I believe an unlikely mix of alleged drug trafficking related politicos and alleged white nationalist related politicos united to elect the infamous “Bloc of Four” in the abysmal voter turnout election of 2005. During their four year term the drug business was good again and white nationalists used Coatesville as an example on white supremacist websites like “Stormfront”. Strong community organization and support from law enforcement, in particular Chester County District Attorney Joseph W. Carroll has begun to turn our community around. The Chester County drug trafficking that I believe centers on Coatesville continues and I believe we still have public officials in place that profit from the drug sales. But the people here are amazing and continue to work against the odds to make Coatesville a good place to live.
Get a copy of the Special Issue of Wired Magazine “The Underworld Exposed”. The great graphics in “CRIME ORGANIZED” make it easy to see why I say that legalizing some drugs just in the USA will bring the $2 Trillion per year Transnational Organized Crime industry down to a level manageable for police work and at the same time reduce gun violence and gun sales in the USA.
It’s a solid pipeline of cocaine and marijuana up from South and Central America and guns from U.S. gunshops down to South and Central America.
The United States alone consumes 216 TONS of cocaine. All the rest of the world combined consumes 298 TONS of cocaine. Cocaine dwarfs, human trafficking, heroin, fake products, gunrunning and all the rest of organized crime. We here in the United States are by far the biggest contributor to Transnational Organized Crime the world has ever known. Repealing the prohibition of cocaine and marijuana and making it a legal but controlled substance like alcohol would come close to eliminating transnational organized crime.
Right now there is an all out war between the Mexican government and the Mexican cartels. Here in the USA we fully finance and fully arm both sides of that all out war. That is a national disgrace.
The organized crime that had its origins here in the United States as a reaction to Prohibition has become a 2 Trillion dollar transnational industry and uses state of the art just in time, networking business solutions to fund their criminal activity.
Organized crime began here. Our drug laws and gun laws feed the beast of transnational organized crime. We need elected officials here that have the coglioni to stand up to transnational organized crime and finish off the monster that we created here in the USA.
The illegal drug business in the USA is a multi-billion dollar business that reaches into all aspects of our society and government. Our arms industry is also deeply involved with drug trafficking as a weapons supply system and profits by selling to both sides in the drug war.
Going up against the entire world’s drug traffickers and their well paid agents within our political, legal and police system by considering legalizing drugs and regulating them as a public health matter would put more than just the white supremacists wing nuts against President Obama. It’s a very real third rail.
It’s just one more example of the great courage and optimism of Barack Obama. More at:
Whenever you pay fill your car at a gas station some of your money is used by our enemies for guns and bullets to kill our soldiers. You would think that fact alone would be sufficient to drive a national energy policy toward renewable energy solutions like solar and wind. Our U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps are taking action in this regard. See links below.
You would think that the extreme and unusual weather events all over our earth and the specter of an underwater Manhattan Island and submerged Florida would prompt the end of reliance on fossil fuels.
But none of this makes the slightest dent in our pattern of energy use.
What is driving the push of auto makers to electric vehicles, more and more use of solar, wind wave power, geothermal and liquid fuels made from algae lies within the word we use to describe the fuel we convert into energy, fossil fuel. Fuel made by dinosaurs and the plants they ate millions of years ago.
Ok, I know that some GOP freaks think that dinosaurs walked our earth a few thousand years ago but that's something for Republican leaders like Glen Beck, Sarah Palin, Joe Barton and their psychoanalysts to deal with.
Anyway once the fossil fuel is burned it's gone forever. We are well past the peak for fossil fuels. There might be enough coal to last for 100 years but it’s incredibly dirty, unhealthy, dangerous and increasingly expensive for our country. And the people like the Koch brothers who own coal are also incredibly dirty, unhealthy, dangerous and increasingly expensive for our country to deal with. There is some gas and oil locked up in shale but even though Dick “Tin Man” Cheney and his Halliburton Company are getting filthy wealthy putting their toxic chemicals into the ground to blow out gas; we may be destroying our fresh water sources, forests and the American West in trying to use that gas.
In any case it's very clear to every auto maker on earth that if people are going to continue to drive cars in the near and far future the energy for those cars will not be any form of fossil fuel because it will be increasing expensive and finally non-existent. And electricity made from renewable sources is going to be used to drive our cars, trains and eventually our aircraft and heat and cool our living and work environments.
Fossil fuels will not entirely disappear from our earth but they will be incredibly expensive to use. That is what is driving our switch to renewable energy. For the most part our politicians, our leaders, don’t consider the killing of our troops or violent storms, floods, droughts and submersion of lowlands to be a problem. Money is the only thing that talks and walks in our political system and ALL the bets are on renewable energy.
At the City of Coatesville City Council Meeting January 24, 2011
Ms. Johnson is the Co-Chair of the City of Coatesville Weed and Seed Committee
“In particular it’s been my pleasure to work with the Coatesville Weed and Seed Steering Committee.
You’re probably familiar with what used to be the “A Team” for Weed and Seed.
About two years ago we decided that we needed restructure ourselves in the wake of some financial difficulty related to that steering committee. And myself the District Attorney’s office as well as a lot of people who are sitting out there in the audience with us, sat down and redrafted our bylaws. And our goal in particular was to make changes that would much more functional efficient steering committee that could really accomplish some things through collaboration for the community. And I’ve empathized collaboration, because what Weed and Seed is, is a partnership of local, state, and social services. It’s a collaborative process that assists in weeding out crime as well as putting in the good things that help a community to improve.
We have a coordinator Allen Smith and I think you are all familiar with him as an employee of the City. And he helps to coordinate the activities that are ongoing with regard to the four subcommittees of Weed and Seed as well as bringing in the community.
And some of the people that I am about to introduce you to are people in this community who work very, very closely with Weed and Seed and who help to get the word out there about the good things that are going on, not just with regard to Weed and Seed but with regard the City and this entire community.
But first I want to tell you about the kind of people we set out to find to participate in our Weed and Seed Steering Committee. We have representatives from the local school district, city government; Interim City Manager Ted Reed serves on that Steering Committee, social and human services and that’s a big part of why I’m here as well as other groups that you are going to hear from; businesses, we have a business owner Tyrone Harley on our Steering Committee. Local politicians; Senator Rafferty has a staff member who serves on the steering committee as well as members of the community of which there are seven.
I want to tell you that State as well as the Federal Weed and Seed program empathizes, and I think this is really important, that we have people who are part of the community working with us.
Let’s not forget the District Attorney’s office as well as the Coatesville Police Department. They are an integral part of weeding out crime asas assisting in the Seeding.
I’m going to briefly introduce our members:
Jim Tice with the US Attorney’s Office
Ted Reed our Interim City Manager
Lt. Rita Shesco, City of Coatesville Police
Cynthia Vickers-Wilson, Chester County District Attorney Office, Deputy District Attorney
Angelo Romeinello Jr. Director of the Coatesville Area School District
Reverend Sherry Compton, Episcopal Church of Coatesville
Tyrone Hawley who is a business owner here in the city (Mr. T’s Auto Coatesville, PA)
Francis Sheehan CEO of the Brandywine Health Foundation
Pastor Randal Harris who is Pastor of the Tabernacle Baptist Church and he is my Vice Chair."
Bill Shaw Community Resident-Life Transforming Ministries Coatesville, PA
John Pawlowski
That’s our steering committee.
We also have sub-committees. And our sub-committees are really the gateway into the community and our way of bringing other community members into the community process.
We have a Community Policing Sub-committee and the Co-Chairperson of that is Officer Roger Ollis, Co-Chair John Pawlowski and Co-Chair Lorie Root (Guardian Angles)
We have the Law Enforcement Sub-Committee and the Chairperson there is Detective Gerald Pawling
The Probation Sub-Committee we have a vacancy there because of a change at the County. We have asked a member of the Chester County Department of Community Development to serve as our chair and they are about to appoint a new person.
We also have Prevention Incidents in Street Net and the Chairperson of that is Elder Alinda Eggleston."
“Carolyn E. Johnson-The executive director of Community Impact Legal Services Inc. in West Chester, a private, nonprofit program that provides free civil legal services in Bucks, Chester and Montgomery counties to low-income individuals and families. She also serves as president of the Coatesville Center for Community Health. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, she graduated from Fisk University in Nashville in 1982 and earned her law degree in 1986 at Howard University. She has been honored with a number of awards, including the March of Dimes 2001 Public Service Award, the Chester County Bar Foundation Award, Don’t Borrow Trouble Suburban Philadelphia Award and the United Way of Chester County Community Partner Award.”
“WEST CHESTER — Pre-trial discussion of a “stop-snitching” video in a Coatesville murder case was put off Friday when the defendant who wants the video suppressed could not appear in Common Pleas Court.”
“Bortner granted attorney Evan Kelly’s request, and set Feb. 11 as the date for arguments over whether the video, titled “The Sequel” and showing Woods and Coatesville crime figure Duron “Gotti” Peoples allegedly discussing having those who cooperated with police murdered, can be used at trial.”
During what might be called as the “Bloc of Four’s Reign of Terror” Jonas “Sonny” Suber was shot and killed in front of his family at his home on Walnut Street in Coatesville on a Saturday morning.
Nothing was written yet in the Daily Local News concerning the murder trial of Shamone “Kadoff” Woods that the “Stop Snitching” video his attorney wants suppressed was produced by Harvey “Bitsy” Legree the nephew of Richard Legree a long time Republican Area 14 Committee Chairman.
"The ethics commission rules, I won't say we ignored them, I'd just say more or less we weren't aware of them.’
West Brandywine does not retain a solicitor for its regular meetings, Obernier said, because officials there don't think it's worth the cost. ‘Most townships … pay $150 to $250 an hour to have a township solicitor sit in the meeting and guide the board through every little thing. We choose not to pay that and have never had a solicitor sit in a normal township meeting just simply not to pay the money."
In the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania local governments are legislative bodies and do make laws. In fact, in Pennsylvania, almost all laws concerning land use originate with local governments. However the laws created by local governments cannot contradict state and federal law. It’s that oath of allegiance to the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the Constitution of the United States of America to which local government officials swear allegiance. Without that oath of allegiance it’s wild west law. That’s one reason why most local governments have a municipal attorney at local government meetings.
I believe that “I didn’t know it is against the law” is not an effective defense in a criminal trial, but this was a hearing and the people of concern were not alleged to be criminals.
But then there is a concept attributed to Richard Legree: “If they don’t know it’s a law, the law ain’t broken.” Richard said that to me while waiting in the back of a courtroom for a trial to begin. He was referring to holding two elected offices at the same time.
When the stock market was thriving and real estate developers had high profits, much of those profits were invested in buying up farmland or obtaining rights of first refusal in Pennsylvania and anywhere that might be along the path of development. A very sizable portion of property owners in Pennsylvania, mostly along the eastern megatropolis path, are land speculators. With a few exceptions most of the farmland that you drive by in Pennsylvania is in some manner already in the hands of a real estate developer.
Our very strong property rights law in Pennsylvania protects those real estate speculators from legal intrusions by local government. In other words when a real estate speculator decides it’s time to develop that land the law is already stacked against the local government. And the Commonwealth and County government have very little say in land use issues in Pennsylvania.
A municipal attorney at local government meetings also has a practical side:
Unless a developer breaks a Commonwealth law local government officials can only stop a land development that is seen by them as unwanted by delaying and wearing out a developer until the developers funds dry up. But all developers are not created equal. If an extremely well funded multinational developer with its own legal department buys land in a municipality and a team of attorneys comes into a local government meeting like an invading army, it’s best to have a municipal attorney present.
For more information about development and local government see:
It’s just great that the RED FACED GOP screwed with the prosecution of Jarred Loughner by painting him as a sick puppy. According to the Republicans, the hate the government talk of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck had no influence on this man.
Right wing extremists will praise the Republican Party for their full court press proclaiming that Loughner’s actions came out of a confused mind and not a mind filled with the conspiracy theories of the extreme right
You would think that news of what appears to have been a major terrorist attack with shrapnel filled shaped IED would have spread like wildfire around the world. What I expected it to be the leading story on all news media early this morning just broke on tonight’s evening news.
As far as potentially violent right wing extremist organizations Washington State and Pennsylvania are similar. I see no reason why a terrorist attack such as was thwarted in Spokane, WA. could not happen in West Chester.
But the real bottom line question is, “Do Republicans want to end Democracy in the United States and begin the modified form of Monarchy that is called Plutocracy?”
“IF CORPORATIONS must be treated as "persons" for the purpose of campaign contributions - as the Supreme Court mandated last year in the infamous Citizens United decision - why shouldn't they also enjoy "personal privacy"?
This bizarre question is at the heart of a case scheduled to be heard by the Supreme Court on Wednesday. The case threatens to weaken an important tool used to hold government and corporations accountable.”
I believe that the “business plan” of the Conservative wing of Republican Party that controls the RNC is abolishing the “New Deal” in all of its forms; including as Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah points out Child Labor Laws. I think the purpose of all this is to return the United States to Karl Rove’s “Looking Glass” view of the “Gilded Age.
"A view opposing Karl Rove and the Conservative Republican's "Looking Glass" view of the "Gilded Age" is in the:
"Growth of the American Republic, the historians Morrison, Commager, and Leuchtenberg describe how in that era 'privilege controlled politics,' and “the purchase of votes, the corruption of election officials, the bribing of legislatures, the lobbying of special bills, and the flagrant disregard of laws threatened the very foundations of the country.”
Although they called themselves “Property Rights” advocates I believe that the real goal of the “Property Rights” movement was to abolish the “New Deal” and that advocating for “Property Rights” against Eminent Domain was a means to an end. I believe that Coatesville was just one of the victims of the “Property Rights” advocates march through local governments in the Conservative Republican “War against the New Deal”.
More about Mr. Epstein here:
“The regulatory takings movement appears to have its origins in the libertarian school of legal thought associated with the University of Chicago and epitomized by professor Richard Epstein. Epstein's 1985 book, Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain, provided the impetus for a regulatory takings legal and legislative strategy. It is useful to examine Epstein's writings, for although proponents of regulatory takings legislation invariably argue that the scope of such laws would be finite, Epstein openly asserts that his position on regulatory takings "invalidates much of the twentieth century legislation," including the National Labor Relations Act, minimum wage laws, civil rights legislation, virtually all government entitlement programs, and quite possibly Social Security. In fact, Epstein proposes to challenge the entire New Deal as "inconsistent with the principles of limited government and with the constitutional provisions designed to secure that end."
For instance, Epstein argues that minimum wage laws are ‘undoubted partial takings, with all the earmarks of class legislation, which requires their complete constitutional invalidation.’ Under regulatory takings doctrine, employers forced to pay a statutory minimum wage higher than wages set by free market forces suffer from a government takings of their property. ‘Collective bargaining,’ Epstein asserts, ‘is yet another system in which well-defined markets are displaced by complex common pool devices whose overall wealth effects are in all likelihood negative and whose disproportionate impact, especially on established firms, is enormous.’
…Also, if the state takings statutes now on the books are upheld by the courts, we may well find ourselves on the slippery slope toward the rollback of the New Deal advocated by Epstein. For, once regulatory takings doctrine is ruled constitutional, there is little to prevent its application beyond wetlands and wildlife protection to minimum wage laws, civil rights statutes, and other public interest legislation.”
“In a news conference at London's Frontline club, Swiss banker Rudolf Elmer gives what he says are details tax evasion by the rich and famous to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, before flying home to stand trial over his actions”
I believe that some of our local drug traffickers could be using offshore banking in the Caribbean.
This WikiLeaks could have “how to do it” information about hiding funds that could be “good to know” information useful to intelligence officers looking into drug trafficking, arms trafficking, extremist organizations and terrorist organizations.
“Mr. Elmer, who previously provided documents from his former employer to national tax authorities including the Internal Revenue Service in the United States, said he had turned to WikiLeaks to “educate society” about what he considers an unfair system that serves the rich and aids those who seek to launder money.”
“The man in the street needs to know how this system works,”'he said, referring to the offshore trusts that many “high net worth individuals” around the world use to evade taxes."
“City Council and also the Coatesville staff, it’s my pleasure, chief and staff, to be talking to you today. This item is informational:
I am from the grand state of Mississippi and I went a school called University of Mississippi and also known as Old Miss. On the second floor of the Student Union at Old Miss it says “You may graduate from the University of Mississippi but you do not graduate from Old Miss”.
And I say that because in many ways being “GRITS”; “GRITS”, that’s a Girl Raised In The South, one of the things we have is this fostering of where we are, this pride with who we are. And what happens is here in the State of Pennsylvania there is a lot of rich history.
And one of the rich histories that the Pennsylvania Management Council looks at is the Underground Railroad. Well we actually have that treasure here in Coatesville. What do I mean by that…About a year or so ago I was appointed to the (Coatesville) Historical Commission and what Carmen Boyd and I did was we went and we did a tour of Black Coatesville. Black Coatesville involved the area that’s known as the Fifth Ward and then we actually had some people and we concluded the tour at the Zachariah Walker Marker. Now in that we also included Ercildoun which had rich Underground Railroad and abolitionist activity. We also included a cemetery now that’s been marked for cleanup that’s in East Fallowfield and it’s of the “United States Colored Troop”.
I say all that to say this:
What I would like to do is and this is an informational item, I’m going to gather folks and we’re going to be looking at the Zachariah Walker story and it’s basically a remembrance revitalization plan.
This year will mark the 100th Anniversary of that Death. And what we will start to do as we look at the revitalization of Coatesville is that we have to do two things:
We have incorporate, of course the story of the steel mills, that is part of the story; but we have to look how the steel mills could have polarized Coatesville by way of class.
So it gave employment to a fellow like Zachariah Walker but it also created a class dynamic.
But in doing so what I would like to do in focusing or looking at this Zachariah Walker story, I would like to have two rationales and two objectives:
The first is to re-launch the Historical Commission. I think that would be a great activity and a great program to kind of re-launch the piece.
And then the second one, I started off by saying given in the University of Mississippi you may never graduate from Old Miss and also about being “GRITS-A Girls Raised In the South”. The second thing I would like to do is pick some of these different agendas that you have, the strategic plans that you have, flags and like sorts; is getting rid of the indifference. When people are allowed to incorporate and realize where they come from is very, very important.
I am concluding with this remark:
Booker T. Washington who started the school in Tuskegee Alabama is the author of the book “Up from Slavery”. One of the things that he talked about in his book was that “character, integrity, industry and intelligence really helps a person to basically mark where they are from.
I am a proud Mississippian who is now adopted this state. There is a lot of rich history in Coatesville. Unfortunately it’s just buried. It would just be great to have this story out and the Zachariah Walker story looking at, again, reconciliation. South Africa has a wonderful reconciliation program.
Federal tax reductions= state tax increases=local tax increases
Or Federal tax reductions=state services cuts=local services cuts
The bottom line is that local governments usually compromise on a lower tax increase and cutting their most expensive service; their police department.
All of this is happening during an economic depression, with the usual increase in crime that comes with an economic depression and just like in the early 1990s an increase in domestic terrorism. The differences between the early 1990s and what we have now is of degree. The depression is deeper and longer and the cuts to local police may be deeper.
The Oklahoma City bombing was the beginning of the end of the 1990 domestic terrorism run up; in part because of the law enforcement crack down on suspected domestic terrorists and in part because the economic depression was followed by prosperity.
In response to the Twin Towers attack we are aggressively pursuing any terrorist threat, foreign or domestic, at each level of government. Electronic surveillance within the United States is at military intelligence levels. And at least one local police force is getting this (The federal grant for it came through before the economy collapsed):
We are three years into the second largest economic collapse within since the begining of the Twentieth Century and the end is nowhere in sight. Our local police forces are continuously being cut. The attack in Tucson is so far the worst attack of many recent domestic terrorist attacks. Since Tucson there has been an increase in hate speech from the extreme right and a spike in weapons purchases.
Cutting police officers has a multiplier effect; at some level of police force reduction community policing shuts down, investigative policing shuts down and the police become a reactionary force that is unfamiliar with local persons and local issues. In other words local police can become an occupying army. The final outcome is a more violent society.
I know Joe and Tom and some of the Chester County prosecutors. They do a remarkable job. Put their names into a search engine and you will probably find something I wrote about them.
We all make mistakes, Tom included. I don’t think it’s possible to be 100% correct 100% of the time.
Back in the 80s and 90s I drove through Phoenixville often sometimes 3 or 4 days a week. I saw Phoenixville Downtown Manager Barry Cassidy move Phoenixville from a place with corner boys on all the major routes to a destination spot in Southeast Pennsylvania.
Barry moved the drug business off the streets by telling the corner boys they have two weeks to move on or they and their customers will be arrested. I know some people in Coatesville that won’t want Mr. Cassidy here for exactly that reason.
Barry knows how to get projects done. He checks to see if everything is moving ahead on schedule and if there is a snag somewhere he digs down to find the hold up and pushes it forward. In the process a contractor or supplier might dread a call from Mr. Cassidy but the project will stay on time.
If Phoenixville gets passenger rail service I think Barry could take most of the credit for laying the “roadbed”. And I don’t believe there is a better municipal grant writer in Pennsylvania.
My daughter lived in Phoenixville for a few years. It was nice to visit her and walk downtown for a dinner or some ice cream any day of the week. It was and especially pleasing experience because I knew the Phoenixville BC (Before Cassidy). In the Phoenixville BC days you could only buy booze or drugs downtown, dinner or ice cream meant driving to the mall.
I can't think of someone more uniquely suited to move Coatesville's Revitalization forward.
The train line that is being proposed by Barry Cassidy now has a name. The Green Line, which Cassidy hopes will connect Phoenixville to the Main Line (and ideally the R5 Septa Line), is now undergoing feasibility studies to see if it is a project worth pursuing.
At the time of the original posting there was not much interest. I think that has changed.
TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009
Below are two recordings from last nights Coatesville City Council Meeting.
Coatesville resident Keith Gargus addressed the Coatesville City Council at the Monday March 23, 2009 meeting during the “Citizen’s Comments” period.
Keith Gargus worked for a large corporation selling software to different levels of government mostly to Federal (FBI, ATF) and also State and Cities.
Below is my transcription of the comments of Keith Gargus. I sometimes make mistakes in transcription so listen along:
“It was common knowledge both on the government side and the sales side that three years software was an end-run against open bids and it was also a sucker play basically, usually unethical. I am not saying that happened here but no one has disproved it or explained how they came to the determination to pick this particular software and in particular, this particular deal.
Secondly:
It isn' free because I think there is a number, either $8,700.00 or $7,800.00 for training. So it’s not free. And that same thing training; no one talked about who is getting trained, but I suspect that the consultants are being trained. And what happens when you train a consultant, he becomes a friend, he’s the person you work with. In essence he becomes indispensable and he becomes an employee. So whether you like it or not or you had any intention you are going to have a hard time getting rid of the person in a year.
Next:
One of the really uncertain things is the fact that you are not you are not going to enter the cities finances and full system simultaneously. What that’s going to do is basically everything is going to be in this new system. If you decide you don’t like it or you decide to go back to the old system you’re not going to be able to.
There are a lot of things that you need to consider here before you go very much further. If this system is not what you want. The other thing is, that disturbed me is he (Mr. McKensie) admitted or I think, one of the city council people brought it up; that the statements looked exactly like the old system from three years ago that we abandoned. Well it likely is the same system and again I’d welcome the administration to refute what I am saying.
The last thing that I want to say is: I am very disturbed about the fact that our financial consultant is making a financial consultant’s wage, what ever that is, and no one will tell us. But I suspect that after talking to current software people it’s probably the equivalent to about three quarters of a year salary. So you have to make the determination that do you want this guy at this consultant fee indefinitely while maintaining our financial officer to stay home at $80,000 or do you want .. And I welcome someone to refute me."
Notice that Mr. Gargus did not use the word "refudiate" it hadn't been "invented" yet! Sorry, I couldn't help it.
I also attached a recording of The City of Coatesville’s Financial Consultant Donald McKensie. The City of Coatesville’s Financial Consultant is presenting February and January’s expense and quarterly budget and year to date budget. The other voice is that of Coatesville City Manager Harry G Walker. The city council members received a document to follow along. There were no questions asked.
The “Iron Pipeline” refers to the nearly unrestricted flow of firearms purchased in states with lax gun laws along the I-95 Corridor from Florida to Maine. The guns are used by criminals in states with stronger gun laws.
Pennsylvania, “The Keystone State” is also a traditional primary location for White Nationalist/racist extremist groups that sometimes indulge in terrorist activity.
I witnessed the look of raw panic and people calling out that, “the cops are here” and quick exits from the parking lot when State Troopers visited the flea market/auctions in northwest Montgomery County. Northwest Montgomery County is by the way an alleged major hot spot for White Nationalist/Skinhead and drug trafficking/drug growing and manufacturing, notwithstanding the “tony” suburban areas there. Some of the drugs sold to the children of parents with six figure incomes in Northwest Montgomery County wind up financing MontCo’s White Nationalist/Skinheads.
If you take a scenic drive on Rt-23 in Chester Counties northern tier you might see a few “Stars and Bars” Confederate Battle Flags flying in front yards. Stop at one of the flea market/auctions in Chester County and you might see a guy with a KKK baseball cap looking for recruits. The White Nationalist/Skinheads mostly look among down and out young white men for recruits. Maybe because they saw the election of a Black President as an opportunity to expand their base, the Keystone Skinheads changed their name to a more family friendly “Keystone United”.
A scenic drive in Southern Chester County will take you near to Cecil County, Maryland, where local KKK and Nazi groups are very active.
Over in Berks County; in Reading, PA the KKK famously had a headquarters building and decade long "Race and Reason" show on Berks Cable TV, and “White Forum" show on BCTV hosted by Longtime KKK leader Roy E. Frankhouser Jr.
Klansmen operating in Parkesburg, PA were arrested and later convicted:
"Residents may not have noticed them, but they were here when they set off pipe bombs, test-fired machine guns and taught bomb-making classes.
They blended right in
‘They look like us. They sound like us. They are us,’ said Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas P. Hogan Jr., assigned to coordinate investigations and prosecute cases with the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force.
Before international terrorists took the spotlight, there were men like Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, a domestic terrorist executed by lethal injection on June 11, 2001, for the attack that killed 168 people and wounded hundreds more
‘To effectively combat terrorism, whether international or domestic, what you need are human sources -- spies, informants,’ explained Hogan. ‘They need to penetrate into the terrorist organization on a long-term basis.’
Obtaining such inside information was critical in convicting David Wayne Hull -- a self-declared Imperial Wizard of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan who operated a "cell" in western Chester County -- of a number of weapons charges, witness tampering and a charge of instructing others how to use a pipe bomb in furtherance of a federal crime.”
Chester County is in the geographic center of extremist activity on the Atlantic Seaboard. A domestic terrorist event here is as likely here as in Arizona. The “Iron Pipeline” makes the instruments of death for a terrorist event readily available.
I can’t say if the City of Coatesville’s former City Solicitor Andrew Lehr was consulted concerning Mr. Matthew’s contract or Chief Canale’s contract.
One difference between Mr. Lehr’s working style and Coatesville City Solicitor John Carnes working style was to me, visually apparent. Nearly every instance when Mr. John Carnes is asked a question he takes the time to look among the 40 lbs. or so of legal documents he brings to every meeting. Understand that I’m only going by memory here; but as I remember it much of the time Mr. Andrew Lehr appeared to be winging it.
Not particularly concerning the items voted on; but I believe a lot of stuff, mostly about “cash flow” concerning the old Coatesville Administration and old Coatesville Council is brewing under the surface, kind of like a volcano.
The discussion and voting concerning Chief Canale’s pension plan are a part of the recording below.
FROM THE COATESVILLE CITY COUNCIL MEETING OF JANUARY 10, 2010
The Action Items in this recording are:
"2. Receive and Consider a Second Reading and Final Reading an Ordinance of the City of Coatesville, Chester County Pennsylvania, amending Chapter 35 of the Administrative Code, which is entitled “Personnel Policies,” to revise certain definitions contained therein, and to revise provisions of the code concerning job qualifications, transfer of employees, disciplinary actions and appeals, hours of work and benefits, and replacing all other Ordinances, or parts of Ordinances, in consistent therewith
3. Receive and Consider First Reading and Ordinance amending Chapter 84, “Building Contractors”, Licensing of” of the General Laws of the City of Coatesville, narrowing the application of a licensing fee to contractors engaged in Commercial Construction, providing for the registration of all contractors engaged in business within the City of Coatesville for the purpose of providing insurance certificates, defining the term registration of contractors, providing for the establishment of the application requirements and fees, and providing for penalties for violations.
4. Receive and Consider Resolution amending Coatesville Firefighters Pension Plan
5. Receive and Consider Resolution amending Police Pension Plan
6. Receive and Consider Police Pension Plan – Plan Revision Guide"
