Justin DiBerardinis

I’ve lived in this city my entire life. I’m a proud product of working class Philadelphia, a proud product of our public schools, and my career has been committed to advancing equity and opportunity for the working class and working poor. The neighborhoods of my youth, Kensington and Fishtown, have been at the leading edge of gentrification. I have seen, lived and experienced the new prosperity in Philadelphia, and the inequity and social and racial tensions that follow it. I also see the opportunity for this new growth to be harnessed and steered by innovative public policy to achieve progressive outcomes.

I believe my career as a community organizer in Kensington and my work leading the program at Bartram’s Garden in Southwest Philadelphia has demonstrated how public space and and public institutions can play a vital role in re-aligning power and ownership and driving opportunity to communities which need it the most.

My platform, The New Deal for Philadelphia, is focused on what City Hall can do to make sure that Philadelphia’s growth in the coming years is equitable and sustainable, and that opportunity is driven to the neighborhoods that need it the most.

1. A Philadelphia WPA: Invest in people with publicly funded living-wage work to provide services
   and to drive employment to where it’s most needed: a teacher’s assistant in every public school classroom; staffing our parks; planting trees and maintaining native ecosystems; and keeping our streets clean.
2. Reform of the worst municipal tax code in America: end policies that benefit suburban companies and multinational corporations; build a tax code that encourages the growth of a local and sustainable economy; and create a progressive wage tax.
3. Reform of Council and City Hall: initiate a Charter Convention to rewrite the rules of governance in the City; make City Council a real legislative body, with oversight and budgetary powers; end local powers that that lead to favoritism and corruption; and end outside employment for Council Members.

Our high poverty rate is at the root of many of our problems. If we don’t take that on, we are just putting on band-aids. I propose a New Deal for Philadelphia that would use increased revenue from more progressive taxes to fund a major public jobs and services program targeted at the neighborhoods most in need of jobs and services. Teachers aides and teaching assistants, street cleaners, public safety workers, home health care aides — all provide needed services and can put people on a path to better employment. We have to drive jobs and services to the neighborhoods, this time without replicating the racist implementations of the original New Deal.
As for the tax structure, we are capable of building a tax code that is fairer, more progressive and more supportive of locally based businesses. Currently our tax code incentivizes businesses to relocate to the suburbs, weakens our tax base, and relies on incentive-laden deals to lure in big corporations. I’m a strong believer that moving to a tax code that relies more heavily on commercial real estate taxes and broad-based, low-rate taxes like gross receipts will be more progressive, have fewer loopholes, and contribute to a stronger local economy that will generate more tax revenue. I wrote the legislation that exempted the first $100,000 of business income, which helped tens of thousands (in fact the majority) of Philadelphia business survive and grow. These are the small businesses, freelancers and independent contractors that keep money in our neighborhoods. Meanwhile, we have large and expanding institutions in this City that are taking very valuable property off our tax rolls. Philadelphia should join other cities in aggressively pursuing PILOTs from these large non-profits.

And finally, I am in favor of completely overhauling our 10-year tax abatement and replacing it with abatements that advance a vision of an equitable, just, and sustainable Philadelphia: eg for low- and middle-income first-time homebuyers, for historic and community preservation and for existing homeowners to improve the sustainability and energy efficiency of their homes.

Philadelphia has a relatively high rate of homeownership but many homeowners are also under the poverty line, and the rising costs of home ownership are pushing more of them down, pushing more of them into an increasingly expensive rental market. We have to reduce this burden and let people stay in the homes they own, and not be impoverished by doing so.

This is not a laundry list of unrelated proposals. The New Deal for Philadelphia is a vision of a path to prosperity that the whole city can walk together.

This city is simultaneously dealing with rapid redevelopment and gentrification in some areas, and continued blight and decline in others. And in some neighborhoods (like the one I live in, the Wayne Junction area of southern Germantown) both at once. Too often we propose policies that respond to one of these conditions, and rarely both. Philadelphia’s core neighborhoods will likely continue to get more expensive. We will likely continue to be a high poverty American city. And these two conditions are happening during an American moment where investment (and perhaps belief) in public housing at a national level is in decline.

What are cities like Philadelphia to do? Obviously we need to do what we can to increase our spending on affordable housing and find the right incentives to spur inclusionary developments. But I don’t think municipal efforts can match the powerful economic forces driving urban redevelopment. Often when we talk about gentrification and redevelopment, we are circling an even larger issue of equity and ownership among the citizens of Philadelphia. Those issues are too often dealt with in a reactive way, but are best tackled proactively, ahead of redevelopment of a neighborhood.

I discussed under question 2 some of the specific issues you raise, but I want to mention the Land Bank. I worked side-by-side with Councilwoman Quiñones-Sánchez to advance that concept. It’s not yet all that it should be. We have housing, and we have people who need housing; let’s put housing more quickly into the hands of people who need it without the distortions and delays that result from political interference. This brings up councilmanic prerogative, which I and others have pointed out is not something you can just wish away. I want a charter change that would give Council more power to do its real job for the whole city, which is legislate and work with the Mayor to move us forward, and less power over individual property decisions. That would help us move unused properties more quickly into use and do it transparently, fairly, and in way that respects and protects the character of our neighborhoods.

There is a place for specific programs, and I support those that work. But I want Council to start being a place where we also see the big picture and go after the roots of our problems. I believe this city must first and foremost commit itself to battling poverty and inequity. To do that we need a growth in living wage jobs, both private and public, as I described above — a New Deal for Philadelphia.

For my overall approach to tax structure, see Question 2. I believe we need a full overhaul of Philadelphia’s tax code. I favor reforming our tax systems to a simple and progressive tax code, with a progressive wage tax, and commercial real estate taxes to replace business taxes which harmed the growth of Philadelphia’s local economy. I also believe that all abatements and incentives we offer must be moving us towards a more economically equitable or environmentally sustainable city to be justified.

A third of our public school students are already in charter schools, including my own kids. So I’m the last person who would blame any parent for pursuing what they believe is the best educational option for their kids. In many communities, charter schools have provided options for parents who have been failed for generations by their district school. Many are doing a good job, but certainly not all. They should be subject to strict accountability standards because they are using public money. Funding poorly functioning charter schools with public money amounts to turning our children into commodities. Whether for the benefit of the incompetent or for the unscrupulous, it doesn’t matter to me—it shouldn’t happen. I believe we must take a pause to reflect on our current policies, understand what we need to do to stabilize and support district-run schools, and figure out our policy and funding paths going forward. For this reason, I support a moratorium on charter school expansion.

Toward the funding goal I would support efforts on the state level to restore the Charter School Reimbursement line item and institute the Pa. Budget & Policy Center’s Fair Share Tax plan, and (as described above) overhauling the abatement to recover revenue, most of which is the school district’s share. I also believe the City will need to continue to increase its contributions to public education, and any reform in tax code or structure must drive more resources there.

The degree to which we have lost control of our own police department is deeply disturbing. We don’t seem to be able to actually end stop-and-frisk even though it is already illegal to stop and frisk people without reasonable cause, and even though it is proven to be overwhelmingly racist in its application. I want to put an end to these daily indignities and violations by whatever means it takes, up to and including a charter change. I also support a better-funded oversight commission that is more independent and has actual investigatory powers. I support efforts to expand restorative and transitional services for returning citizens. Savings from reduced incarceration should assist re-entry and create real opportunities for formerly incarcerated people to rejoin their families and communities with options and with pride.

During this campaign, I speak frequently about the common wealth of a city — the spaces and institutions which we own collectively and which bind diverse people together. I believe the trend of privatization in public space, in public schools, in public services has undermined this shared ownership. It must be rebuilt.

There is an important role for community and non-profit organizations to contribute to these institutions. The work at Bartram’s Garden has demonstrated the possibility for public space to thrive with deep and inclusive partnerships. But the land and the institutions must remain publicly owned and publicly accountable for this to be achieved. If we allow these spaces and institutions to been driven by market forces (which increasingly is the case) we will see the same inequity and social tensions that are growing in our gentrifying neighborhoods.

Philadelphia is a better city for each of us when it is a better city for all of us. I support a permanent Office of Immigrant Affairs, municipal ID legislation, legal assistance to families and children facing deportation, and the immediate closure of the detention center in Berks County, but I will take my lead on these topics from leaders in our immigrant community. It is not the city’s job to work on behalf of the Trump administration’s racist policies, for example by cooperating with ICE beyond the absolute minimum that is indisputably required by law. Rather it is our duty, our obligation and our privilege to stand up and defend all human rights at every opportunity.

New fossil fuel infrastructure is almost always placed in areas where pollution, asthma rates, etc are already well above average, and where local residents don’t have the political and economic power to resist. It’s no coincidence that these are places where more black and brown people live. I don’t believe the future of this city is in fossil fuel production, processing, or pipelines because this infrastructure represents an investment—in some cases a 30-40 year commitment—to increased carbon extraction. Philadelphia should have no part of that. I will not take money from the fossil fuel industry.

As a Council member I would promote every effort to transition the City and its residents away from fossil fuels, including through the sustainability and renewable energy abatements I discussed above. We must create tax and economic incentives that allow working class and poor Philadelphians to transition away from fossil fuel dependency and the fuel poverty created by this dependency. Instead of investing in fossil fuel infrastructure I would work to create jobs for Philadelphians in the renewable energy sector.
I believe that abatements for low and moderate income homeowners to weatherize and reduce the carbon footprint of their homes, combined with a public banking system to allow these households to borrow against these abatements to afford upgrades could transform the housing stock of this city. This is how we can lay the foundation for a sustainable future.

The issue of lead poisoning is also an environmental justice question. The bulk of Philadelphia’s housing is single-family homes built before 1978; that reality, combined with our 26% poverty rate, means huge numbers of children are growing up in houses with old, peeling, lead-based paint. Between our housing stock and our aging schools we have thousands of children testing positive for lead exposure, the vast majority of them poor. We need to restore funding to the Health Department for testing and intervention, enforce lead inspection laws and crack down on landlords who don’t clean up their properties. We must take aggressive action to protect our children from permanent damage. This includes joining the lawsuits against the paint companies that created this problem. In the schools, repairs and improvements are deferred for far too long. Conditions in many are increasingly similar to the decayed and toxic state of the Willard school building in Kensington that, as a community organizer with the Eastern Philadelphia Organizing Project, I fought successfully to replace with a safe new building. Along with the Charter School Reimbursement line item and the Fair Share Tax plan I mentioned in question 5, I support the PlanCon recommendations of May 2018 and the funding of state subsidies for PlanCon at the highest level possible, at least back to their 2014-15 level of just over $300 million.

But until we win our fight for more funding, we need to prioritize protecting children from lead in every school as well as every home. City Council has made some important progress in doing that and I will make sure it’s not just a response to a string of news stories but a consistent and successful effort to eliminate this threat.