SEPTA about to derail?
No. 45 | Monday, April 14, 2025
City News
Hundreds of Philadelphians, including DSA State Senator Nikil Saval, protested looming SEPTA fare hikes and service cuts.
In better news, Mayor Parker announced—after lots of pressure from DSA City Council Member Nic O’Rourke— that SEPTA’s subsidized fare programs will remain funded.
With a death rate higher than that of the notorious Riker’s Island in NYC, incarcerated individuals waiting weeks for medical care, tiny and disgusting food portions, and crumbling facilities, Philly’s prisons are in crisis. DSA councilmember Nic O’Rourke spoke alongside decarceration advocates at a press conference in support of a ballot measure to create a municipal Office of Prison Oversight with the power to demand accountability for these inhumane conditions.
Those inhumane prison conditions did result in an ongoing class action lawsuit, filed in 2020, that has incentivized city officials to reduce the number of prisoners in Philadelphia jails. Now Philly has the lowest jail population in at least a decade, even as the city also approaches some of the lowest levels of violence it has seen in recent memory.
Mike Huff, a progressive candidate for judge in Philadelphia, lost his first appeal and is now appealing to the PA Supreme Court after being thrown off the ballot for the upcoming Democratic primary. Despite the court acknowledging that Huff lives in Philadelphia, his residency was invalidated because his wife resides in Bala Cynwyd.
Next month, hiding from that PPA agent won’t be enough. SEPTA buses will soon be equipped with AI “smart cameras” to help issue tickets to cars stopped in bus lanes, double parked, and more.
Despite asking for $3.7 million to expand the Kensington Wellness Court program, no one from Mayor Parker's office could answer any information about the program's effectiveness. Councilmembers pressed officials for any data about the program—which targets drug users for low level offenses—but were given nothing, despite reports that the program has proved ineffective and is rife with abuse.
Fearing ICE surveillance and arrests, organizers have canceled El Carnaval de Puebla, Philly’s longtime celebration of Mexican culture that draws thousands. It’s the second time in a decade the community has pulled the plug out of fear, a reminder that for immigrants in the US, even joy isn’t safe.
State News
UPMC, which has a near-monopoly on hospitals in the Pittsburgh area, stopped providing gender-affirming care to people under the age of 19. Hundreds attended a rally and delivered a letter in opposition signed by 14 state and local electeds, including Pittsburgh’s Mayor, but UPMC leadership refused to accept it.
An upcoming documentary found Pennsylvania to be one of two states that host plastic plants responsible for producing much of the single-use plastic polluting the world’s oceans. Always the gluttons for punishment, we gave Shell $1.6 billion in subsidies to do it.
A court ruled that Pennsylvanians don’t have the right to view communications between lawmakers and lobbyists. Pennsylvania lobbyists spend hundreds of millions of dollars every year to influence politicians.
On the campaign trail, US Rep. Rob Bresnahan called stock trading by members of Congress “sickening” and promised to support banning the practice. Fast forward to now—about a year later—and the sitting congressman has traded millions and neglected to cosponsor any bills to prohibit it. Across the aisle, Rep. Dwight Evans recently failed to meet trading disclosure laws (again).
When Senator Fetterman voted with Republicans to pass the government funding continuing resolution last month, he voted to cancel $264 million in federal funds across Pennsylvania, including for fire stations, homeless shelters, and a project to improve drinking water in Kensington. The Inquirer published a database of all PA's lost earmarks.
The governor's mansion, with Governor Shapiro and his family inside, was subject to an arson attack early Sunday morning.
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