As most people know, City Council passed a bunch of ethics legislation. Basically, there will be an ethics board, campaign finance info online, and the like. And, we even had the spectacle of Councilman Indictment voting for the legislation. So, now that we have passed most of Nutter’s bills, and assume that Street will sign them, can we turn our attention to the one “ethics” or “good government” that may be able to make a real difference in the kind of government we get in Philly?

Yeah, I am talking about public financing of elections. (And, I ain’t stopping until we get it. So, um, I could be talking about it for a while. I digress…)

Ethical government is great. I would vote for any of the packages City Council passed yesterday. But, I think progressives get a little trapped into thinking that a board of ethics is going to lead to progressive government. I don’t think it particularly will. What will? Public funding of elections. Click read more to see the rest.

Doctored polls notwithstanding, there are people who might really, genuinely disagree with me about a vision for the City of Philadelphia. They also might be fine with a board of ethics, and anything else that passes. The reform package at hand does not really attack the real issue though: the entrenched powers that often run the City in an unprogressive way, and why they stay in power. At the end of the day, with our new ethics laws, is it likely that Philly government will be acting substantially different than it has in the past? Well, maybe. Will it be the same exact government. Yeah. Why will it be the same? As my friends at Bad Boy Records said so eloquently, “it’s all about the Benjamins baby.” The same money that was in Philly politics before? It is still there. And the only thing that will get rid of it is public funding of elections.

.....

The reason public funding of elections would challenge the status quo? Let me think of a few ways off of the top of my head….

1) Fear. Incumbents have huge money advantages. They are entrenched. If someone from their community can challenge them, without having to have a big fundraising base, they are simply more likely to vote in the interests of their constituents. I think plenty of sitting Councilmembers can be “progressivized,” so long as there is real pressure, and real fear. But, we cannot do that without giving potential challengers real avenues to challenge their opponents. Simply put, most progressive community activists do not have a ton of money, nor a good way to get it.

2) Fairness. Does it make sense that we effectively require candidates in very poor districts to fundraise from wealthy people and the like outside of their district? If it takes $300,000 to win a district, and the median income is $25,000, where is that campaign money coming from? Certainly not from the people of that district. Where, then, does loyalty start to inevitably go? To the people, or to the fundraisers?

3) Empowerment and ingenuity. Public funding of elections is a way to truly empower community organizers. I know that great organization can overcome a lot of things. But good organization also takes a lot of money. Which brings us to the ingenuity…

Councilman Goode said earlier:

My problem with public financing of campaigns is that most political money in Philadelphia is not spent on "message" - but is "street money" - therefore, volunteers and grassroots organizing serve the same purpose. Most candidates don't effectively spend campaign dollars and I would hate to see that at the taxpayers' expense.

In my last primary election, I spent around $50k with almost 90% going to the Democratic Party and ward leaders ($15k to the party, and around $28k more to ward leaders). I placed first in about 28 wards and second in the overall vote count. Get the picture?!

Money is an issue - but ward "brokering" is THE issue. You could have the money and still not have the opportunity to spend it competitively.

First, let’s get out of the way that I think Councilman Goode is one of the best Councilmen we have. That said, his situation, along with Councilman Rizzo, is simply unique. Advertising gets you a lot of name recognition, but so does the name Wilson Goode. Maybe not enough to get you automatically elected, but enough to help close a money gap. Most people simply do not have that built in advantage.

But, forgetting TV ads… lets get back to ward brokering and the like. Yes, ward leaders will still try and bargain for their money. And, they may shut out insurgent candidates. But, you know what, I don’t really care. Just because Philly politics has been based on a system of ward leaders for years doesn’t mean it is right, and in today’s day and age, it doesn’t necessarily mean it is effective. Off of the top of my head, I would estimate that at most 5% of Philadelphians know who their ward leader is. The fact that ward leaders get paid thousands to hand out ballots? Count me as unimpressed.

There are ward leaders who are effective representatives of their neighborhood, and really are community organizers. But are most? I don’t think so.

That is a long way of saying that if real community organizers started campaigning, they could spend their money on going door-to-door, developing GOTV strategies, and generally talking to their neighbors about issues that really matter in their lives. But, they cannot do that in the current system, because generally, many of our community organizers, like the communities they work in, do not have the money, and may not have the stomach for bigtime fundraising. They may instead be able to effectively organize 15,000 of their neighbors to get out to the polls.

I will soon start to get into the specifics of how the mechanism could work. But, if we want to empower community organizers while simultaneously removing the too large influence of big money in a city of working and middle-class people, we need to get money out of the political process. A City Council of neighborhood activists, from Germantown to Gray’s Ferry, who don’t feel compelled to answer to big money? It is there for the taking. If Councilman Nutter wants to show me he is really for clean, progressive government, I hope to see him start pushing the issue.