Reports of Federal Warrants are being served at the Municipal Services Building in Phila.

NBC10

[Dog]

Local NBC station in Philly is reporting federal warrants are being served in at the Municipal Services Building.

There is also a report of an emergency meeting of Mayor Street's cabinet taking place right now..

[LenS]

The Carpenters are mad because Street and Rendell replaced them at the Convention Center with state workers.

Though, to be honest, they needed to be replaced. They were driving away business with their extortionate demands, lack of productivity, and sheer orneriness. State workers are actually an improvement (a remarkable statement).

[William McKinley]

Takin' it to the Streets...

[isom35]

fuddy = duddy

[jammer]

Thanks for the explanation. That sounds like real, educated knowledge. I didn't mean, however, to sidetrack this thing from the big news. Don'tcha' just love it when things like this happen?

[Mo1]

This part was also interesting

Also Wednesday, FBI agents raided the office of Ali's accountant, Jeanice M. Salter, according to the Inquirer. Salter's politically connected firm signed public tax disclosure forms for Black United Fund of Pennsylvania Inc., which was funnelling charity donations to cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal in the 1990s.

[norraad]

You name it & he & his gang are in deep!

The City has been run to hell in a handbag full of crap with this crowd, glad the feds are here for a round-up.

[Mo1]

I agree .. but they are still ticked

[LenS]

No bid means that there was no competition or notice of a contract up for bid. The contracts were simply assigned to someone. Generally, no bid contracts are only supposed to be for rather small stuff where prices are low and pretty generic (or for some emergencies -- i.e. a bridge falls down and needs to replaced yesterday).

Minority set asides require that a certain percentage of contracts should go to minorities. But competitive bidding is still required. A higher bid might be accepted if the bidder is a minority and the bid is close. But the bid isn't just given without bidding or notice.

[Grampa Dave]

Herr Gray Davis has rented every big shredder in North America after Tuesday's election.

[mpreston]

Philly today, Chicago tomorrow

[Grampa Dave]

Probably all of the above plus drugs and maybe some funds from some Friendly local IslamoKazis?

[oldplayer]

Hey, Where are Mayor Goode and Janet Reno when we good really use them?

[Pearls Before Swine]

Re your #48. I know, I know. But to me, its a question of degree.

There are a lot of set-asides which are essentially non-competitive within the set-aside group, and definitely not competitive outside the group. I don't think you believe that set-asides for race or gender aren't subject to manipulation and cronyism any more than I do.

My tongue-in-cheek point is that the direct nepotism of the mayor is worse than the usual set aside, but not entirely different. He has abused his power by essentially giving non-competitive contracts to his cronies. In set-asides, the law does it for us by limiting competition--sometimes to very small groups of non-competitive bidders. Both are anti-merit and anti-competitive, and both steal from the public pocket.

[LenS]

It's tough for them. Ever since the Philly mob got squashed, they just don't have the pull like they used to. *g*

If Rendell gets caught up in this, I'm gonna start smelling the Clintons in the background. They seem to be doing their best to make sure that there's is zero competition for Hillary. With Grayout gone, Rendell is one of the last Democratic governors who could challenge her in 2008 (since Granholm is ineligible).

[Grampa Dave]

A whole lot of mayors, governors, ceos, and cfo's have been finding out that there is now a controlling legal authority since Bubba left office and took his Wooky, Jake Reno with him.

[TommyDale]

It has now been confirmed that one of the charges is "groping". Turnabout is fair play? :-)

[Servant of the 9]

I, in my admitted ignorance of the situation, also wonder why they picked Friday afternoon to do this. If it had been an "ultra-right winger", they would have done it on a Monday or Tuesday to get a full week's coverage.

Cause they can keep them around till a Judge shows up Monday morning to set bail?

So9

[MissAmericanPie]

They got him.

[Ben Hecks]

Thanks for the link. This is heavy duty stuff.

[LenS]

Well, even without the set asides, there tends to be a limited pool of people/companies with the knowledge to get these contracts.

I suspect that the big difference here was that the Imam supporter seems to have been billing for stuff that wasn't done AND that his brother was given a contract he had no experience in handling. One has to be more subtle in one's contract awards. To be honest, I thought that John Street had learned how to play the game better. Instead, he seems to have fallen back into his street vendor day practices (maybe even farther).