Disorganized Dems

The public frenzy of last month’s contentious Democratic primary contest between Auditor General Bob Casey Jr. and Ed Rendell may have settled when Rendell won the race, but the bitter battle in the darkest corners of Philadelphia’s ward politics still rages.

In two of the city's 69 wards -- Roxborough's 21st Ward and the 33rd Ward of Kensington and Juniata -- allegations of back-room deals and post-election power plays between big-city politicians over key ward leader seats proliferate.

The city's ward leader elections, scheduled for June 10, will take place in private halls where elected committee people vote to decide who runs the ward.

Leaders not only control party money in the ward, but typically have a lot of pull with local voters through "get out the vote" drives and distribution of printed sample ballots in their territory.

But to become ward leader, one needs the "right" committee people to vote, and the strategy to get those committee people elected is not always honest.

In the 33rd Ward, as reported by City Paper on May 23, 19th Ward leader Carlos Matos waged a primary day battle to eliminate incumbent Ward Leader Donna Aument. Matos, looking to gain a foothold in the ward, picked a slate of largely Latino candidates for committee people to run against neighborhood mainstays and others who support Aument, who is white.

However, he couldn't win in the 33rd. According to committee people in the ward who asked not to be named, Aument's supporters won 32 of 48 seats in the elections, leaving Matos with 16 seats. Aument won the day, but her battle to keep the leadership position is not over.

After the primary elections, some committee people said they received calls from City Councilman Rick Mariano, whose 7th District seat contains a number of 33rd Ward divisions. Matos and Mariano, it is rumored, have agreed to pool their resources to oust Aument and take the ward leadership. One committee person, speaking on the condition of anonymity, even said that Mariano paid a visit to his house.

"It's absolutely not true," Mariano said about telling people he was interested in being ward leader. "I'm very happy doing what I'm doing now. I have no intention to be ward leader there."

Mariano said he was aware of the fighting between Matos and Aument and said he would like to see the ward in better shape, particularly between Latinos and whites who have used racial politics to polarize the neighborhood. He did not, however, say whom he favored to run the ward.

"Maybe if she had done a better job [Aument] wouldn't be in this position," he said.

When asked about Mariano's challenge, Aument said she would not comment. "You guys never get it right," she said. Matos did not return phone calls to his office.

While racial politics don't enter the ward leader run-off in the predominantly white 21st Ward, the contentiousness and scandal are no less pervasive.

The longtime incumbent, Joseph Quigley Jr., is being challenged by Roxborough attorney Louis Agre and former Philadelphia AFL-CIO head Joseph Rauscher.

Both Agre and Rauscher say they are looking to provide the ward with real leadership. At one point, both agree, the ward had more than 30 vacant committee-person slots. The 21st Ward, the largest in the city, has 45 divisions, and 90 committee-person slots.

Both accuse the other of trying to control the ward for "bigger players," and the battles between Agre and Rauscher have taken both men to court.

On April 24, a municipal court judge heard nearly 130 challenges of committee-person petitions filed by Agre and Rauscher. Quigley actually lost his committee-person post when it was revealed the address on his petitions was not his. Many of the other challenges were thrown out of court, but the massive number was a sign that the battle for the 21st Ward is not a gentlemen's contest.

Agre, who says he's been involved in 21st Ward politics for 12 years, is confident that he will win the ward-leader election. Quigley, he said, no longer stands a chance. "This race is between me and Rauscher at this point," he said.

"Rauscher is the result of outside influence," Agre said. "He's an outsider who has never been a committee man before." Asked who the influence was, Agre said, "It's not hard, you figure it out. They're party architects."

Rauscher, according to a committee person who did not want to be named, is running because of his ties to state Sen. Vince Fumo and Lynne Abraham's campaign manager Eleanor Dezzi.

"Dezzi would have liked to run herself, but no one in the ward likes her," said one committee person.

Rauscher rejected the charges and insisted that, as a man "born and raised" in the 21st Ward, he is simply trying to bring respect back to a ward that lost it some time ago.

"Am I tied to Vince Fumo? That's just ridiculous," Rauscher said. "I've been in politics as a labor leader for 39 years. ... I can work with Fumo and Mayor Street, two guys who would never walk into a room together.

"Vince is not involved in that ward contest," Tuma said. "He is not supporting any candidate there."

As for Dezzi, Rauscher said, "She's a smart lady and a good friend of mine, I won't deny it. This stuff is just a lot of rhetoric from Agre's people."

Agre says he is running independently and that is the main reason he is not favored by Rauscher's supporters. He says the petition challenges were tough, but he is confident the fighting will be over after June 10.

"In the end, we're all neighbors," he said. "This is what Democrats do. We fight and then we make up. It's like Will Rogers said: ŒI don't belong to an organized party, I belong to the Democratic Party.' In the end, we'll all be together."

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