Have been some criticisms. What grade are you thinking . Id give him an a. When he came on board, i was at the inquirer at the time. I got a call from the publisher down there, don graham, who said to me, you are getting one of the finest cops in all of america. This guys unbelievable because he came from washington. And i think hes been that way. Hes obviously superbright, hes communityfocused. The statistics are great. Theres been issues, but you can look at anybodys eight years and find it. So i think he leaves a wonderful legacy, and i think theyre big shoes to fill Going Forward. And richard ross is what he suggested, deputy commissioner, who said could be a phenomenal top leader, as well. There have been some issues, though. Stop and frisk still very controversial and certainly people who believe the black lives Matter Movement say that he hasnt or his department hasnt hired enough black Police Officers. For example, that trend is not going the way they want. What would you say about the criticism . Well, it wasnt for a lack of trying. You know, he had made the comment that he had trouble finding black Police Officers because of the requirements that are in having a certain number of credits per year. But it wasnt for a lack of trying on his part. I think he struck the right balance between respect for the community and making sure that cops were acting appropriately and respect for police, and its hard in this day and age to do that. I really think an a is the right grade, and its a loss for the city. I concur. [ clears throat ] he was a reformer, and he fought corruption [clears throat] and he did a good job. He didnt win every case that he fought over. I also think he was right on a lot of the issues. He was right about stop and frisk. He was right telling the black lives matter people that they had to focus on more than the police, that there were larger issues of concern involving black lives, including the shortage of goodpaying jobs. Thats, i think, really at the root of the racial crisis in america. But there have been more policeinvolved shootings, and there was a federal study done by the Justice Department to try to fix that. Theyre implementing some of those changes but he brought in that study. You know, he requested that study, and, you know, thats leading to more reforms. Where do you see the future of the department at this point . Because after such a high, i mean, he was even lauded by president obama when he announced his retirement, and certainly the president had used him, of course, to do the task force on 21st Century Policing for the whole country after so many of the incidents in other cities. And by the way, philadelphia state calm after a summer of violence in many other places, in missouri and elsewhere. Well, i mean, all of us are reading the tea leaves, but theres only one teapot to consider, which would be jim kenney, the presumptive mayor most likely for philadelphia. He will decide who the next commissioner will be. Indication is that it will be most likely somebody from the department. Both jim kenney, as well as commissioner ramsey, have tipped the hat in favor of Rick Ross Richard ross. So from all indications, if he wants that job, looks like thats where hes gonna go. But i want to make a comment on the black lives Matter Movement, which is a young, spontaneous grass roots movement. It is disruptive by design. It is disruptive by design because its adherence are intent on making sure that they convey the disruption and outrage they feel in their own communities. The message is not supposed to go down easy. And from their standpoint, it makes us feel uncomfortable, but if it wasnt as disruptive, we as a nation will not be talking about these issues as we probably ought to, because there is institutional racism, there are issues about police brutality. For commissioner ramsey and philadelphia police, you know, they engage with community engagement. And as a result, if you notice, our relationship with the police force in philadelphia is a lot calmer compared to other cities, and its an example of what works when the police force engages with community and when theres trust. 60 plus of whites in philadelphia trust the Police Officers. In philly, 47 of africanamericans trust our department. Job well done. A. Much better than it was. All right, lets talk about the pennsylvania budget battle. Three months overdue. July 1 came and went. Were almost at november 1 here. Still no break of the impasse between Governor Wolf and the legislature. An interesting couple of ideas came out this week, and i wonder if these are just too simple to work. The state auditor general, eugene depasquale, says, look, if they can just compromise on marcellus shale tax and use that money to pay for education, get pension reform over to the side, do it a little later, separately, and then make state stores a little easier, boom, bang, bing three topics. Do it in a weekend at the governors mansion. Were done. All well and good, but thats not the deal the governor wants. The governor wants wholesale change of the way we tax in pennsylvania. He wants to turn pennsylvania into illinois or, god forbid, california. The Republican Legislature doesnt want that. And that would be a great deal. Theyd have the votes for that. But dave reed, the majority leader, went to the governor and said, i just dont have the votes for wholesale broadbased tax increases. Were gonna give you the chance to lobby the General Assembly over the next week. If you can get the votes, well run it. Governor spent that weekend making calls, including to some of my republican colleagues, and couldnt get one republican vote and had nine democrats peel off and wouldnt vote for that budget. And will they get more ds to peel off and maybe supercede him and he wont even matter on the budget . Theyll just pass it without him . Well, thats what theyre talking about now. They are now having talks without the governor, and the governor says, i will not cave. So its a problem. You know, republicans put up a bill to some stopgap funding to keep social services and education going. That was vetoed. So where do you go from here . Theres about a 600 million difference between where the two sides are out of 31 billion. So its about a 2 difference. One of the things that surprises me is this governor gets elected and you think hes gonna be pragmatic and common sense, and he had some good support coming in. But youre the governor and you have to figure out how to work with the legislature. And there was more this sense of as i say it, so it must be done. Thats not these guys got elected, too. He got elected statewide. They got elected from their districts. So you have to find, you know the kind of Emotional Intelligence is to sit down with the other side and say, how do we figure this out . And kicking the pension part of it down the road again is a huge mistake. Its a huge mistake. It does seem, though, compromise would be lets find the lowest tax on shale. Lets at least be that, okay, so youre not gonna lose to other states if you have some tax, but its on the low side. And the income taxes are high enough. Find a way to save money. And state senator Larry Farnese he said, look, can we get a 1. 8 billion compromise budget . Just give the schools and some of the social Services Agencies something. Theyre choking here. Numbers can always be compromised, but, you know, in principle, the governor ran on his shale tax, on his severance tax. Theres got to be a severance tax. And ive been saying the compromise is clear already. Everyone knows what its gonna be. Its gonna be a severance tax. Theres gonna be no income tax increase, theres no sales tax increase, some money for education. And the republicans have to win on something, and pensions are a great issue that will have longterm benefits for the commonwealth. And i think Public Opinion is turning against the governor. You hear a lot of people who say, i voted for this guy, but, as you say, hes not being very flexible here. And eventually we know theresg. Why not do it sooner rather than prolong the agony . And have more damage in the meantime. He needs to understand, you know, this is not a oneyear fight. He doesnt have to win everything this year. You know, the budget is a recurring thing. He can come back a second time and raise the issues again. And Philadelphia Schools among the entities not receiving all their state money, obviously, for this reason. They did get 25 million, at least much of the promise of it, from city council, and so thats helping in the interim. For today theyre okay. But they have some other problems, including the group that they outsourced to fill in substitute teachers with promised 80 ability to fill those classrooms with subs, delivering at less than 20 , sometimes 14 , meaning regular teachers who would be in there planning on their break now have to go teach. There is no planning time. They have to get some retirees out of retirement and promise them bigger paychecks than they would like to comfortably pay a substitute so that they have some teacher in the classroom. Its a bit of a mess. Even the superintendent, bill hite, said, this cannot go on, and he put the source for teachers company on notice. Whats the answer . This just seems like one of those simple things. Lets just get some people going. People need jobs. We need teachers. Youd think so. You start to come to the conclusion that the Philadelphia School district is just too big to be run by one board up there if they cant even do this kind of thing right, to get substitute teachers in the classroom. Its staggering. There are plenty of people teachers, qualified teachers looking for jobs. Why cant you plug them in . I dont understand. And the only conclusion i can come to is the School Districts just too big to govern centrally. Meantime, theres talk of eliminating the src. Weve been hearing rumblings of that for a while. And theres some other tempest in a teapot issues, if you will, about a couple of the members. Farah jimenez, a former member, longtime member of inside story, is on the board, and now theyre giving her a bit of a hard time, maybe legitimately, maybe not, because her husband is part of the Charter School legal system. His firm does represent charters, and shes been voting on charters. Is that fair . Thats the underlying thing i think thats going on. And thank god for the School Reform commission, frankly, because it was going horribly before. But the underlying thing is the issue of the Teachers Union and the teachers, i mean, and the students themselves. 1 3 of the parents approximately, maybe 25 , 30 , have opted out to go to a Charter School. Its because this is the only time their child has second grade or fifth grade or eighth, and theyre just not gonna wait till they reform the schools. And theres a power play behind the scenes, and i think obviously the substitute Teacher Program is not working out well. And bill hite said it. Bill hites doing a terrific job, the School Reform commission. The fact of the matter is, 1 3 of the people have abandoned the schools, so get real. Get real. The people are voting with their feet. And so meantime, the issue with the one member of the src is it fair or unfair . She, in fact, did not vote. She abstained 26 times. But shes part of the discussions, part of channeling some ideas, and people who dislike that are even asking the governor to remove her from the src cause they said she shouldnt even be in on the discussion. Well, thats not gonna happen. I think farah has bent over backwards to try and abstain where its appropriate. But its her job to Pay Attention to whats going on and to inform herself on all the issues that are before the board, even if she needs to abstain on the vote. So, i dont think this challenge to farah is going anywhere, but i do think the substitute teacher thing is a disaster. The School District was filling 60 of the vacancies on its own, before they brought in this private company, and the private company was just trying to cut costs and generate profits by taking a slice out of substitute pay, and as a result, if you pay them less, you get fewer people. I mean, its pretty simple. Im gonna say one thing about this group thats bringing up these, what i think are, defamatory charges against farah. Its a group that nobody knows how theyre funded. Theyre not a corporation, not registered with the state. What we do know about them they show up at src meetings to disrupt and to toe basically the educational establishment line, the Teacher Union line. And so they have an axe to grind with anybody who doesnt toe that agenda. Yeah, shes an independent voice, and thats what they dont like. Lets face it. Meantime, more porngate coming up. The Supreme Court specifically and the emails that lead to and from attorney general Kathleen Kane, whos in battle and has issues of her own, of course. Theres now word that there is yet another person who is being looked at on the Supreme Court. One Supreme Court justice already retired early because of the scandal. Is this, again, sort of a mess that all roads lead to our attorney general, whos fighting legal issues herself . Well, possibly. I mean, i think right now, theyre still waiting for more evidence, probable cause. And were talking about judge eakin. Whats next for that would be, you know, you need to have enough probable cause to bring formal charges against judge eakin. If that happens, then it goes to the court of judicial discipline. And if they decide that theres clear and convincing evidence, then, of course, they can impose sanctions or reprimand or a permanent removal of judge eakin. He then has the right to appeal, which goes to a special tribunal of seven who are comprised but these were 1,000 emails to his private yahoo account. Does that matter . But my larger point being, this is gonna be a long process, which is the process that judge eakin is afforded. But in between all of this is politics, which is people looking to shame another, or the Supreme Court, as it did with judge mccaffery, can come in and simply suspend while all this happened. But underlying all of this is the undercurrent in stench of politics, partisan politics. So, youre a legal attorney and also a professor. Do you think that because its a private account, that matters . Do you think that he should know just the smell of something . It didnt pass the smell test here . Well, i think whats disturbing is not so much the content of the emails, as this kind of intimate relationship between a sitting judge and prosecutors and attorneys that appear before him on a regular basis. That is sort of disconcerting. And fundamentally, we shouldnt be electing our judges, you know. I mean, the chief justice of the Supreme Court says judges call balls and strikes. You know, its like having the fans elect the empires. It doesnt make any sense. We need to go towards merit selection. Here in pennsylvania, all you have to do is look at delaware, which has merit selection, and the Business Environment that that creates, where businesses have confidence that their problems will be litigated properly and fairly without political influence. You want to bring jobs to pennsylvania. You want to bring business to pennsylvania. You create a judicial environment in which the Business Community has confidence, and thats what well do, and you dont do that by electing judges subject to a political process. Meantime, the sideshow to all of this with the emails is how they were released, when they were released by the attorney general, did she release them sort of to threaten people in small batches, or did she acquiesce and give you the whole group, which is not the case. She finally did release most of them now, but the judicial conduct board had to pursue charges against her and make her release them, if you will. Are you disheartened by the sideshow . In other words, is our whole judicial system between the Supreme Court issues with the emails, pornographic or otherwise, and her releasing them is the whole system broken here . No, you know what . I dont think it is. I do think appointing judges rather than elections would make a lot of sense particularly with terms of the Supreme Court. But you cant i dont think you have to be, you know, Sherlock Holmes to figure out that to suspect that some of this is tied to the attorney general, who got elected as the first democratic woman, and theres a certain sense of optimism. Frankly, im a republican, but isnt this great and has turned out to be at an emotional decision making. And people very close to her saying the same things. Just making one bad decision, one illtempered decision after another, and whether it be the frank fina thing and the Seth Williams thing and the Supreme Court thing, these are all, i believe, tied together somehow. And it stems back from her feeling embattled, you know, showing up again in terms of in Montgomery County, showing up in, what, jeans and a sport coat or Something Like this . I mean, you cant help if you were close to her to say, i think shes falling apart. Right. Were gonna take a break. Inside story continues right after this. Inside story is presented by temple university. 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