Street to continue neighborhood focus

John Street has always billed himself as the neighborhood mayor. During his first term, the Democrat focused significant time and energy on improving all parts of Philadelphia, not just Center City, and by all accounts he will continue with that tradition during his second term.

He campaigned heavily on programs like the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, which seeks to clean up decrepit areas of the city, and Operation Safe Streets, a massive anti-crime undertaking.

Campaign spokesman Mark Nevins said Street will stand by those initiatives in his second term.

"People responded favorably to the accomplishments of his first term," Nevins said. "We're going to continue to build on our record."

Political analyst Larry Ceisler said that some of the emphasis would probably shift away from Safe Streets, in part because of the looming budget problems the city faces.

"Everything is going to depend on how much money they have," he said. "They have a budget problem and these programs are very expensive."

Safe Streets might take a budget cut, Ceisler added, while NTI will likely see consistent funding.

"NTI hasn't even [really] gotten started yet, they certainly don't want to cut that," he said. But "they are going to look at Safe Streets and whether it has to continue at this level."

Fred Voigt, executive director of the Committee of Seventy, a political watchdog group, agreed that the budget posed a challenge for Street's next term.

"He's got to negotiate new contracts with municipal workers," he said. "Everybody's up [for new contracts] next year. Workers are going to want more, and he's going to have to figure out how to balance the budget."

"He may have to make choices," Ceisler added. He certainly "can't afford to raise taxes."

Nevins said that Street was dedicated to maintaining "fiscal responsibility," but that it was too early to tell what programs, if any, would need to be cut.

But analysts say that Street will try to get as much out of the next four years as possible.

"He's shown no interest in running for higher office, so his second term is his legacy," Ceisler said. "I think when you shoot for legacy, you shoot for the stars."

Part of that will be trying to salvage the failing Philadelphia public school system in Street's second term.

During his first four years, for the first time in the city's history, control of some schools was handed over to private companies -- a motion which has met with mixed results so far.

"I think he will allow privatization where it fits," Ceisler said. "If they find a good company to come in and run schools, that wants to take on some of these problem schools, they will hand them" over.

Perhaps the most immediate issue the mayor will have to face is the aftermath of a Federal Bureau of Investigation probe of which he is a subject.

Nevins said that the listening device planted in Street's office by the FBI is "highly unlikely [to] affect him in any way." But at the very least, the probe will continue to hold the attention of the public and the media.

But Brian Tierney, campaign manager for defeated Republican mayoral challenger Sam Katz, said Tuesday after the election that the bug would likely have a significant impact on the future of the city.

"Most lawyers like myself believe we are about to enter into a period of probable indictments," he said. "We're into a very rocky period as a city. Now I'm going to go back into my corporate business world, and I'm trying to think who in this city, with a mayor who is a subject of a criminal probe... is going to want to invest in here?"

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