Neighbors, Following up on the discussion with Mr Moreau, I wanted to share a relevant part of a case study I was documenting last night. A corollary to our list discussion is that the leadership in the city government, and the broken systems they fail to fix, place subordinate city employees in untenable positions which lead to poor morale and burnout. (Case study: I have the basic notes to put together a book, using the case study method, which looks at the processes of civic associations and the addition of the UCD in this neighborhood over the past ten years. Most list readers probably have a good idea about some of the conclusions I've drawn-hahaha)
Last night, I was documenting my experience with an excellent city employee, who I witnessed doing his job professionally, at my last hearing for bogus trash tickets. I also wanted to capture the full details of a big lie, coming from the highest levels in city government, which placed this front line employee in a terrible position! The big lie: After I wrote a letter to the new mayor Nutter through his office of citizen complaints on the first floor of Tamany Hall, the Deputy Commissioner of the SWEEPS program actually called me. The mayors office did not initiate any investigation, which I insisted was necessary, but they did forward my letter to Williams. (Note: Most phones at the Dept of Finance, administrative adjudication and SWEEPS are never answered. That is one reason I concluded that the 311 system had nothing to do with bringing accountability to city departments which continue to ignore phones.) The conversation: With other PR crap and falsehoods, the Deputy Commissioner told me a ridiculous lie that violation notices were sent to Philadelphians within a few weeks. You, me, and the deputy commissioner know that this was a big and important lie. The ethical professional employee: So at my recent hearing, the adjudicator informs me that the lie continues to be the official information! Consider the position that this employee, obviously to me doing his best, is placed in. I made it easy and I told him that I knew, and many people knew, that this was a lie. And I told him about my conversation with the Deputy Commissioner and told him unequivocally that I believed that the commissioner knew it was a lie, and that I had documented the conversation on a public neighborhood listserv. Why are our elected officials, who know that serious problems exist at the SWEEPS program, allowing a bold and ridiculous lie to continue like this for an extended period? I imagine that I don't need to discuss the range of problems this presents to front line city employees trying to do a good job. I can if necessary or maybe a city employee would like to share a similar experience with the effect it had upon him or her. Glenn ---- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named "UnivCity." To unsubscribe or for archive information, see <http://www.purple.com/list.html>.
