"PENNDOT plans to have the train station open 2015" Next Coatesville RDA meeting June 1st

RDA Chairperson Joseph DiSciullo, “If you remember we added one item to this meeting and that would be the “letter of cooperation that we are going to issue to PENNDOT for the train station project. Basically what I’d like to get is approval of the letter so I can sign it.”

RDA Solicitor Mr. Mancini, “Well basically you would be passing a resolution to endorse a letter of cooperation amongst the city, the RDA and the County to amend some issues.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Is everybody OK with giving me the authority to sign that once that letter is completed and reviewed by our solicitor.

Mr. Matt Baker, “We need a motion… I’ll make a motion for you to sign.

Mr. DiSciullo, “Thank you Matt. Could I get a second? Thank you Jack. All those in favor; Aye?  Any opposed?  

John, you get a second chance at citizen’s comments, anyone with citizen’s comments?

Mr. Pawlowski, “I think I’ve said enough. I’ve said enough.”

“How are you doing? My name is Darren and they used to call me “Zeke” Howard, Another Zeke. Referring to the train station, the redevelopment of the train station and with the redevelopment of the train station that you have some kind of a plan that you are going to use how the train station redevelopment is going to be.

On the “Plan the Keystone Website” has a couple of options of what possibilities they would be. And has the Redevelopment Authority decided on what plan they are going to actually implement within the overall area of the train station itself?

Mr. Mancini,”I don’t believe that that’s been finalized. There are some clauses that have bounced around. Further input and consultation is probably necessary before a final decision is made.”

Mr. Howard. “The properties then just acquired from the city on Fleetwood Street are going to be incorporated into the plan itself.”

Mr. Mancini, “That’s the…plan.

Mr. Howard, “And any additional properties after that?”

Mr. Mancini, “Absolutely.”

Mr. Howard, “Do you have a time frame that you might get a report back on the final plan?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Darren, PENNDOT plans to have the train station open 2015.

Mr. Howard, “2015?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “When they’d like to have the train station open. I can tell you that they have recommended that we begin having monthly meetings because they are doing some environmental studies and so forth on the property up there. And they came down with a sketch plan, which is just that, that’s all it is. There are a lot of studies, environmental studies and so forth that of course will be generated that will affect that plan. And we’re hoping that by Fall we will have a better feel, that we’ll know exactly what the plan is.”

Mr. Howard, “Right, that’s my questions. Thank you very much for your time.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “You’re welcome. John?”

Mr. Pawlowski, “I said enough tonight.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Anyone else with citizen’s comments? Well, I’d like to thank everyone for coming tonight. Our next meeting is June 20^th.  Excuse me, We are going to have a special meeting June 1^st. So our next meeting will be June 1^st.

Mr. Pawlowski, “What time?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “7 O’clock. 

Koch Bros - It's the Evil Thing

"You know, we’re at the RDA and we’re looking at deals that are millions of dollars for the city. And nobody comes..City Council is arguing over a basketball ring somewhere and the room is full. You know it’s just, it’s sad that’s what it is"

At the City of Coatesville Redevelopment Authority Meeting May 16, 2011

RDA Volunteers.mp3

RDA VOLUNTEERS

RDA Chairman Joseph DiSciullo, “Next thing we have on our agenda are the RDA Volunteers of which I guess we have 4 and we already have Mr. Collins who turned in his volunteer agreement, thank you for that. So we’re waiting for Corley Pearce’s agreement, Dave (Collins) agreed to work on some projects for us.  And then the other 2 we have Mr. Pawlowski and Mr. Givler, have agreed to work on the boxes of files which Rob and I brought back from Pat O’Donnell’s office to inventory to inventory those items and such, so we know what’s there and so forth.

I will need to get you a volunteer agreement for both of you and then we can get you started with some of that and you fellows can start going through it. It's how many boxes Rob?"

Mr. Robert Barry, “There are 8 boxes.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “8, 8 boxes from Pat. There is a lot of information in there and if we can get an inventory so the solicitors can look at it and decide what we need to retain and what we might be able to shred. But that’s going to be their decision not ours.

Yes Sir John.”

Mr. John Pawlowski, “Mr. Chairman, do you think we can we take some comments on that now?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Certainly, I told you we were going to give you your turn John.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “Thank you; I got a call from Mr. DiSciullo a couple of weeks ago about basically for a review for ---material. That Pat O’Donnell who was our previous solicitor for this group had some files from RDA in his possession and I guess he returned them back to the city.

And Mr. DiSciullo called me at home and asked me if I would be willing to go through those boxes along with Mr. Givler and see what should maybe stay as a matter of record and what possibly could be expunged with a solicitor’s or somebody’s approval.

And Mr. Givler and I talked for about 3 or 4 minutes over the phone. Just to say; did you get a call? I said, yes I did.  No discussion of should we shouldn’t we help.

I would just simply like to make this suggestion; those 8 boxes that Mr. Barry has, I would say for the time being speaking for myself I have looked through that and I can’t speak for Mr. Givler but I would strongly, strongly recommend that not one sheet of paper be taken out of those boxes.

Here’s why; Going back, going back to, this is how fate, this is how fate has things… going back to the election City Council Election year of 2005, the Redevelopment Authority was not appreciated by a lot of people as a matter of fact it still isn’t. You can just look around the room and see the size of people here besides the newspaper reporter.

Back then Mr. Givler and I were part of the initial 5 people on the RDA and while we were working on the list we had $700 million of redevelopment coming into Coatesville. The question is, what happened since? How much do we have coming into Coatesville today? Not because of mismanagement, not because of lack of ability just circumstances.

And the reason I’m suggesting, the reason I’m suggesting not to take anything out of those boxes is there were times particularly during the campaign of the 2005 election where it was a very bad time in Coatesville. Particularly when the City Council was involved with building the golf course here in Coatesville the RDA had nothing to do with that. That was not an RDA function. It was a City Council function. Eminent domain was a factor and consequently there was a lot of hatred. And I do not use that word loosely I mean it in the way I’m saying it. There was a lot of hatred toward some council members not everyone but to a few. Basically against the few who favored the golf course and the eminent domain process.

Those people were even accused of taking pay to play money from developers for these projects. Consequently if that were the case, am I boring you guys with all this? Consequently I took that rather personally. I personally was never accused of pay to play. I’m not speaking for Mr. Givler. Just for myself. I was never accused of pay to play but the fact I supported the golf course and the eminent domain issue, I was kind of drawn into that because now I was part of it with some of the City Council people. Do you follow me? In other words If they were to use pay to play then John Pawlowski was through them also. Friends, friends.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “By association.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “Friends by association, guilty by association.”

This guy in Coatesville who was very, very vocal about all this, his name was Pat Sellers…Everything should be documented here sometimes minutes, recordings…As fate would have it, Pat produced a little flyer sent around town and I was hit in that pretty hard as being senile, not taking my medicine, blah, blah blah and other things, to the point where I said, this is wrong accuse me of what you want to but now you’re, you’re influencing my reputation, my family, and on and on and on.

See:
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 12, 2011

 Larry Pratt and Coatesville's Pat Sellers

I talked with a local lawyer about it. I showed him these things. ‘What can I do with this?’ He says, ‘John, I agree with you these things are terrible, blah, blah, blah; but I’m not going to help you, I’m not going to work with you. Walking out the door and he said, ‘By the way, please don’t tell anybody that you talked to me.

I talked with another lawyer that suggested recommended.

This is a long thing, this is why I am saying Mr. DiSciullo do not touch those papers don’t delete anything. You know what I mean? Even if Mr. Mancini is willing to come over and say, OK… let it in there. This is a long story.

I talked to another; I talked to attorney, my wife and I, in West Chester. They said yes we’ll take you case but a deposition will cost you a minimum of $8,000. That’s to return back my reputation. The problem is when we’re done with all this, you’re cost to us will be around $62,000. And we still may not get the results that you want. So we went and talked to a 3^rd attorney didn’t get too far there.

The reason I say this is all come back today by coincidence in today’s Daily Local News is a newspaper article by Pat Sellers. And the 3^rd Attorney I talked to Sam Stretton I have a copy of his letter to me, John these things are libelous yeah, blah, blah, blah well…Called me the other day on the phone, wants me to vote for him for district attorney. All tied in with today.

So what I’m saying is in 2005 we had a couple of city council people got elected because they said the RDA wasn’t moving fast enough and getting enough done. They wanted the city to move faster. But that election set the city back 6 years.

There’s a candidate running for this election right now who’s saying things aren’t moving fast enough in Coatesville, we got to speed it up.  It’s like déjà vu all over again.

So what I’m saying is as much progress has been made, I will not want anybody, I don’t want this board put itself in a position where somebody could say, ‘One sheet was taken out, I wonder what was on there? And if one was taken out, many others were taken out. Do you follow my point?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Yes John, and we discussed that and are very concerned about that. That’s why we discussed the idea of, if you gentlemen would be kind enough to get some imagery of what’s there we would let an attorney make that decision, so that it’s not you or us that destroyed anything… The reason that we want to get this is John, I’ll be honest with you. You know these guys here, it’s not cheap to pay them to go look through paper through these boxes and of course we’re on some issues that go back. The Flats, some of these other projects, Comfort Care; they’ve got to dig through those files and I don’t know what’s in the boxes. Rob doesn’t know what’s in the boxes. Rob and I went to West Chester, Pat said come this day, we just loaded it all up and we all loaded it up brought it back and they were all on the floor in his office.

And since then we still are trying to think about where we store them, shouldn’t we know what’s in there. And that’s where the thought came up that you and Paul were both around when a lot of these files were created. So you would know more accurately than anyone the proper way to describe them what they were involved with and so forth.

Yes, the utmost care needs to be taken if anything, if anything is destroyed it has to, they’re going to make the call (the attorneys). I don’t want to make it and I’m sure that neither of you gentlemen want to… John, you and I both know the way it is in this city, ‘You guys were trying to hide something , you guys were trying to hide something.’ And we don’t want to go there. We’re not going to open that box."

Mr. Pawlowski, “That’s exactly my point and Paul has what transpired. Once again I was accused of being senile but I can almost remember meeting, to meeting, to meeting things that did transpire.

And what you see here is a big attendance to what we had in our prior RDA meetings. We were talking about $700 million. And then we always had 3 people, incredible.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “John, Jack tells me one time, he says’, ‘You know, were at the RDA and we’re looking at deals that are millions of dollars for the city. And nobody comes. He said, City Council is arguing over a basketball ring somewhere and the room is full."

Mr. Pawlowski, “Or banners across Lincoln Highway.”

You know it’s just, it’s sad that’s what it is. And we just have to keep trying to moving forward and we’ve got, and we’re discussing right now that we’ve got 4 people that would like to help resolve some of this. This gentleman and this young lady that you’ve got to move some of this stuff forward.

And yet everybody wants to move very quickly. I love to push projects as fast as I can. But when we start dealing with public money, grant money and so forth. It does not move quickly. It’s a slow process. You know, you’re not building that house you’re building a house with somebody else’s money. Things you’re going to have to get approval for.

It takes time, it takes time and God knows it took 7 years to get this hotel. OK? Ten? Paul here said it’s going to be near 10 years.

Thank God it’s finally happened. You know, I remember sitting in Pat’s office and Mr. Pulver was in with his team and me with some…Paul, you’ve got to move some top soil, you’ve got to move some dirt. The people are ready to hang us all. You’ve got to move some dirt. The time is here and it’s gone, it’s gone, it’s gone…"

Mr. Pawlowski, “Mr. Chairman, I’m trying to make a point. A lot of these meetings too, I’m the only guy in the audience. That’s why lots of times when you asked about some comments you looked right at me, which I expected you to do.  But what I am saying is, please rethink what you, what you have done. I will help you and cooperate with you in any way I can. But just remember what the consequences can be.

Mr. DiSciullo, “Could the two of you stay for a minute so we can talk once the meetings over?”

Mr. Matt Baker, "There’s a concern John and Paul with this is this; does it not make sense for us to go through it first to go through everything before you even touch it. So you’re coming in on the second pass. You’re going, OK, we’ve got everything here.  You guys are going to get a hand off with a concern about a piece of paper or a document missing. If we, if a person someone from a security standpoint goes through it all documents it all and on the second pass you come through and say that’s the way, it looks fine or you’re missing something that takes you out of it. Do you understand that takes you out, in my opinion, takes you out of that, that culpability, it you will. Whereas if you go through it and something’s missing, to your point John, somebody’s going to come back at you."

Mr. DiSciullo, “I don’t see a problem with that.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “I’m not too concerned with someone coming back at me.”

Mr. Mancini, “I think what John’s saying is giving the impression that we destroyed some evidence.

Mr. Baker, “Right, from year to year. But then if you take…

Mr. Mancini, “What it comes down to is keep everything.”

Mr. Baker, “Well keep everything but what I’m saying is just one person put it all together and inventory everything. And then you guys take a second pass and then you safeguard it from even giving that idea in the first place.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Well that’s why I wanted these gentlemen to do the inventory because I think they are intimately familiar with a lot of those projects and can best describe them on inventory lists.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “I agree to help and we can start doing something and as we get into it we can report what we’ve done. I’m speaking for both of us right now. We  can report what we’ve done to see if we’re on the right track.

Mr. DiSciullo, “Hey, here’s a list for box 1.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “Well see, I wasn’t aware of that.”

Mr. DiSciullo, “No you guys can prepare a list and say well, box number 1 back here, here’s what’s in it. Then we’ll file it or whatever.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “Something comes back, if something comes back to John, I really don’t care. I’m a big boy, I can handle that. But I don’t want anything subsequently to come back to what the RDA has that they has that they don’t want… You understand?”

Mr. DiSciullo, “Understood John.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “Because this is such, well I’m going to go out on a limb, I’m not going to get misquoted and I wouldn’t care. In some respects this board is as important as or at times more important than Coatesville City Council. You have the city’s future in your hands right now, serious stuff. You can be a target.

I think I’ve talked enough.

Mr. DiSciullo, “Thank you John.”

Trust

Back when the millionaire lottery was on a Friday a man came into David Pilotti’s store, known as Nick’s News, in Coatesville and said, "I think this won something".

David thought it’s probably for a couple of bucks.

It came up $3.5 million.

The man said, “I live in a bad neighborhood, would you put this in you safe until Monday when I can go cash it in?”

That is the kind of man that David Pilotti was, his trustworthiness and loyalty were unassailable.

Volunteer Codes Committee Presentation– Allen Smith and Damalier Molina

Volunteer Codes Committee Presentation– Allen Smith and Damalier Molina

At the City of Coatesville City Council Meeting Monday, May 23, 2011

Mr. Molina,

“Some time ago we started a Code Volunteer’s Program which basically galvanized the people who were actively addressing some of the issues throughout the community. And one of the topics that the Codes Volunteer’s have always acted on and prior members before was addressing the issue of graffiti… Part of the concept that is presented tonight evolved discussions that Mr. Pawlowski had presented about a year and a half ago and seems to resurface through all these discussions and we were looking for ways of addressing in a cohesive way the issue of graffiti that would be more friendlier and rather than resorting to victimizing the victims, citing them for not removing them from the property we came up with a pilot program so we could see how successful we could be with it.

Essentially what we do is; the volunteers will of course go out and resurface, repaint the surface of buildings that have been graffitied and they will be helpful in maintaining a list of those buildings that have been painted at least once…

If the building later on is graffitied again those individuals the property owners will have to pay a fee for service. That will pay a sum to the volunteers program to cover the cost of paint and expenses for people who are volunteering to basically use their services in painting the surfaces of these properties.

Failure to comply or get involved they may have the most current option of they doing some of the volunteer work and also beyond that we’re looking at the third option that is proceeding with the issues of a citations for not removing the items from the building.

Allen had put together a video demonstration of how the program would work and also has supplementary information at his disposal in case you have any questions.”

City of Coatesville Weed and Seed Director Allen Smith:

“Good evening council and leadership, I want to thank Mr. Rawlings for coming out to our Community Policing subcommittee clean up on Penrose Lane in the city on Saturday morning and also Don and Officer Ollis, John Pawlowski, all those who are here today I thank you for that. We want to again present the Volunteer Codes Committee suggesting fee for service process.

And basically we have 6 simple steps. The Codes Committee in addition to addressing the graffiti, we want to be an information delivery service. Our clean up committees are all sweat equity right now.

In our Weed and Seed we suggest that we can be more efficient by teaching the community by information delivery of the various violations of codes that will allow the seed to better apply.

So basically the step that we will deliver information to residents about graffiti and then also we can recruit members as we go through the city delivering information because I think that the residents of the city want this. This is part of the assessments that the Weed and Seed Revitalization Plan said that the city residents want in the city.

Then the committee can notify codes, notify the codes department of frequent violators so that codes can then charge of the fee toward the committee, subcommittee and others cleanup efforts and I think that we need to recognize that Mr. Wilkinson’s department might be a part of that clean up too.

The committee could also clean properties with graffiti cleanup groups suggesting what time to end kind of this repeat type thing where it’s all sweat equity and we’re continuing to do the same work over and over.

So the owner will be notified that the volunteer services will be a onetime offer and after that it will be a fee for service.

The 4^th one is that we will continue to track and list the graffiti allowing the Codes Committee to be the eyes and ears for multiple offenders and then we could report the second offender…”

City Council President Karl Marking, “So you define the offender by the victim of the graffiti?”

Mr. Smith, “Not the victim necessarily but individuals who we happened to have identified, who have kind of resisted cleaning it up; the ones who have been unresponsive to cleaning it up.”

Mr. Marking, “I’d just be cautious of your language. Calling someone who was victimized an offender doesn’t seem to be effective.”

Mr. Smith, “There is definitely as suggestion received and we shall change that, that’s for sure.

The 6^th one is whoever the codes process should take over as Mr. Molina said. We feel that this is the opportunity for the residents to kind of get involved. This is on the heels of the assessment we’ve already talked to the residents who said they would like to see these issues addressed.

More than the city or kind of us coming down on the victim it’s more about information dissemination an invitation for people to get involved and to be able to police themselves in terms of addressing the problem of graffiti…

Again, these are suggestions we’re looking for suggestions back like Mr. Marking just gave us.”

Mr. Marking, “Have you been keeping the stats on the places that you’ve cleaned up of late of which they’re either hit again or not hit again? I’m curious about if they’re constantly being retagged or… What’s been your experience with that?”

Mr. Smith, “Well, I don’t have that information of the Community Policing Subcommittee. I can get that to you… John, unless you want to open up? I’m afraid I have been put on the spot.”

John Pawlowski, “I can answer that question to comment. I couldn’t hear what it was.”

Mr. Marking, “I was just wondering, once you guys paint the graffiti, what’s the likelihood of it being retagged or left alone? Does it get hit then again immediately or does it get left alone? Do people respect the effort that you made to clean it up?”

Mr. Pawlowski, “OK if you allow me to comment on it, I don’t want to but in on, I don’t want to but in on his presentation.

If anybody in this room has not seen an improvement on how clean Coatesville looks today compared to a year and a half, two years ago, they have been walking around with blinders on their eyes.

Luckily, I will say this; we’ve cleaned off in the past few years hundreds of places that had graffiti, mostly on garage doors. And rarely has it come back, rarely. But we are experiencing an episode of that right now up in the northeast portion of Coatesville on the underpass where we painted it. There is a little character that appears every once in a while and we don’t know who’s doing it.

I talked with a couple of leaders in the neighborhood and said hey who’s capable of this kind nice artistic graffiti and I haven’t gotten a reply yet.

Right now as I speak, this isn’t part of Coatesville but the Keehn Company on Foundry Street. There is a big long grey fence. About a week and a half ago Officer Ollis and I cleaned off a lot of graffiti. Today it’s back and worse.

 

I called the Keehn Company today and said are you part of Coatesville or Caln Township? Caln Township. So I won’t get into that right here.

But by and large, by and large people who see us clean up the graffiti some are thankful but there’s some who see us coming with paint brushes and cans go out the front door and go take a ride…

We’re concentrating on gang related graffiti and I have hundreds of pictures that I’m willing to show anybody at any moment anytime of what we have done for the City of Coatesville.

And when I say we, I’m taking about a handful of dedicated people.”

Mr. Marking, “I didn’t want to side you on this presentation, I just wanted to know if it was having an impact and it sounds like from what you’re saying that it has.”

Mr. Pawlowski, “OK so it is. I’d like to comment on this thing too. Allen, mind if I but in on your presentation? What this program has done, if you would ride around some of the back alleys in Coatesville like we do, namely Modena Alley, Modena, OK; you will see piles of trash, like it’s just unbelievable that people are willing to live with this stuff in their yards or outside their fences and live like that. I can’t understand it.

However since we’ve started this program, we take pictures and I have pictures, we take pictures of everything. I pay a lot out of pocket to have all those pictures processed. They’re not all digital photos. Because I want Coatesville to look better than what it is. However, I’ve taken pictures of trash. I’ve emailed them along with a report to Mr. Molina. Within three days a lot of that trash is gone. If it wasn’t for this program, I don’t know what to say, I can’t speculate. I just congratulate those people. I take up more time than I should, I guess. I see that thing spinning there…This program is extremely valuable for the City of Coatesville.”

Mr. Smith, “And in an effort to keep it short I have just 4 slides. So again, these are all overtures. Again this is not to attack the victim but it is an effort to try and transfer from being a sweat equity only to a door knocking information delivering committee. We want to do that above all this.”

Mr. Carnes, “Mr. Smith, “I noticed in here that the Volunteer Codes Committee is as you identified a sweat equity program that’s out there trying to assist.”

Mr. Smith, “It’s a subcommittee.”

Mr. Carnes, “Subcommittee providing that free clean up and then there’s a sort of a suggestion in here that you move to being a arm of codes with a fee attached to it. Do you have an example where somebody analyzed that and came up with a legal authority for it and maybe moving that forward as an ordinance? Wouldn’t we have to do that?”

Mr. Molina, “No, no we do not, Mr. Carnes. Let me explain what the crux of the fee is. It’s not so much a fee for the committee. It’s a fee to cover the expenses of the volunteers.”

Mr. Carnes, “I understand that but do you have an example of that could be used…”

Mr. Molina, “No, no this is our idea, everybody’s idea, not just my idea.”

Mr. Marking, “We may have to move in that direction.”

Mr. Molina, “It’s a pilot program and we want to move in that direction.”

Mr. Smith, “And all i’s need to be dotted and t’s crossed, absolutely, absolutely. And thank you for bringing this up. We will definitely address this.

Any other questions about the process or concerns?...

On the half of the city leadership we want to thank the volunteers who have dedicated and decided to participate in this committee for the beautification of our city.

I want to end by saying Carol Wieland our program Weed and Seed Manager from the Community Capacity Development Office in Washington, D.C. remarked on her trip three years ago and she just gushed over how much cleaner our city is today. We haven’t arrived we have a long way to go. But we certainly are on the way.

Thank you so much. 

Mr. Simpson, “Thank you”   

Does the City of Coatesville have a TOP SECRET CLASSIFICATION?

It seems like some volunteer fire officers think there is a TOP SECRET CLASSIFICATION for select public documents.

Former Chief Johnson said this in today's  Daily Local News:

“I think whoever released it (to the Daily local News) did it under-handedly,' Johnson said. “I think it’s sad.”

Where did the notion that public documents are for the eyes of the City of Coatesville City Council ONLY come from?

The rift between a very small number of volunteer officers and paid firefighters has always been about volunteers officers refusing to train.

This comment on today’s DAILY LOCAL NEWS says it well:

  silly4143 wrote on May 25, 2011 7:42 AM:

 " Truthurts:

Please elaborate on Mr. Lentz's and Mr. Patton's not "squeeky" clean record.  If you are going to explain why the volunteers don't show up, please don't blame the career firefighters. Please at least admit to the real reason: they don't show up to training, because, as Paulukinas put it, they don't feel that they should have to. How somebody expects to do a good job (in any industry) without training is beyond me. And Paulukinas claims that his experience fighting fires is training enough-- well that was clearly demonstrated at Millview, wasn't it?? 

You say, "I can guarantee Lentz will run into the same problem kevin had because Everyone wants to play chief and nobody wants to play Indian." Well, that is exactly the issue. The volunteers don't want to listen to authority. 

As for Patton and Lentz not listening to officers... As soon as Lentz arrived onscene at Millview, he stated that a defensive approach should be taken. The officers ignored his suggestion and the rest is history. 7 firefighters were injured and luckily none killed, because the volunteer officers had too much pride to listen to Mr. Lentz (who obviously knew what he was talking about). 

 MORE AT:

 Former Chief Johnson speaks on resignation

Published: Wednesday, May 25, 2011 

And, as I have said before, how can the West End Fire Company run an "Old Coatesville WHITES ONLY" bar and continue to receive Federal funds? The West End Fire Company has the appearance of a social drinking club masquerading as a fire station. The West End Company has a reputation as "Old Coatesville". Blacks are allegedly not even wanted at fund raisers for the West End company.

Can someone with a criminal record run for office? Very good question!

That question appeared a comment to my post:

"MONDAY, MAY 16, 2011

Two of the candidates for Coatesville City Council have significant criminal records."

The answer turned out long:

The simple answer is yes.

A criminal record does not automatically disqualify you from office. Only a felony conviction can disqualify a person from office.

Any number of misdemeanor convictions does not disqualify a person from office.

No matter how far back that felony is it disqualifies the person from office.

NONE OF THE COATESVILLE CANDIDATES IN THIS ELECTION HAVE A FELONY CONVICTION.

It's important to note that one or two convictions for Driving Under the Influence is a misdemeanor but if that person is convicted a third time (within I believe a 10 year period) for DUI that third conviction is a felony and that person then is then not qualified to hold office.

The answer to "Can someone with a criminal record run for office?" is incomplete without looking at how a candidate gets on the ballot.

"First day to circulate and file nomination petitions February 15" 

"Last day to circulate and file nomination petitions March 8"

"First day to circulate and file nomination papers March 9" 

"Last day for withdrawal by candidates who filed nomination petitions March 23" 

FROM:Important Dates for 2011

That last date March 23, 2011 was not just the last date for the withdraw of a candidate it's also the last day to have someone not appear on a ballot because he or she is not qualified in some manner to hold office.

If somehow you are sure, say about March 1, 2011, that a person is running for office and you are sure that person is not qualified for any reason for that office you can hire an attorney and have about 20 days to go to court to tell a judge about it.

But there is usually an air of secrecy about running for office. So, it will probably be a few days after March 9, 2011 or so when the petitions are officially in before you know who actually is running.

If someone has lived in the same place a long time you might be aware he or she may have a felony conviction. Remember that while a court case may begin with multiple felony offenses, plea bargains may reduce all the charges to misdemeanors. That means a recollection of a possible criminal offense that might disqualify a candidate won't do. You need hard facts provable in court and that means court records.

If the alleged felony conviction goes back less than 15 years and it's in Pennsylvania it's not hard to find criminal records in 7 or 8 working days.

The minimum residency requirement for running for local office is one year. So a candidate could have lived in another state. I believe that not every state has an on line criminal records check. So it might not be easy to get the court records of someone who has lived in another state. If someone has say, 2 AKAs (Patsy Ray has 2 AKAs) it’s more difficult to get the correct records. 

When you are looking into the past of a candidate from out of state or with a murky backround and since you only have about 7 or so working days to find information about a candidate, that means in addition to hiring an attorney you also need to hire a private detective.

In the run-up to the 2005 elections in Coatesville Pat Sellers, Ernie Campos, Bob Saucier and others threw up several candidates for Coatesville City Council to see which one of them stuck.  We went to Cloud, Freehry & Richter Detective Agency to check them out. One of those candidates did have a felony conviction but did not get anywhere in the election.

If by some chance no one invests into checking for a criminal record and March 24, 2011 comes around and the process of making up the ballots begins; felony conviction or not that person will be on the ballot.

If by some chance a person with a felony conviction wins an election and takes office it might take months of legal work to have them removed.

Kevin Johnson about the 2001 incident

OK everyone knows Coatesville Fire Chief Kevin Johnson fired a pistol at a police officer in 2001. There is one very important thing about this event, it's the only criminal charge  Kevin Johnson has and it occurred because he was distraught over a domestic dispute. 

From:

FIREFIGHTERCLOSECALLS.COM

 FIREFIGHTER BACKGROUND INVESTIGATIONS.... A "warning flag" From Coatesville, PA for ALL FD's

"Saturday, March 28, 2009 On Jan. 17, 2001, police responded to a domestic dispute involving a man in camouflage gear waving a semiautomatic pistol. As two officers approached the Caln Township residence, a shot was fired "in such a manner as to place individuals in danger," court records said.
Less than four years later, the person who shot the gun, Kevin Johnson, was hired as an assistant fire chief in Coatesville.
His hiring is an example of Coatesville's weakness in screening firefighting personnel, said Richard G. Poulson, the attorney for the city's 13 paid part-time firefighters and four full-time firefighters."

MORE AT:

http://www.firefighterclosecalls.com/news/fullstory/newsid/83314

Chester County Court of Common Pleas

Court Summary

Johnson, Kevin

Coatesville, PA 19320

COURT OF COMMON PLEAS OF CHESTER COUNTY

DOCKET

Docket Number: CP-15-CR-0000577-2001

Court Case

CRIMINAL DOCKET

Page 1 of 6

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

v.

Kevin Johnson

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/CPReport.aspx?docketNumber=CP-15-CR-0000577-2001

Nolle Prossed means, "please do not prosecute" or "to be unwilling to pursue".

Public Forum on the Phoenix Steel Site Remediation tomorrow!

Good presentation tomorrow night. Coatesville will be doing something similar very soon.

Two of the candidates for Coatesville City Council have significant criminal records.

None of the other candidates have anything but parking and speeding tickets.

Walter Benn

ACTIVE-DUI: Gen Imp/Inc of Driving Safely - 2nd Off

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/CPReport.aspx?docketNumber=CP-15-MD-0000525-2010

DUI: Highest Rate of Alcohol (BAC .16+) 1st Off

Driving Unregistered Vehicle

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/CPReport.aspx?docketNumber=CP-15-CR-0003380-2006

Operating a vehicle without a valid inspection

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-1-05&docketNumber=MJ-15105-TR-0002233-2009

Disorderly Conduct Hazardous/Physical Officer

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-1-03&docketNumber=MJ-15103-NT-0001825-2004

Democrat Walter Benn is running against Republican incumbent Ed Simpson in Coatesville's 1st Ward.

 

Carrie Arvilla Hunt

Driving unregistered vehicle

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-1-05&docketNumber=MJ-15105-TR-0003055-2009

Driving without license

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-3-07&docketNumber=MJ-15307-TR-0004062-2007

Driving unregistered vehicle

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-1-03&docketNumber=MJ-15103-TR-0003766-2003

Bad checks

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-4-02&docketNumber=MJ-15402-NT-0000482-1998

Harassment-Physically Strike Kick Etc

http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-15-1-01&docketNumber=MJ-15101-NT-0000450-1997

Democrat Carrie Arvilla "Villa" Hunt is running against Democratic incumbent Karen Jorgenson in Coatesville’s 3^rd Ward.  

Kite Flying Day postponed due to weather concerns.

"Good morning everyone,

Due to weather conditions and concern for safety of the children and participants, we will be postponing Kite Day until Saturday, May 28, 2011! I hope to see all of you there!

Thank you for all of your support for the City of Coatesville! 

Marie Hess"

Veldrome Group Bike Race presentation by volunteer Corley Pearse

This is part of the presentation the entire presentation is in the recording below.

RDA Presentation to propose RDA participation regarding planning & promotion of the Veldrome Group’s Bike Race by volunteer Corley Pearse

“The point is we really want to be overly prepared.  This is a great opportunity for a lot of people coming into the City… This is an opportunity to start to change the perception. We are going to be bringing people, we think, that maybe have never heard of Coatesville even before… We want to leave them with a good impression or maybe we want to come and say, ‘Hey, I had no idea that Coatesville was this much fun! Maybe I should come back next year.” And then they start to tell their friends and it builds on itself.

So we really want to emphasize the opportunity to gather in one City to bring all respective groups together and harmonize our plan to execute together.

For anyone who hasn’t seen the route of the bike race, this is the loop that is currently planned. We’re not going to go into detail about this tonight. But suffice to say this is a broad a wide space and we really have a lot of detail that are either in planning or we still need to address…

So I’m standing here before you and I’m saying, hey, we have an opportunity but we still have things that need to be addressed. So what do I propose?

We would like to create a central program framework where we coordinate all teams to work together and we are asking for a single point of contact from each work stream so that we can streamline communications. Not to be exclusive or anything to that effect but really we want to maximize the reach of the framework that we have.

And we also, given the fact that we have only… 8 weeks between now and the race we really need to streamline… so that we have a clear process to estimate any issues of key risk.  Right, so we want it to go off without a hitch and if we do have an issue or we do have something that we need to work through we’ll have that process to address it together…  And I can’t emphasize enough that we have more than enough work to go around.

And we want to look at this as an opportunity to set a baseline. Next year we want to build on that baseline, subsequent year’s etcetera.  This will be a great year to put all the bits and pieces in place, have an overall concept for a project plan for how we are going to do this every year.

So with that being said, here is the program framework that we are recommending. You can see in the upper right corner there are 5 key areas:

There’s staging

 Sponsorship

 Publicity

 Administration

 Overall plan

Those will be the 5 main work areas. And then you can see myself and Dave Collins would be requesting service from a central coordinating function.

So we would be requesting bringing, streamlining communications. There is a ton of work that each one of these buckets down here. But we would help set up bi-weekly, there would be bi-weekly meetings that we are proposing. We would help with minutes actions follow up…

We would like to ask Mr. Rollins to be the single point of contact for the City to help streamline communications. Besides myself and Dave we would also like to ask Matt Baker to be a single point of contact for the RDA. Greg Krajewski for the Rotary Club as well as Rich Roth from the Wright Commission….

So we really want to get out fast, get a line, organize a work stream, identify the key risks. So there some things, some big decisions that are still not been made or solidified and we’d like to first get together the high risk items and move those forward. So things that are standing in our way from a critical path perspective and then get an agreement on what that overall plan looks like in the work sessions…

Just recognizing that we need as many people as can help, we need sort of all hands on deck at least 2 times maybe 3 times before the race.  And that would be to do things like: walking around, making sure that we slog through all the details in terms of logistics; sprucing up the City making sure that we can make that great impression; building awareness; and that would be doing things with people out there in the City and we’re doing volunteer work, it’s beautiful weather and were doing something and people will say, “Hey, what’s going on?” and we’re building awareness that way too…

So we want to have our nuts and bolts locked down at least a couple of weeks before the race. As you all know, you know, the best plan, is the best plan but there’s going to be  lots of things, the weather, somebody changes sponsorship, so it will be better to have things locked down for 2 weeks to give us a little wiggle room…

So we have 3 actions that we would like to ask for your support:

It may be slightly obvious but I’ll say it anyway; we just want to re-empathies that you guys are supporting the race and that you’re behind it and there are no reservations about the race taking place.

We’d like to ask Mr. Rawlings to be the single contact point for the City.

We’d like you to agree to the proposed framework e.g. the central program management and coordination and ask for full collaboration from everyone.

And we’d also like to ask if you could please place an item on the agenda as sort of a standing item for the race so that we could give you a status, and provide full transparency in that respect.

So just from a next step perspective we would like to propose 2 to 3 meetings; one in person, ideally and one through a conference call. In my day job I program manage as well and so it may sound like a lot but really, but again, better be prepared than be behind, right? We’d like to be able to talk to you this week just to get everyone together and to be on the same page and really identify those top issues that are critical path items and leveraging Mr. Rawlings to bring us back if we need to come to you on another issue…

City Council President Karl Marking, “Well I think you can count on everybody’s enthusiasm,” Ms. Jones, “For sure!” Mr. Marking, “I think we’re excited about this.” Ms. Jorgenson, “We’re all looking forward to it, it’s great!”  

Are our local codes warrants and parking tickets piling up in boxes?

There are is a lot of concern in Coatesville about codes violations, slumlords, enforcing zoning, sign laws, animal control and other local regulation enforcement. A lot of people are concerned about illegal parking. I believe none of our codes, parking or any local regulations can be enforced.

 I wrote this on February 15, 2011:

 Unenforceable laws?

 Parking tickets and code violations are already ignored by a few connected people, but they mostly are paid.  Coatesville Police can’t handle extra duty serving warrants.  There are outstanding warrants in Coatesville for more serious crimes.  So are we stuck with unenforceable laws until we have a mechanism for municipalities to use State Constables? Does anybody know how to do it? 

County changes warrant collection system

 I believe Judge MacElree, consulting with no one, made a thoughtless decision that if not quickly rescinded could have disastrous consequences for the entire County. I wonder how the Republican Party will spin this one. 

POSTED BY JIM PITCHERELLA AT 3:27 PM 

 “In a one-page order dated Feb. 9, Chester County Court of Common Pleas President Judge James P. MacElree II said that beginning immediately; all such warrants would be issued by magisterial district judges only to the municipal police department from which the original violation allegedly occurred. Previously, those warrants were assigned to state constables for collection. The courts would also be restricted from posting the warrant on the county's Web Enforcement Bureau database.

 ‘The order came as a surprise to most of us,’ said Downingtown Police Chief

James McGowan. "Most of the chiefs are greatly concerned and have a lot of reservations."

See:

Warrant changes raise new questions 

Published: Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Our magisterial judges are issuing warrants for parking tickets and code violations. They then allegedly go and sit in a box.

Allegedly nothing at all has been done to change Judge MacElree’s order. It's technically possible for a local police officer to accompany a state constable to serve a warrant for unpaid parking tickets or local code violations but to my knowledge that has never occurred.  So Chester County’s Pennsylvania Magisterial Court District Judges decisions function in cases were Commonwealth Law was violated and in civil law cases. But at this moment when a warrant is issued in Chester County for the volition of local ordnance that warrant is NOT SERVED.

Since President Judge James P. MacElree’s surprise order on February 9, 2011 parking tickets and code violation warrants allegedly have been piling up in the offices of the Coatesville Police Department.  Something similar may be happening in every other municipality in Chester County.

When a warrant is served by a State Constable in Chester County the Chester County Courts collect a $15.00 fee. Allegedly parking and code violation warrants sit unserved over Chester County. Since February 9, 2011 those $15.00 fees that have not been collected because the warrants were never served have allegedly might have accumulated to over $100,000.

We once had a State Constable system in place in Chester County to serve warrants. Warrants for Commonwealth violations are being served by State Constables but warrants for local municipal violations are allegedly basically discarded. I would rather see those warrants piling up in boxes, our Chester County Courts loosing hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and local codes and parking violations not enforced than to have our local police removed from protecting citizens and made into chauffeurs accompanying constables to serve warrants.

Right now I believe that Chester County is officially a Laissez-faire slumlord and parking county. I believe the slumlords already know they can get away with almost any local violation. Federal Section 8 enforcement by the County might keep some properties from literally falling down.  I think putting quarters in parking meters anywhere in Chester County is at this moment purely voluntary. Your parking tickets warrants will sit in a box, most likely for at least 2 more years.

Judge MacElree is not up for retention until 2013 so we may be stuck with tons of unserved warrants. 

Maybe all of us should just get into the routine of voting no on retention of Judges.

I’m not even going to get into what Judge MacElree allegedly does to tiny little dogs.

UPDATE:

Well, just so people know what I’m referring to; I’ll get into the shooting a tiny little dog on top of his head thing a little bit:

The Daily Local (dailylocal.com), Serving Chester County, PA

Frontpage

Judge shoots neighbor’s pet

"NEWLIN -- Common Pleas Judge James P. MacElree II shot and killed a neighbor’s pet dog while it was on his land, apparently trying to keep the dog from attacking a goose which lives on the judge’s property.

 Thursday, February 1, 2001

By Michael P. Rellahan"

About the City of Coatesville Comprehensive Plan

We have a Zoning Ordnance but the City of Coatesville Zoning Ordinance is based in part on our Comprehensive Plan.
“All comprehensive plans are subject to the following four common criteria: 1) contain basic plan elements set forth in Section 301(a); 2) contain a plan for the reliable supply of water, considering current and future water resources availability; 3) be reviewed every 10 years, and 4) “…identify those areas where growth and development will occur so that a full range of public infrastructure, including sewer, water, highways, police and fire protection, public schools, parks open space and other services can be adequately planned and provided as needed to accommodate growth.”
From:
The Comprehensive Plan in Pennsylvania-Planning Series #3, pages 2 to 3:

The City of Coatesville’s Comprehensive Plan is up for its 10 year renewal.
The Comprehensive Plan is important because many of the ordinances enacted by the Coatesville City Council have their “teeth” in the Comprehensive Plan.

If our Comprehensive Plan is not renewed on time as required a property owner may be able to challenge our zoning ordinance on the grounds that the City of Coatesville does not have a Comprehensive Plan in effect.
See:

Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code

Article III – Comprehensive Plan

Section 303.  Legal Status of Comprehensive Plan Within the Jurisdiction that Adopted the Plan. 

(d)  Municipal zoning, subdivision and land development regulations and capital improvement programs shall generally implement the municipal and multimunicipal comprehensive plan or, where none exists, the municipal statement of community development objectives.

In Pennsylvania all land use with the exceptions of Federal and Commonwealth owned land is controlled at the local government level. All municipalities in Pennsylvania have to provide a space for every possible land use in that municipality. A Multimunicipal Comprehensive Plan allows for every possible land use in that Multimunicipal Comprehensive Planning Area. But if Coatesville were to enter a Multimunicipal Comprehensive Planning Area it must first have a Comprehensive Plan in effect.

St. Thomas, PA had no comprehensive plan. And a company wanted to build a quarry next to their public school.

NOW with David Brancaccio, Feb 18, 2005
“When residents of St. Thomas Township, Pennsylvania opposed a company’s plans to build a quarry in their small town, they did a uniquely American thing: they elected a town supervisor who shared their view. The ensuing battle, like many around the nation that are pitting communities against corporations, raises a question at the heart of American democracy: can corporate rights trump the will of the people? NOW goes inside the controversy in St. Thomas Township by looking at how Frank Stearn, the newly elected official, steered clear of issues relating to the quarry and examines the legal status claimed by the corporation that stopped him in his tracks. “I mean, clearly, it does not speak well to most people's understanding of how democracy works,” says Stearn.'
'BRANCACCIO: And here's where a quarry story becomes a story about democracy both in this township and across the nation.
With no zoning ordinance on the books to restrict a quarry, township supervisors told the members of FROST, they couldn't stop the project.
FRAN CALVERASE: They should've been looking at that as a quality of life issue for our people. And they wouldn't do it.
BRANCACCIO: Fran Calverase is a retired Army Lieutenant Colonel who now serves as FROST's president.
FRAN CALVERASE: Essentially their response was: 'Well there's really nothing that we can do."

A few land owners have an out-sized say in land use in Pennsylvania. 

They are the real estate speculators and businesses that have deep pockets. Those land owners can influence the Commonwealth Legislators through their lobbyists.

Municipalities have lobbying organizations also but overall the municipal law in Pennsylvania in regards to land use highly favors land owners. What I am getting at is that in dealing with land owners, mostly known as real estate developers, the laws are slanted toward the land owners and communities are on the short side of the law.

In most States in the USA land use is controlled at the county level. In Pennsylvania municipalities control land most use. There are over 2000 municipalities in Pennsylvania. School Districts, Parks, National and State Forests and other entities bring the total number of separate entities that control land use in Pennsylvania to nearly 4000. It’s easy for a land owner who is a large corporation to overwhelm a community with a half dozen or so attorneys or possibly its own law firm against the community represented by a part time municipal attorney.


With concern to land use it's very important for the City of Coatesville to have all of its legal ducks in a row.

Coatesville is a UNION TOWN

THE COALITION TO SAVE WORKERS

I am just learning about an organization called LAW ENFORCEMENT AGAINST PROHIBITION

For over a Century we have had a prohibition of the use of drugs made from weeds like poppies and marijuana that grow anywhere. The percentage of addicted people in the USA, about 1.3%, has remained the same for over a Century. I learned about Law Enforcement Against Prohibition from this article:

"Miller-McCuneApril 27, 2011
Fighting Drug War Creates Drug War
When the United States starts talking about illicit drugs, why does the word “war” always make its way into the conversation?
By Michael Scott Moore"

When you say “mobster” an image of “Tommy Guns” shooting from speeding black sedans appears. That image is from Hollywood but the emotional feeling that organized crime, the sophisticated business of international organized crime that we have today, began on the streets of the United States in the 1920s and 30s is also a fact. The Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution ban on Alcohol, better known as Prohibition, was in place from 1920 to 1933. Before 1920 we had criminal gangs, but they were isolated. Prohibition didn't alter the use of alcohol it just made it an enormously profitable commodity. Those criminal gangs expanded, proliferated, fought and died for those profits. There was some of that violence right here in Coatesville when an alleged "bootlegger" was shot on Harmony St. I believe the political corruption that grew roots in Chester County during Prohibition still exists today.

 At the end of World War II organized crime started to become the sophisticated international criminal organization and public corruption organization that it is today. International organized crime was the spawn of the Eighteenth Amendment. Prohibition of alcohol ended but the international criminal organizations remained in place and moved on to other commodities.

 I believe the roots of international organized crime developed here in the USA between 1920 and 1933. The fruits of organized crime have spread their seeds all over the world. The primary driving product of international organized crime is drugs that are illegal. President Nixon began the "War on Drugs" in 1971. We use more illegal drugs here in the USA than in any other country. The "War on Drugs" has made selling drugs and firearms incredibly profitable and drug use remains the same.  Profits and violence are increasing at exponential rates.

The Mexican Government has lost the "War on Drugs" and that Mexican Drug war will soon be in your neighborhood. I believe we got a taste of it in Coatesville in 2006 when we saw the SUR-13, Surenos, MS-13, Bloods and Crips graffiti all over Coatesville and shots were heard almost every day. (See; TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2010 About the arrest of a suspected Ninos Locos Mexican Street gang member).

Wealthy criminals and the corrupt public officials that make organized crime possible would not disappear if we did legalize all drugs but legalization of drugs would bankrupt nearly all of them. International organized crime began here; we should end it. Violence and illegal drug profits driven by drug use in the USA are destroying Mexico and we're next. It's time to try something different and that time is now.

 “Drug legalization is a solution to our drug and violence problem. It’s not a solution to our drug problem. Once we legalize drugs we need to buckle down on our drug problem.” 

Captain Peter Christ ret. Tonawanda, NY Vice Director:

 Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

Stanford “Neill” Franklin 

Maryland State Police Major (ret.), Narcotics Enforcement and Executive Director of LEAP

 “Two people permanently changed his steadfast belief in fighting the drug war: the Mayor of Baltimore, and Ed Toatley, one of the best undercover agents the State of Maryland had ever seen. Sometime in the mid nineties, Kurt Schmoke, the sitting mayor of Baltimore, declared on television that the drug war was not working. ‘We need to have a discussion about where we go from here,’ Neill recalls him saying, “because the drug war is not working.” Schmoke put forth the reasoning that fighting a war on drugs was not only violent, but also counterproductive to fighting the high rates of AIDS and Hepatitis C in the city.

I knew instantly, ‘ Neill says, ‘that he had said something profound, and that this deserved some looking into.’ This was the beginning of Neill’s new direction, and it started with researching and evaluating his own experiences in law enforcement. He compared the areas in his jurisdiction with the people and cases that came across his desk. ‘We worked in predominantly white areas, but most of our cases and lock ups were minorities. There were only a couple of cases in the outlying areas that involved whites.

 Not too long after Schmoke’s announcement, Neill's good friend, Corporal Ed Toatley, was killed in Washington, DC, while making a drug deal as an undercover agent. “When Ed was assassinated in October 2000, that is when I really made the turn. That’s when I decided to go public with my views. I even contacted my police commissioner at the time and warned him that I was going to start speaking out on this. I didn’t want him to be blindsided.”The institutionalized racism and cost of life to both civilians and police officers are just two of the many unintended consequences of our drug policy that keep Neill Franklin speaking for LEAP."

Lieutenant Jack A. Cole

Former New Jersey State Police Undercover Officer

Board Chair and Treasurer of LEAP
"This is Not a War on Drugs - it's a War on People."

  

 James Gierach 

 Secretary of LEAP

"Prohibition - not drugs - is at the hub of most U.S. crises worth talking about" 

“As an attorney representing a ‘zero-tolerance’ municipality, Jim once dutifully advised an applicant for street-sweeper that because he failed his drug test for marijuana he was ineligible for the job. However, Jim noted, the test results would not disqualify the applicant from running for President of the United States.”

See: 

SATURDAY, JANUARY 29, 2011

NATIONAL DISGRACE: We fully fund both sides of an all out war between Mexican drug cartels and the Mexican government

Also see:

O

Organized Crime: The World's Largest Social Network

January 31, 2011  |  12:00 pm  |  Wired February 2011