10.31.17: Philadelphia – (Politics): Within a matter of minutes, Philadelphia City Councilman Curtis Jones, Jr. went from the second floor of City Hall, where he and his colleagues in City Council were engaged in a poverty simulator, to walking the littered street of a low-income neighborhood where homelessness and drug addiction is prevalent.
The challenge to pull participation from the poverty simulator and instead see hardship up-close and personal was made to members of City Council by two activists who’ve become infamous for their disruptive tactics.
Mr. Jones, a Democrat who chairs the Public Safety Committee, was the only lawmaker on Tuesday afternoon to leave City Hall with Mr. Asa Khalif and Mr. Isaac Gardner and travel North, without police escort, to Kensington and Allegheny Avenues. On the brief El train ride there, Mr. Jones acknowledged that neither event organizers nor participants ever proposed executing the poverty simulator in an impoverished neighborhood.
The section of the City Mr. Jones visited has the reputation of being blighted and unsafe. There, one needn’t look far to find a cash-strapped renter, unemployed residents, panhandlers, a bootlegger or individuals zombified by drug use.
Mr. Khalif and Mr. Gardner, trailed by a photographer and a reporter from the Associated Press, introduced Mr. Jones to the people they passed on the street. One of the residents the councilman met was a veteran named Mr. John O’Bannon who lived next door to an abandoned lot that resembled a small trash dump.
Mr. O’Bannon, a former Marine whose sole source of income is his G.I benefits and who pays $575 a month for a one-bedroom apartment, told the councilman of the peaceful homeless people who sleep across the street from him and how they’re routinely harassed by transit police.
Septa police drive their cars on the pavement, Mr. O’Bannon said.
As John and the councilman talked, a woman who shied away from the cameras approached us.
“Can you please come to Kensington and do something about this neighborhood,” she asked of the lawmaker. “Children can’t go to school without seeing people stick needles in their necks.”
Feet from where we dialogued was a convenience store. Inside it, the councilman noticed no green-leafy vegetables or healthy options for those who live nearby. While we toured the small bodega, a woman, who had heard the councilman was in the area, came inside and offered to take Mr. Jones to Lehigh Avenue and Emerald Street, an area nicknamed Emerald City, where there’s, according to the woman, “nothing but people sleeping outside.”
After his interactions with the people, Mr. Jones returned to the littered lot and took a deep sigh.
“People shouldn’t have to live like this,” he told me upon pledging to ensure the lot would be cleared.
For the folks living on and around Kensington and Allegheny Avenues, poverty isn’t a simulation, it’s real, the councilman said.
Thanks for reading! Until next time, I’m Flood the Drummer® and I’m Drumming for Justice!™
Author’s bio: Christopher “Flood the Drummer®” Norris is an award-winning journalist, online content producer and professional drummer currently serving as the CEO of Techbook Online, a Philadelphia-based news and event company, and the co-host of ‘Pushback,’ a social-justice podcast produced and distributed by Philadelphia Magazine and WURD Radio. Listen to the latest episode below and CLICK HERE to subscribe.
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