R. Shrader, who lives in Northern Liberties, has a master's degree in political science from Suffolk University. He can be reached at Nathan@NathanShrader.com.