CITY HALL

Better living through chemicals.

by Sara Kelly

As another dull hearing droned on, making Council late, attention in the loudening crowd turned to the poor dude (or dudette) standing on the sidelines in a hot turtle suit, looking, frankly, a little green. Not to mention fuzzy. >> David Cohen, who called PW last week to ask what we had against senior citizens (as evidenced by this column's relentless documentation of his and Thacher Longstreth's absences), kept the party going with repeated requests for clarification on the future of Fairmount Park. We can be sure that Cohen, who also beefed about our characterizing his singular attention to detail as "nit-picking," was merely being thorough when he briefly halted the proceedings for a sidebar conversation. But that didn't stop Anna Verna from noisily drumming a pen on her desk as she waited. >> The public meeting began when Verna banged her gavel loudly (one of these days that desk's just gonna go). A big blank book embossed "GUESTS" made the rounds, attendees blindly signing their names to the thing before passing it along. Note to self: Bring medicinal marijuana petition to next City Council meeting. >> This just in from the Department of Homeland Security: A woman seated alongside a PW reporter got up so stealthily no one noticed her leave--or that she'd abandoned an unmarked brown box under her seat. Weighing the potential embarrassment of reporting the offending article against the possibility of a nail bomb, the reporter opted for quiet paranoia. Hey, and guess what? No one died! >> While WHAT-AM radio personality Mary Mason exhibited her astounding talent for broadcasting the proceedings by what appeared to those around her as silently moving her lips, Thach exhibited literal silence as he went missing for the fourth straight week. >> Finally, to explain the sudden outbreak of fresh-faced little girls in the gallery, Verna acknowledged Council progeny, present for--yes, it all makes sense now--"Take Your Daughter to Work Day." When Verna introduced Jim Kenney's daughter Nora, the eight-year-old buried her head in her father's shoulder. Perhaps the Kenney political gene instead went to the councilman's son, Brendan, who happily hammed it up in his father's chair after Kenney emphatically renamed the holiday "Take Your Child to Work Day." Truly, why should girls be the only ones to suffer the adult indignity of work? >> Next up for honors was the intriguingly named Oliver St. Clair Franklin, whom Michael Nutter talked up as "Britain's first honorary consul in Philly." Franklin had just won the deliciously Bill-and-Ted-sounding "Most Excellent Order of the British Empire" commendation. In keeping with this most excellent theme, he called his benefactors "the Brits" before going on to solve the riddle of the guest book making the rounds through the crowd. Turns out it was a condolence book for the Queen Mum that's now winging its way to Buckingham Palace with a note--lest it be confused with, well, with a list of people who attended City Council on April 25. >> Just then Mr. Turtle busted through the door behind Verna like that pesky Kool-Aid character that's always barreling through walls. Except, well, Mr. Turtle's gait would more accurately be described as walking. With a smiling green-and-yellow mug, he hung back as Joan Krajewski declared April 2002 "Autism Awareness Month" in Philadelphia, no doubt prompting the crowd to collectively wonder: Whose dumbass idea was it to represent autism with a mute reptile? >> Ah, but no. Mr. Turtle, the crowd later learned, was not Mr. Turtle at all, but rather Wally Wise Guy. And he was here to represent for "Shelter in Place Week," which Jim Kenney described as a program preparing school kids for chemical emergencies by training them to shut the doors and windows, gather pets, oh, and don't forget, "to listen to KYW two, three, four times a day." >> Here's something you won't see outside of City Hall: Michael Nutter and Rick Mariano cavorting like old school chums. And what's this with Darrell Clarke and Franny Rizzo? The Universe to Rodney King: Looks like we can all just get along. >> Speech time conjured--you guessed it--Angel Ortiz, who wasn't quite finished with last week's rant against the plan to turn city schools over to Edison. This, he said, even as York, Pa., officials were terminating their contract with the financially strapped school-management company over "broken promises" and experienced teachers were joining a "mass exodus" from the Philadelphia system. David Cohen joined in the two-part harmony, adding that the School Reform Commission was "doing a great job of destroying our public education system." Their ultimate plan, he added with a flourish, "is to destroy the democratic system." Philly is a world-class city, the councilman continued on an odd tangent about no longer offering Latin in the public schools now that their population is mostly minority. The bottom line, he said, is that the schools need money, and as long as he's been in Council, school funding has been a rock-bottom priority for the city. Okay, so the kids are getting burned again, but at least, thanks to Wally Wise Guy, they'll soon know what to do if chemicals are involved.