Neal Santos TAKING ON A DUMP: A neighbor has been complaining about the 1100 block of South 24th Street, but she hasn’t seen results. The rowhouse Erika Rose’s family owns at the corner of 24th and Ellsworth streets, the last…

Neal Santos The “Reclaiming Vacant Properties” conference, organized by the Center for Community Progress, has assembled hundreds of politicians, planners and code enforcement officials, appropriately, in Philadelphia. Yesterday, after a morning of predictably forceful commentary on tackling blight from Mayor…

Last week, Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell said that a water bill indicating that she had apparently not turned on a tap or flushed a toilet at her official residence for several months was “erroneous.” Additional Water Revenue Bureau documents that have…

Happier days. About an hour before Mayor Michael Nutter took the stage at the “Reclaiming Vacant Properties” conference today, his campaign sent out an invitation for a fundraiser at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Tickets ranged from $1,000…

via flickr/victoriaporter No Snacking: Pokeweed is toxic if improperly prepared. “Would you look at this, it’s some kind of edible. Oh, it’s just beautiful!” says Lynn Landes, leading a tour with the Wild Foodies of Philly. “I should know what…

Four months after 68-year-old Don Ly, a Vietnamese immigrant with a wife and four children was killed, his family is still searching for answers. They’ve been asking for help to spread the word about a $25,000 reward offered for information related…

A census report, quietly released in May, revealed some interesting statistics about student populations and urban poverty rates. The report found that, overall, Philadelphia’s official poverty rate was 1.4 percent higher than it would otherwise have been due to the…

Evan M. Lopez Darkness has already fallen over the park. We’re waiting with a series of silhouetted figures on an unnamed cobblestone street that sprouts from a parking lot off Kelly Drive and runs into the Glendinning Rock Garden. Trolleys…

Outrage in Point Breeze, lately the hub of conversations about the impact of gentrification, has been at a simmer for several years. Now, a group calling itself Point Breeze Organizing Committee is throwing fuel on the fire. A protest against gentrification…