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All of MMPs Feeds
Hi Megan. Thank you for posting a blog about the AmericaSpeaks: Our Budget, Our Economy National Town Meeting. I hope people will join the Philly meeting (sign up here http://usabudgetdiscussion.org/participate or view on the home page tomorrow during the event). Some Myths & Facts are addressed here -- http://usabudgetdiscussion.org/learn/myths-facts/ All the best, Adriana
This seems like a pretty important issue to organize around. Do you have ideas of what we should/could be doing. How do we get some information on this and then organize around it?
Well, philly residents who are behind in their real estate taxes and water bills can also face foreclosure!. In an aggressive measure to collect taxes the City of Philadelphia now has TWO collection Agents. These special agents are Law Firms (Linebarger, Goggan, Blair & Sampson and the GRB). Thousands of residents who are behind in their taxes are receiving collection letters from one of these two agents as well as the City's Law Department. Homeowners are also sued in Municipal Court. Facing collection action and foreclosure, low income homeowners can apply for payment agreements.
The payment agreements are affordable (based on income) but, the devil is in the details in these low agreement contracts. The contracts they are signing contain a "stipulated judgment".
If a homeowner defaults, The city will have an automatic judgment and the homeowner is now in deeper peril, because this allows the city to take the homeowner to sheriff sale more quickly. Unwittingly, homeowners are signing away some of their rights, such as to file bankruptcy or petition the Tax REview Board for the abatement of Penalties and Interest. ALso, interest and penalties continue to accrue and the low monthly payment they are now paying barely touches the principal, let alone the mounting interest and penalties.
These minimal payment can make it nearly impossible to ever pay off your back taxes. But, low income homeowners can't pay much more given the rising utility costs. Also, some uninformed homeowners just pay the agreement amount which covers only portion of the outstanding tax balance and they don't understand that they still have to pay annual taxes as they become due. If this is the case the City can still put the homeowner in collections for that balance.
A payment agreement might be all the homeowner can do to stop or slow down collections or in other cases stop the property from going to sale. But, in the long run if the homeowner can only afford to pay the minimum amount required its likely that they will never fully realize a satisfied debt.
The rise of unemployment rate is a scary thing in every contry. The government has implemented lots of programs to recover from economic mess which have brought by recession. While more and more people are becoming jobless, more and more bill is being passed to the Senate, and the recent one is the financial reform bill. This bill being suggested might regulate pay day loans greatly. Large company is one element that helped push our economy into its present recession, so maintaining them on top of everything isn't a wise idea. One stipulation to the new bill is that a payday lender could only give loans 6 times in a year. I know that sounds reasonable at first glance but everyone who has ever gotten a payday cash advance from their bank knows banks are not as easy to work with than smaller pay day lenders.
Congrats nurses at Broomall Presbyterian Village
This is a powerful reminder that we do not have the option to fight in isolation. Better working conditions, living wages, housing, health care, and quality education can not be fully realized until we have put an end to the poverty where these struggles took root. The poor and working people of Philadelphia are in the same fight as poor and working people of West Virginia.
A new group, Earth Quaker Action Team (EQAT, prononuced equate) is taking on mountaintop removal has formed and is taking action to stop PNC Bank from continuing to fund Massey, and to push them to invest in renewables. Check us out: http://eqat.wordpress.com/
Thank You all for caring about us. We truly appreciate the support you all are offering. It is a wonderful thing to know that SOMEONE out there understands how we feel and what we deserve.
They closed Northeastern Hospital. They closed Episcopal. So they can do whatever they want to do.
Thanks for this and keeping us posted on the situation. We all support our TEMPLE nurses.
Broad & Ontario
Go Temple nurses! All of us need you to be able to do your jobs well!
Temple has made it crystal clear where they stand- between us and our patients. It is an absolute disgrace the way they are dealing with us. They would like you all to believe that we are all fighting for money.......FALSE. first and foremost we want safe conditions for our patients. These strangers coming in to replace us- DO NOT KNOW OUR PATIENTS.
Many of our patients come in frequently for chronic illnesses. They are here a few times a week in some cases.THEY KNOW OUR FACES AND WE KNOW THEIR CONDITION(S)Please let us do our jobs. We care about our patients or else we wouldn't be here.
GET A GRIP TEMPLE. AND RECOGNIZE OUR VALUE!
I want to thank everyone that came out today to show your support. Today's rally was really powerful. We are standing strong and we will be heard. We ARE being heard all over the country. Thanks to everyone who spread the word, everyone who honked for us today, everyone who came out to capture it on film.
A very special thanks to MMP for being with us throughout this entire campaign. We are truly thankful for everything you've done for us.
It's not over though......We made another offer to administrators to sit down and talk once more this weekend.....they refused. So the strike starts on Wednesday,march 31,2010.
We will be forcing Temple to recognize how valuable we are. And its about time. We work so hard and what we do makes Temple the wonderful hospital it is. WHAT WE DO...NOT THEM. We are on the frontline. Any one of our thousands of patients wouldn't know who the administrators were if they tripped over them. So they need to really really GET A GRIP! WE are Temple- The workers- not the "suits"!
So they can pretend that us walking out will have no impact on the quality of the care- but they will soon see- VERY CLEARLY- that we are the ones who make Temple the well known and respected hospital that it is. And without us- it just won't be the same.
Thank You all for everyhting.
I have been at Temple Hospital for 3 years. I love my job but lately, working for Temple has been rough, to say the least. Regardless of what administartors want people to think, WE DO NOT WANT TO STRIKE. But it is the only way to get them to get it. They have pulled so many slimy stunts recently that we have no choice but to show them just how serious we really are. They want to take away so many things from us. Including much deserved, and resonable raises, tuition remibursement, over time, worst of all our basic human rights. They really want to implement a gag clause to stop people from talking about the hospital.
Our V.P. of Human Resources actually said at the last negotiations on March 15, "If you want your Constitutional Rights, you need to go somewhere else."WOW, Tell me, if you aren't the one who gave me my Constitutional Rights, how in the world do you think that you have the power to take them away?
Sorry but nothing will stop me from speaking my mind and the truth!!!!!!!!!!!
Families face a shrinking social safety net as political disagreements
hold up the passage of a final state budget for cissp exam questions. This segment covers a rally
by The Coalition for Essential Services in Media, PA. Speakers
discussed potential cuts to Head Start, Pre-K, child care, housing
assistance, adult education classes along with other social services like ccnp.
Viaja de casa en casa en una peregrinación del evangelio. Sus
anfitriones la esperan con ansia, es un honor recibirla junto con la
pequeña comitiva que la acompaña cada noche.
Es la imagen peregrina de la Virgen de Guadalupe, que hace visitas
diarias a hogares del sur de Filadelfia desde principios de octubre
hasta el 30 de noviembre, eventos que coordina el grupo la Legión de
María.
“El motivo es acercar a las familias más a la Iglesia y motivar a sus
hijos a que sigan conservando la fe y que sigan siendo mejores
cristianos para ser una mejor sociedad”, dijo Jesús Gutiérrez, miembro
del grupo que conduce los rosarios.
Las peregrinaciones de este grupo comenzaron hace siete años cuando se
colocó por primera vez la imagen de la Virgen de Guadalupe en la iglesia
Santo Tomás de Aquino, uno de los dos recintos en el sur de la ciudad a
los que la comunidad mexicana católica acude.
oracle certification training
In the midst of a national health care reform battle, a small drama unfolds in northeast Philadelphia. Last week, the Pennsylvania House held up $175 million in additional funding to Temple University. Representative John Taylor described the move as a “wake up call for Temple University” to live up to their responsibility to the public.
The communities of Port Richmond, Kensington, Fishtown, Bridesburg and Juniata coalesced last December amid rumors Temple University Health System (TUHS) planned to close down the busy, full-service Northeastern Hospital. Despite the effort of community members and local lawmakers, Temple refused to discuss their plans. In fact, they would not even confirm their intention until they announced in March they would close the hospital. They gave two months notice, which is the minimum required by the state. Temple did the minimum.
Have you seen the video made by PB residents, featuring the same PB residents you're claiming to 'save'?
http://sct.temple.edu/blogs/murl/2010/03/05/southwest-planning-commission-focuses-point-breezes-future/
It's embarassing that civic groups in our hood can campaign against development, acting as if they speak for the entire community. In reality, your group consists of the same tired old people crying out against change. This hood has been trash for years, do something productive because we want to see it! And what's the community you're claiming to save anyway? Trash, abandonment and crime? Good riddens people!
Allied Barton has a long history of being abusive to employees. Messing around with employees benefits has been an age old problem for guards with Allied Barton. They create a hostile work environment.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Joseph T. Hansen, International
President of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union
(UFCW) and chair of the Change to Win Immigration Task Force, and John
Sweeney, International President of the AFL-CIO, today unveiled a
unified framework for comprehensive immigration reform legislation.
The joint announcement and proposal is a critical
sign of support for the Administration and Congress to address
immigration reform -- and to ensure that it remains a priority on the
legislative calendar. It is also an important sign that immigration
reform is an important part of economic recovery with it training.
This campaign is a great continuation of earlier work in Point Breeze and it is very important to the future of affordability in South Philly. Do the organizers know what garbage the City Paper wrote about their efforts? Check out http://citypaper.net/blogs/clog/author/andrewthompson/.
The writer, Andrew Thompson, reprints the campaign flyer and disrespects the entire community, calling them violent and drugged out. What benefit could he get from attacking our women, children and elders?
Here is his trash:
"February 22
Save Point Breeze; or, Don’t let the Sidecar happen to your neighborhood!
Monday, February 22nd, 2010 at 4:03 pm
posted by Andrew Thompson
Back in October, I wrote about simmering tensions between newcomers and old-heads in Point Breeze, the mostly derelict, violent, drugged-out, blighted neighborhood south of Washington Ave on the West side of Broad Street that had accrued such a reputation as to be designated for federal funds to make it slightly more livable. At that point, push-back to the newcomers was more of a tacit sentiment than a force with any organization.
Now, the latent antipathy has become at least as organized as a flier distribution program. The “Save Point Breeze” campaign, started by Concerned Citizens of Point Breeze, is perhaps the most visible sign of resident-rage yet at the prospect of wealthy white folk coming into the area and building condos and living with their dogs - dogs they will, undoubtedly, take for walks. The flier shows the Sidecar cafe at 22nd and Christian Streets as an example of doom that could potentially befall Point Breeze residents, raising their property values and and wreaking havoc on their idyllic Eden.

The link above gives a “list of demands” CCPB has for the Philly Planning Commission, among which is that Point Breeze residents have priority for jobs at the new Philly Live complex, to be built neighborhoods away. Also demanded is tax amnesty for old residents who may be kicked out of their homes and a strict prohibition on condos.
I think we can all agree that the best thing for Point Breeze is to keep it poor and segregated."
|| End of the City Paper's garbage ... ||
If these primitives are crawling out from under their rocks because of what you folks are doing, then you must be doing something right. Keep up the great work!!
oh grand, the phillyblocks bigotry has finally broken out into new territory. trying to take over this site?
really? that's beef number one?
so leave the vacant lots as trash heaps instead...
how's that equal? i pay my mortgage. my neighbor gets the city to. please explain to me the equality in that?
finally! a point worth talking about! here's the kicker: the money's already there, but you have to actually do work to get it.
ummm, the city is broke. you're talking about, on average, letting the people who proportionally use the most city resources (welfare, health clinics, public trans) to not pay for it. how long you've lived somewhere shouldn't determine anything.
again, the city's broke. there are grants for things like this. but YOU HAVE TO ACTUALLY APPLY FOR THEM TO GET THEM.
that usually takes private investment. the very private investment you're saying you do not want. make up your mind.
???
how about assuring new business owners they won't be robbed at gunpoint within a week of opening? oh right--that's the element that you're trying to preserve by not allowing people to move in to the neighborhood.
I guess my point is, you can't have your crack and smoke it too. The "gentrifiers" aren't trying to kick you out. In fact, most of them want the same things you want and would bend over backwards to work with you. But unless you're willing to enter into a conversation instead of listing your demands, that's not going to happen.
But, if that fails, I hear properties down by the airport are cheap ;) have fun "gentrifying" that neighborhood...
I too live in this neighborhood, and I am fedup! Not fedup with new people moving in, but fedup with this communtiy and how it is acting around positive change. I have lived here for some time now, and I work everyday to support my family. Do you really think we are going to get any stimulus money, if we give them a list of demands!!! Do you think they will give us any money, if you tell them we don't want anything they have to offer. What is WRONG WITH YOU! People these are professionals creating this plan, they do it for a living, let them create a plan that can help everyone. Not a plan that is unprofessional, unrealistic, and juvenile.
THIS IS JUST A PLAN! WE AS INDIVIDUALS OF THIS COMMUNITY HAVE TO PUT IT IN PLACE!
DO YOU LISTEN AT THE MEETINGS!
An to you you Ms. Beaufort when you said...
"you would walk around like you were looking
at art. Our community is more than seven poster boards. There was no
community participation."
Betty you forgot to mention, that next to the 7 easels, there were 7 HUGE boards w/ markers on them to write thoughts, changes, or anything your little heart desired. So there was plenty of time to participate. I think it was a great that the City Planning Commision decided to do this, because the other meetings turned into bickering battles. Plus it allowed everyone to participate as an individual from the communtity....
I just hope as an African American and a truly "concerned citizen", that my neighborhood CHANGES! The "concerned citizens" you mentioned above, have done nothing but make this community what it is today... nearly abandoned and dilapidated. Why don't you pat yourself on the back!
Sam
i am so sick of you people using gentifications as a means to practice bigotry of fellow residents of this city. its a deceptive attempt to mask the true emotions of bigots in our city. you are just as bad as whites who dont want blacks in their neighborhoods. redlining was a great example of this. you all may not realize it now but my only hope is that some day you will realize and come to terms with the beds that you make. spreading hatred and exploiting others for deviant means is wrong. you might call yourselves community activists, call yourselves what you really are, community terrorists looking for any opportunity to spread hate and alienate those who have nothing to do with what ails these communities. its people like yourselves that keep these neighborhoods riddled with crime, substance abuse and the like. you are the disease and crutch and keeps people ailed. your mission is not to work with communities, your mission is to divide and evoke hatred towards other groups of people, mainly white or any one who sympathizes with whites moving to black communities.