The Man Who Would Never Be

INMAYOR THE RACE FOR ’S BY TREY POPP TOP JOB, W’79

WAS DISMISSED AS THE CANDIDATE

WITHOUT A CONSTITUENCY. As career suicides go, Michael Nutter’s

HIS JOURNEY FROM LAST PLACE was a uniquely Philadelphian affair. On June 27, 2006, the four-term City TO LANDSLIDE VICTORY HAD THE Councilman walked into the City Hall MARKINGS OF A POLITICAL MIRACLE. chamber where he had spent the last NOW THE PUBLIC EXPECTS MORE. 15 years. Fresh from spearheading a widely praised ethics-reform bill and a citywide smoking ban, the reform- minded Democrat was higher on the legislative hill than he’d ever been. Even for a man whose hands had never quite touched the levers of the city’s political machine, the view was now one of virtually unlimited job security. Then he spoke a dozen words. “I love this place,” he said, “but it is time for me to leave.”

32 JAN | FEB 2008 THE GAZETTE PHOTOGRAPHY BY CANDACE DICARLO On theTHE move: PENNSYLVANIA Nutter andGAZETTE aides JAN outside | FEB 2008 City 33Hall. The announcement shocked many of by tapping into such deep hopes that “What happens at the Prep is that it’s the politicians and reporters in atten- by the time he reached the general elec- almost like neighborhoods,” says Jerry dance. Resignations have their place in tion after walloping the primary, the Taylor, who still teaches history there the city’s politics—former Councilman groundswell beneath him produced the and remembers Nutter fondly. “The kids Rick Mariano had just submitted one city’s largest margin of victory in more from Jersey hang together, the kids from ahead of a 6½ year jail sentence for than 75 years. It’s the story of the North Philly hang together, the South selling his office to pay off credit-card mayor Philadelphia never thought it Philly kids hang together, and then they debt—but they are typically preceded would get. mix according to circumstances. I don’t by disgrace. Nutter was so clean he think there was a lot of racial tension in practically squeaked. Forget about cor- the school, but there was an awful lot of ruption; this was a man who didn’t ichael Nutter grew up racial tension in the streets, and that car- smoke, drank no caffeine, and ate no in , ried over into the school. So the ability to meat. The only reason he would step but there’s something live in both worlds was sort of unusual.” down would be to run for another office, about the bespectacled Chris Hannum, one of Nutter’s old since city law prohibits elected offi- M50-year-old he has become that makes stickball pals who also attended the cials from seeking other posts. it hard to picture him as a kid. True, his Prep, and now practices internal medi- And as Nutter went on to say, that’s slightly nasal voice can recall Kermit cine near Philadelphia, describes his exactly what he had in mind. He was the Frog, as the Daily News once put it. old classmate as someone who fit into quitting what he viewed as a dream job And there’s definitely something playful all molds by accepting none. in order to take a shot at the mayor’s about a new mayor-elect who uses his “He wasn’t rambunctious, he wasn’t office 10 months down the road. celebrity turn as a TV weatherman to tell the life of a party, he wasn’t the class A legislator at the top of his game, viewers, “Bottom line, it’s cold out there. clown,” Hannum says. “He wasn’t a nerd, unsullied and well liked—there are plenty Wear a coat.” But it’s a particular kind of he played football but he wasn’t a typical of cities where this move would have playfulness, a parental kind really, and jock—he sort of had qualities of all those made perfect sense. Philadelphia was that’s the vibe Nutter gives out most. different types. That’s why he could not one of them. The reasons were all too Even reminiscing about his days play- relate to so many types of people, obvious to the local punditocracy. Nutter ing stickball at 55th and Larchwood, the because he’s like an Everyman.” was too intellectual. He couldn’t raise picture he paints has a way of centering By his own reckoning Nutter “wasn’t a money. He didn’t have a natural constitu- on grown-ups. “You really kind of belonged stellar performer in high school,” but his ency. He was on the outside of the ulti- to every parent on the block,” he recalls. grades were solid enough to win him a mate insiders’ game. And most damn- “If anybody got in any trouble, I mean, scholarship to Penn in 1975. He was ini- ingly of all, the opinion-makers asserted they could discipline you or certainly tell tially interested in the business side of in so many words, he might be black, but you to stop doing it. They’d let your par- medicine, but the pre-med curriculum he wasn’t black enough. ents know. It was a real sense of commu- proved no match for life outside the class- Nutter’s announcement made him nity. And I loved it.” room. As a freshman Nutter kept his job at the first official candidate for mayor, It isn’t every Catholic boy who remem- the neighborhood drug store. After that he but the smart money stayed put behind bers communal discipline so fondly, started working at the Impulse Disco on four other men. “Only in Philadelphia,” but Nutter was well served by it. His North Broad Street, which probably shaped Nutter later quipped, “can you be the father was a plumber and salesman. his future more than the University did. first person in the race and already be His mother worked for the telephone When the topic turns to Penn, Nutter in fifth place.” company. Neither of them tolerated ducks for literary cover. “Mark Twain A week is a long time in politics, the “ghetto talk” in the house, as Michael’s once said, ‘Never let your schooling get saying goes, but for Nutter the next half sister Renee has said, and both had in the way of your education,” he quips. a year changed nothing. Three months high expectations of their children. “When I was in college I didn’t know before the Democratic primary, he was After attending grade school at that he had said that, but I certainly polling a scant 8 percent, the only one Transfiguration of Our Lord just a few was a follower of that philosophy.” of five candidates in single digits. One blocks from his house, Nutter won a There is no telling whether Twain would month later his pole position was no partial scholarship to St. Joseph’s Prep, have amended his advice if he’d lived to different. Finally, in April, he bested all a prestigious, predominantly white Jesuit hear the 1976 disco classic “(Shake, his previous marks—and vaulted into … high school in , famil- Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty”—the fourth place. iarly known as “the Prep.” By this time he only number-one song title in history There were 28 days left until the pri- was working at a drug store a block from to feature a word repeated four times— mary. The only political analysts inter- home, and coping with the gang wars but the Impulse was much more than a ested in Michael Nutter’s campaign afflicting the city in the early 1970s. The place to groove to KC and the Sunshine were the ones who specialize in autop- Prep was in some ways a world apart, but Band. It was ground zero of a new gen- sies. This is the story of the man who by most accounts Nutter had a knack for eration of black leaders whose members defied all those sages. It is the story of finding his comfort spot no matter where would help to shape Philadelphia politics someone who came from so far behind he happened to be. for the next 30 years.

34 JAN | FEB 2008 THE PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE “People expect that he won’t even need a city car to get to work—he’ll just be able to walk on water to get there.”

At the nightclub’s frequent political primary on his own account. Clinching campaign-finance law he had helped to fundraising events, Nutter met the play- the general election later that year, he push through as a councilman. Yet this ers. He had worked for Xerox after gradu- won the only job he would want until the worked to his advantage. The new, lower ating from Wharton, and then spent a mayor’s office beckoned 15 years later. fundraising caps forced Nutter’s oppo- spell as an investment banker, but he was nents to play on a flatter field. There was still searching. “I may have been either too With 28 days left until the 2007 primary, no stopping Knox from spending as much young or too stupid to have any fears,” he Philadelphia’s mayoral race was all but of his own money as he desired, but estab- says about those days. “I knew I would be sewn up. According to an April 17 opinion lishment favorites like Fattah and U.S. successful at something. It was really just poll, a multi-millionaire businessman Representative could no longer a matter of working hard to make sure I named enjoyed a nearly two- tap the city’s traditional power brokers as stayed focused.” When his elders at the to-one lead over his closest challenger, deeply as they could have in the past. Impulse pushed him under the wing of U.S. Representative GPU’86. After maintaining his self-discipline Councilman John Anderson, Nutter got a That margin was widely interpreted as a during that eternity in last place, Nutter taste of what that something might be. measure of the electorate’s fatigue with spent just about his whole nest egg in the Most Philadelphians remember Anderson the political establishment. Knox had last few weeks of the campaign, vying to as a closeted gay man who championed spent a year and a half as deputy mayor reclaim the reform mantle. In the climax liberal causes. Nutter remembers him as for management and productivity under of one TV ad, a giant illustrated hand a hero. “In 1982 he asked me to manage C’65 Hon’00—famously draw- ripped off the top of City Hall and shook his re-election campaign,” Nutter says. ing a salary of one dollar a year—but he out a dozen animated figures whose “Initially I said no, because I didn’t know had never held an elected office. dark-suited, screaming bodies bounced anything about politics … But he and Knox had pledged to spend up to $15 when they hit the ground. THROW OUT some others convinced me. So I did. And million of his own money to “buy City THE BUMS, said a title card. In another, on the night we won in May of ’83, I Hall back for the people of Philadelphia.” which got a huge response, Nutter’s decided that night that this is what I The final tally was closer to $8 million, daughter Olivia showed off her public wanted to do.” but that was enough to give him a virtual middle school—underlining the candi- As it turned out, he would have to do monopoly of the airwaves early in the date’s personal stake in improving the it without his mentor. Shortly after race. He used it to outflank everyone on Philadelphia educational system. winning the primary election, Anderson the issue of reform—stripping the butter For Terry Gillen L’85, the campaign’s died at 41. But Nutter had set his mind right off of Nutter’s bread. political director, the outcome was sim- on City Council. Eight years later, on his There are two ways to tell the story of ple. “The national story of this race,” she second try, he defeated the incumbent what happened next. said after the primary, “is that campaign- in his district—and the city Democratic The first is all about strategy and tac- finance reform came to Philadelphia and party that had supported her—to win a tics. Nutter’s war chest was limited by a the good guy won.”

THE PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE JAN | FEB 2008 35 For months, Philadelphia’s homicide Great Expectations rate had been arguably the central issue know no safe depository of the throughout the city. A wide range of of the election. Nutter’s controversial pro- Penn professors participated in one way ultimate powers of society but posal, detailed in a policy paper heavily or another, and the Inquirer’s editorial “I the people themselves,” Thomas footnoted with academic references, was Jefferson famously wrote. “And if we think page used the project to drive coverage down an issues-oriented path. to introduce “stop, question, and frisk” them not enlightened enough to exercise tactics to the police handbook. control with a wholesome discretion, the The culminating event was a “Citizens Convention” in early December, at which A number of Penn faculty advocated remedy is not to take it from them, but to this strategy as a way to reduce the level inform their discretion by education.” mayor-elect Michael Nutter received the of gun-carrying in public [“Gazetteer,” For Harris Sokoloff, those words function citizens’ agenda and delivered a keynote Sept|Oct 2007], but it had generated plen- as a job description. The adjunct professor address. “There were more forums in the in the Graduate School of Education has most recent election cycle than in any ty of heat in the media. Opponents ques- spent a dozen years trying to bring citizen other mayoral race in the city’s history,” tioned its compatibility with constitu- voices into the halls of government, and he said in praise of the project. “Now the tional safeguards, particularly the prohi- Philadelphia’s 2006 mayoral election real work begins … There are 1.5 million bition on racial profiling. During the May served as the impetus for what may be the of you who are the shareholders of this 7 debate, Fattah, who is black, translated most ambitious project he’s worked on corporation who work hard every day to those criticisms into ad hominem terms, yet. Aptly titled “Great Expectations: give us your tax dollars, and you expect accusing Nutter of having “to remind Citizen Voices on Philadelphia’s Future,” it a return on your investment just like any himself that he’s an African American.” other investment you make.” is a joint effort by the Fels Institute’s “I’m still not exactly sure what that Project on Civil Engagement and The “One point about civic engagement isn’t just that we’re going to listen to means,” Nutter says now. “You know, Is he Philadelphia Inquirer’s editorial board to black enough? … Of course, you would never focus the new mayor’s attention on an what citizens say,” Sokoloff points out. “Once you hear what they have to say, hear that about a non-African American, or agenda created by the public. somebody who is white—Oh, he’s not white “With an open mayoral seat and a politi- you have to tell them what you did with enough. What does that mean?” cal free-for-all looming,” says the Inquirer’s it. And then you have to give them an For many Philadelphians, long accus- Chris Satullo, who led the project along opportunity to say, ‘Oh, we like what you with Sokoloff, “a lot of people in town were did,’ or ‘No, we’re not sure—can you tomed to the poison of racial politics, trying to think of ways that there could be modify it this way or that way?’” the most inspiring accomplishment of a good, clean, civil, issue-oriented race The project leaders hope that the pro- Nutter’s campaign was the way he tor- instead of a bad Philly political free-for-all cess will not end when Nutter takes office. pedoed this divisive rhetoric. Fattah’s with a lot of playing of the race card.” “What we hope to refine and extend,” remark was stunning in its blatancy, but Supported by the Lenfest Foundation, says Satullo, “is that you’ve got a great he was just saying aloud what many had which agreed to underwrite the project’s research university with a lot of people articulated less directly. Nutter faced major public events, the University was who know a tremendous amount about another variant when the Inquirer’s able to team up with the newspaper to urban issues, and we try to use them to editorial board asked him to respond to inform our reporting.” create what Satullo calls a “12-step plan what it called a general sense that he The partnership is just as strong in the to cure Philadelphia of its addiction to was “something of an elitist” and “not negative politics.” opposite direction, says Sokoloff. “The Inquirer is crucial because it gives a mega- a man of the people.” Starting well before the mayoral prima- In the sound file the newspaper post- ries last spring, Great Expectations went phone to the citizen voice. And it’s a mega- phone that politicians tend to listen to.” ed online, you can hear the exasperation out into the neighborhoods to conduct mount in the candidate’s voice. “I am citizen forums. During the general elec- “Leadership is strongest,” he adds, probably, from an income standpoint, tion campaign, the candidates attended “when it has the active voice of the gov- potluck dinners in various homes erned behind what it does.”—T.P. either last or next-to-last in terms of financial resources,” Nutter says. “I don’t know what elitist means, to be honest But that wasn’t all there was to it. There As one of two white candidates, Knox with you. I mean, I could have come in is a devil that comes out for city-wide may have benefited from the presence today with my jeans on—maybe halfway races in Philadelphia, and past victo- of three African Americans in the con- down my behind—and my hat on back- ries have often hinged on which candi- test. As 28 days left turned into 14, how- wards. Now if that makes you more date makes the best deal with it. “For ever, Nutter’s TV blitz—and attacks on down—” he cuts himself off. “I mean, better or worse, these mayoral cam- Knox’s reformist credentials by the this is a bunch of nonsense!” paigns do come down to racial politics,” other white candidate, Bob Brady—had Whether he was facing Fattah’s blunt an unaffiliated Democratic consultant siphoned off enough of the leader’s sup- stab or the subtler whisperings of the told The Philadelphia Inquirer the very port to make it a statistical dead heat. media, Nutter didn’t take the bait. He day Nutter announced his candidacy. Whatever the case, all the candidates liked to tell people that he was who he “The white candidates benefit with had so far followed a pledge to avoid was and he was comfortable with it. That multiple black candidates in the race, race-based appeals. That ended during a he wasn’t ashamed to speak a “relatively and Michael’s move guarantees that.” debate one week before the primary. understandable version of the king’s

36 JAN | FEB 2008 THE PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE English,” or to have come from a family To be in Philadelphia in the days after tory party, Chris Hannum felt over- that valued educational achievement. He Nutter’s victory was to feel a palpable whelmed by the diversity of the revelers. hadn’t clothed himself in a stereotypi- sense of optimism about what it meant. “It was a potpourri of different types cally “authentic” racial identity at St. Outgoing mayor John Street had been a of people, and about every aspect of Joseph’s Prep or at Penn, and he wasn’t lame duck ever since a federal investiga- Philadelphia was represented in that room going to shift shape for a political race. tion of his office uncovered the biggest somewhere: business, the collegiate com- “I think when people try to label him, corruption scandal in Philadelphia in 25 munity, the urban grassroots, labor, you he bristles—and rightly so,” Gillen says. years. (Ultimately Street was not charged, name it,” Hannum said a month later. “He “He doesn’t want to be labeled and he’s but his city treasurer went to jail. The feds’ had some support from all the different not going to let people define him.” broader case was crippled when alleged groups in the city, and it was enough to Neither did he accept the conventional ringleader Ron White, a Street ally and put him over the top. It was amazing. wisdom that the only way to win a city- fundraiser, died before trial.) Being in that room, you just felt like a new wide office was to put yourself in the Furthermore, Street had been almost era in Philadelphia politics was unfolding pocket of the union vote, the black vote, gleeful in his embrace of racial politics. right in front of your eyes.” or any other demographic piece of the “The brothers and sisters are running the Nutter’s opponent in the general election, pie. “I considered my base to be people city,” he had crowed early in his tenure, Republican Al Taubenberger, evidently felt who wanted change,” Nutter says. “People firing up his own base. “Oh, yes. The broth- the same way. Amid a series of debates who were tired of politics as usual and ers and sisters are running this city. that were almost parodic in their civili- business as usual in Philadelphia. That’s a Running it! Don’t you let nobody fool you, ty, a reporter asked Taubenberger what harder base to identity, versus a geographic we are in charge of the City of Brotherly was motivating him in the race. “I’m area or a racial constituency or class con- Love. We are in charge! We are in charge!” running to make Michael Nutter a bet- stituency or a specific area of the city. But Nutter’s supporters were harder to ter mayor,” he said. my base was people who wanted change.” pigeonhole. Looking around the Warwick Of course, local government is rarely a Mark Alan Hughes, a senior fellow in Hotel during the campaign’s primary vic- staging ground for ideological warfare Penn’s Robert A. Fox Leadership Program to begin with. “Pragmatism is everything,” and a columnist for the Daily News, Kettl says. “No matter whether you’re a took a leave of absence from the opin- liberal or a conservative, if the garbage ion pages to get a worm’s-eye view of Two More Penn doesn’t get picked up and the streets Nutter as a campaign volunteer. don’t get plowed, it doesn’t matter what “What I loved watching happen during Faces in City Hall point of view you come from. People the course of the primary election cam- After winning the mayorship, Michael care about results.” paign is the way Nutter was able to take Nutter named former Penn classmate Winning in the fashion that he did, something that many people in the chatter- Clarence A. Armbrister C’79 as his Nutter now faces extremely high expec- ing classes in Philadelphia had character- chief of staff. Armbrister has in the tations to deliver them. “He’s coming in ized as his liability—the fact that he’s well- past served as city treasurer and with a tremendous amount of good feel- educated, and well-spoken, and thoughtful, managing director of the Philadelphia ing surrounding him,” says Kettl. That’s and policy-wonkish, and endlessly fasci- School District. He will leave his post better than acrimony, he adds, but it nated with some of the details of governing as Temple University’s chief operating does have a downside. “People expect and so on,” Hughes says, “and demonstrate officer to take the job in City Hall. that he won’t even need a city car to get that, you know what—Philadelphians like “I was a little surprised when I got to work—he’ll just be able to walk on smarts too. That in fact Philadelphians the call,” Armbrister told The water to get there.” process those very qualities not as liabili- Philadelphia Inquirer. After all, he had ties but as assets. And that they’re not supported Chaka Fattah in the primary. alienated by somebody who speaks in com- But Armbrister added that he was the new mayor does have any plete paragraphs, that they’re not turned impressed by Nutter’s approach. “He miracles up his sleeve, he can’t off by somebody who does his homework told me he was looking for the best afford to waste them on a fancy people, regardless of anything else, If and shows up prepared for a forum, but in commute. On January 7 he inherits a fact they respect that.” and he made a very convincing case.” far tougher situation than most voters Whatever the appeal, it worked. “It was Meanwhile, Nutter tapped Penn appreciate. Electoral victory has inter- the kind of way you see some Kentucky President Amy Gutmann to co-chair rupted his plunge toward career suicide, Derby horses win, coming around the his transition team as the mayor’s but only with the thinnest of nets. Add corner pole with this incredible burst office changes hands in January. the buckling weight of high expecta- of speed that surprises everyone,” says “I look forward to doing everything I tions, and Nutter finds himself in a Don Kettl, director of the Fels Institute can to further the mayor-elect’s precarious position. for Government. What’s more, “He won agenda to control crime, improve On the surface, Philadelphia is the without a ton of bitterness in the pri- education and build our city’s econo- picture of good health. The recent comple- mary, which was surprising given how my, goals that are eminently worthy tion of the 58-story Comcast Center epito- contentious it was.” of every citizen’s support,” she said. mizes Center City’s continuing growth. On

THE PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE JAN | FEB 2008 37 the other side of the Schuylkill, construc- city’s retirement system is underfund- path. A month before the general elec- tion crews have become virtually ubiqui- ed by $3.9 billion. If Nutter can’t turn tion, Terry Gillen recalled the Nutter tous. Restaurant renaissance remains a that around, posterity will have harsh she first got to know back in the 1980s. common phrase on downtown lips. The words for his failure. She painted a picture of a man given to Street administration’s focus on periph- David L. Cohen L’81, who played a key deadpan humor and small crowds. “We eral neighborhoods has made many of role in averting the last financial catas- were in an organization at the time and them nicer places to be. trophe as Rendell’s chief of staff, sees he was the treasurer, and he would get Yet these improvements camouflage familiar terrain ahead for Nutter. “I think up and give these treasurer reports deep problems. Homicide has reached epi- Philadelphia is probably two years away that were hilarious. I don’t know if he demic proportions in the last several from a financial crisis that is every bit as knew anything about the budget of the years. Right before Nutter’s general-elec- severe as the one that the city had in organization, but he was very funny.” tion victory, three city cops were shot in 1991,” Cohen said in late November. Asked if Nutter was the kind of per- the space of four days. The public-school “That’s good news and it’s bad news. The son who could work a big room, Gillen system, which fell into a nine-figure defi- good news is that the crisis is two years paused for a moment. “He can work a cit in 2006, is failing too many of its stu- away. The bad news is that the sense of medium-sized room,” she replied. dents, and its bond rating is a notch above urgency that existed when Ed took office A month later, many people who have junk. The city’s tiny projected budget sur- is less obvious or less present today. It watched him closely were noticing a new plus for 2009 could easily be wiped out by was that sense of urgency that gave us kind of magnetism. “Over the course of “three snowstorms and a couple of bad the appropriate level of desperation and the campaign, I’ve seen him grow,” Cohen events,” Nutter recently told Philadelphia the public support to create some very said. “I’ve seen his humor, which has magazine. Meanwhile, there are fewer and difficult labor agreements.” always been on display one-on-one and in fewer residents to shoulder the financial “None of this is terribly sexy,” Stalberg small groups, come out as he addressed burden; the city has lost more than says, “but it’s facing every organization larger groups. He’s approachable. And I 100,000 taxpayers since 1990. in America. GM just managed to nego- think people like him.” The city’s core financial challenges tiate away a lot of their health-care and Mark Alan Hughes traces the change to didn’t get much attention during the pension costs, you know. In some ways a particular campaign event at the election. That’s going to make Nutter’s the city is not a heck of a lot different Convention Center. It was a highly orches- job harder. In addition to his crime plan, than that.” trated scene that didn’t presage any rhe- Nutter campaigned on issues like mak- Philadelphians have a penchant for torical fireworks, but Nutter seemed to ing Philadelphia America’s “greenest putting flamboyant, larger-than-life char- feed off the crowd in a completely new city,” offering businesses incentives to acters into the mayor’s office to govern way. “He delivered as good a political hire ex-criminal offenders, reducing the almost by the power of id alone. Ed speech as I’ve ever heard—live or even wage and business-privilege taxes, and Rendell thought nothing of christening a recorded,” Hughes recalls. “The cadence, extending health-insurance coverage. new city pool with a cannonball splash, and the power of the imagery—but also Those big ideas are what all the high or mugging his way into the final cut of more than that, it was the delivery. There expectations have centered around. Jonathan Demme’s Philadelphia. In the were no notes. It was all new language Money concerns have the potential to 1960s, famously left a black- that I had never heard before, and deliv- trip up each of them. tie affair with a billy club tucked into his ered with this personality and charisma Philadelphia is not yet in a state of cummerbund to break up a riot. that just electrified the room. I mean, I collapse, but paradoxically that may It’s hard to imagine Nutter fitting asked him about it afterwards, because it weaken Nutter’s hand as an executive. either mold. Yet it is possible that by was as if he’d been transported.” “When Ed Rendell took office it was electing a vegetarian intellectual who In a way, that’s exactly what has hap- essentially bankrupt,” observes Zack once named Governing magazine as pened. The story is only partly that of a City Stalberg, director of the good-govern- his favorite read, Philadelphia voters Councilman surprising everyone by becom- ment group Committee of Seventy. have found just the man to take the ing mayor. It is also about how, in becom- “That turned out to be a great advan- city’s unsexy problems seriously. ing mayor, Nutter has discovered within tage for Rendell, because everyone Be that as it may, Nutter spent his himself an expansive political persona that understood—all the taxpayers and the two months as mayor-elect virtually wasn’t apparent when he set out. unions understood—that the city was daring them to want more. “I like high Of course, he puts it another way entirely. on the brink of bankruptcy. And it expectations,” he said in November. “I “Every now and then,” Philadelphia’s new meant that he had a lot of support and think there is virtually nothing you can mayor said after his victory, “the voters just there was a lot of flexibility.” do with low expectations. And the prob- kind of figure out what they want. Not what Nutter will soon have to renegotiate lem in the city is that expectations the political pundits want. Not what the the city’s contracts with its municipal have been so low, if not invisible, that political chattering class thinks is the con- unions. If he can’t persuade them that it’s hard to get anything done.” ventional wisdom or anything else. disaster may lie around the corner, As his first day in office approached, “And I think what’s happened here is they are unlikely to willingly sacrifice the mayor-elect’s confidence seemed to that the public has actually surprised as much as Rendell got them to do. The be turning his personality down a new itself.”◆

38 JAN | FEB 2008 THE PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE