STEPHEN ZOOK
The Temple News

Controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders will make his Main Campus debut tonight – but only after losing a student sponsor and almost being canceled.

Wilders, known for his inflammatory statements about Muslims and Islam, was originally sponsored by Temple College Republicans and TU Purpose, a newly-formed social and political group.

Late last week, however, Temple College Republicans pulled its sponsorship. Barry Scatton, president of College Republicans, said in an e-mail to The Temple News that his organization no longer supported the event and “strongly disapproves” of TU Purpose continuing its sponsorship of Wilder’s appearance.

The two organizations originally made the decision to cancel the event at a meeting with Student Activities on Friday, Oct. 16, Scatton and others close to the situation said. Temple’s Muslim Student Association met with Student Activities earlier the same day to express its concerns about hate mail it received.

Monira Gamal-Eldin, president of MSA, said after her name and contact information, along with the MSA statement, were posted on Web sites, she received “enough [hate mail] to feel threatened. I received messages from as far as Australia.”

Vice President of TU Purpose Brittany Walsh said after discussing the decision to cancel the event, TU Purpose’s executive board decided to continue its sponsorship. Without a student sponsor, Wilders would not have been able to appear on Main Campus through the event.

“[Our purpose is] to unite people of opposing views, different ideologies and different religions to discuss these very relevant and emotionally driven social issues,” Walsh said.

“We don’t agree with everything he has to say, and we don’t think the Quran should be banned,” Walsh said. “We certainly don’t harbor any ill will against the Muslim community.”

The event caused a considerable stir on campus after it was announced. MSA released a statement denouncing the event, which read, in part: “The Muslim population at Temple feels attacked, threatened and ultimately unsafe” that Wilders was invited.

“We have decided not to protest the event [by] picketing. We are trying to approach the event intellectually and not emotionally,” Eldin said.

Walsh said TU Purpose members realize there is a chance the event will divide the student body.
“I think [that is] always a concern any time you talk about an issue that people have strong opinions on either end,” Walsh said.

Strong opinions were on display at Temple Student Government’s meeting Monday, Oct. 19. Half a dozen students holding signs opposing Wilders’ appearance were in attendance. During the emotional meeting, Eldin read a statement about her religion, and the Senate voted unanimously to adopt a resolution condemning Wilders.

“I think Barry [Scatton] did the noble thing. He felt horrible that so many people got physically and intellectually threatened by this man,” Eldin said.

Contrary to buzz surrounding the event, Assistant Vice President of University Communications Ray Betzner said Temple Police had no role in canceling the event.

The university also released a statement saying it respects “the right of our student organizations to invite people who express a wide variety of views and ideas.”

This story can be found on temple-news.com.

U.S. Sen. Robert Casey Jr. said expanding the federal Pell Grant was the most important step in encouraging more low-income students to attend college, after chairing a Congressional hearing on college access at Sullivan Hall yesterday, Oct. 5.

“It’s been said education is the great equalizer,” Casey said in his opening statement. “But we cannot say that if more of our students don’t have access.”

The 1 p.m. public hearing, held under the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions, featured seven witnesses, including three college students, a parent, two college professors and Senior Vice President of Finance and Administration for Temple Anthony Wagner.

The college students, from the University of Pennsylvania, Cheyney University and Penn State University, relayed their stories of dealing with financial aid throughout college.

“Many times, people don’t realize how many additional costs there are,” said D.J. Ryan, a junior at Penn State, detailing his struggle through college funds used for family medical emergencies and having to transfer colleges in order to live at home. “The scenario I face is simply unfair.”

Dr. Andrew Gillen of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity said one of the problems with affordability is that colleges were raising tuition and spending more money on expenses other than teaching students. He cited scholars who had referred to universities as “cookie monsters” because they tend to continually spend more money, raising tuition as they spend.

Wagner said part of the continual rise in tuition and fees stems from a dwindling percentage of state support.

“I don’t know about the arms races between elite private universities,” Wagner said, pointing to the fact that between 1972 and 2009, the percentage of public schools’ budgets that came from the state decreased from 60 percent to 20 percent.

Gillen said one of the first things colleges need to re-examine is what their purpose is, instead of being institutions that cater to research, liberal arts education or professional schools, such as law and medical programs.

“They are trying to do all of that, and are spending gobs of money doing it,” Gillen said.

Dr. Laura Perna of UPenn and Gillen said access to all the money available to students for college needs to be simplified. The FAFSA form is too complicated and cumbersome for low-income students, whose parents have little experience with financial aid, they said.

“It’s written in arcane government language and it’s impossible to decipher,” Gillen said.

The consensus of the witnesses seemed to be that the direct and indirect costs of college have become too much of a burden, and that there needs to be more aid and better access to the aid that is available now.

“Other than healthcare, there are very few costs that have gone up [like higher education],” Wagner said.

Casey said after the hearing that the Pell Grant would be a major focus of his efforts on education and affordability.

“Student lending will be a big part of the debate [as well as] expanding the number of students who can afford to go to school,” Casey said.

Lunch trucks on Main Campus may be the latest frontier in the relentless search by advertisers for innovative spaces to sell their products. Shawn Geller, a recent Temple alumnus, has started selling ads to local businesses that are placed on the street-facing sides of lunch trucks.

Ian Rose TTN

“People always say they want to advertise to students on a daily basis,” Geller said. “I was trying to think of something on campus to utilize.”

That something became lunch trucks, the owners of which receive payments based on the ads’ square footage.

“They seem to have no problem with it,” Geller said. “This is a way of increasing their income.”

Truck owners sign a one-year contract with Geller to have the ads put up, and Geller solicits them from businesses on and around campus. He said he is planning on soliciting businesses further off campus in the future to attract a wider advertising base.

Not all lunch truck owners have accepted his offer yet.

Part of the attraction of the lunch trucks is that they are privately owned, Geller said. This means it’s easier to get them to allow him to advertise.

“Temple itself isn’t inclined to let businesses put up their own advertisements,” he said. Utilizing lunch trucks was a way to get around the relatively few advertising opportunities on Main Campus, one that didn’t require going through the university.

But it wasn’t always easy to persuade the owners to let Geller put up signs on their trucks.
“It was a struggle at first, to be honest,” Geller said, adding that the signs were put up in a way that makes them easy to remove.

The usually empty street-side of the trucks is a largely unused space, ideal for advertising to college students.

Geller said it was also much easier than the more traditional ways of advertising on campus.
“I always see people on campus putting up flyers,” he said. “It’s a lot of work to go up weekly and put up flyers.”

Several on-campus businesses have bought lunch truck advertisements through Geller. He is also using the spaces to advertise his own business, collegeclipper.com.

“This is one of the things I did to lead up the Web site,” Geller said.

Geller may be one of the first people to try advertising through lunch trucks. He said he hadn’t heard of anyone else utilizing them for ad space.

For now, he can enjoy the advantage of being on the frontier of Main Campus advertising, having come up with a novel way to advertise, benefiting himself and truck owners.

This post can be found here on temple-news.com.

However, Furey had friends at Temple and thought he would enjoy the North Philadelphia university more than Catholic in Washington, D.C. His parents relented and let him transfer.

Today, Furey wishes he never made the move. He now faces serious criminal charges and was permanently expelled from Temple for possessing a weapon and disorderly conduct. Furey believes he wrongfully charged and suffered injuries at the hands of a Philadelphia Police officer.

On April 5, 2008, Furey, a former finance major, left one of his two jobs and drove his mother’s car to Temple. He was going to hang out with his friends.

They went to a party on the 1800 block of Diamond Street, and then went to a friend’s house on the 1700 block of Monument Street, where they watched TV and ordered Chinese food.

At some point, Furey’s friend John Fisher locked himself out of his bedroom. They tried using credit cards to open the door, but nothing worked.

Around 3 a.m., Furey remembered he had a machete in the trunk of his mother’s car. He left it there after landscaping his parent’s three-acre home.

He went to his car to retrieve the machete in order to pry open Fisher’s door.

Exactly what happened next is in dispute, but it ended with Furey sitting in a hospital in handcuffs, facing charges of assaulting a police officer, terroristic threats and possession of an instrument of crime with intent.

Furey said he was standing at the trunk of the car retrieving the machete, when he heard someone call out to him from across the street. He said he saw a small group of young men walking toward him. They asked him what he had in his hand.

“None of your business,” Furey said.

They asked him again.

Furey said one of the men in the group pulled a gun when the group saw the machete.

He dropped the machete and said the man with the gun and several of his friends jumped on him, knocking his head against the pavement.

Furey struggled against the man trying to subdue him. Seconds later, a Campus Police officer showed up and held Furey down until he could be handcuffed. Then, Furey said he was dragged into a Campus Police car.

The man with the gun was Travis Wolfe, an off-duty Philadelphia Police officer from the 22nd District and recent Temple graduate. The other people in the group were Colin Anderson and Doug Segars, both Temple students, and Stephen Robinson, who has since joined the police academy.

Wolfe’s story, to which he testified in court and at a University Disciplinary Committee hearing, isn’t the same story Furey told.

Wolfe said in court he was in a vehicle, driving down the block, when he heard someone shouting. He said he rolled down the window of his vehicle and heard Furey shouting. He said he saw something metallic, which he thought was a gun handle, in Furey’s waistband.

Wolfe said he called out to Furey and asked him what was in his pants. Then, Furey quickly walked toward him, with the machete raised above his head, in what Wolfe described as a “combat mode.”

Wolfe said he stepped out of his vehicle, shouted, “Police, drop the knife,” and aimed his gun at Furey.

He said he then pulled up his shirt to reveal his badge, and when Furey dropped the machete, attempted to apprehend him. At this point, the Campus Police officer showed up.  

Furey was refused at police headquarters because of the injuries to his head and knees and was taken to Hahnemann University Hospital.

Furey said while there, the Temple police officers who accompanied him refused to call his parents,  telling him they don’t call phone numbers with the area code 610.

His parents found out a day later, when police called Andrew Haff, Furey’s friend, who then called his parents.

Furey was charged with aggravated assault, possession of an instrument of crime with intent, terroristic threats with intent to terrorize another, simple assault and reckless endangerment. The case is still open, so the district attorney’s office could not comment.

Meanwhile, his problems with Temple had just begun. After multiple postponements, a UDC hearing ended with Furey being expelled for violating the Temple student code of conduct.

Furey said the panel members, Temple faculty and students, did not seem interested in fairness.

“[The hearing] was one of the most biased things ever. It wasn’t a hearing. They had already made up their minds,” he said.

One of the panel members, English professor Keith Gumery, questioned Furey’s argument that he was afraid the group approaching him was a gang.

“Could you define a gang for me, what you believe a gang to be?” Gumery asked.

“A group of criminals with the same allegiance and mindset,” Furey answered.

“So if they were a group of friends who’d been to a club and were wearing board shorts and Hawaiian shirts, you would see them … as being a gang?” Gumery asked.

Later, Gumery questioned Fisher’s need to get into his room.

“Could you have gone to stay with someone else that night, or did you really need to get into it that night?” Gumery asked. “Was there something you needed that night at 3:30 in the morning?”

“My bed,” Fisher said.

Missing from the meeting were Anderson, Segars, and Robinson, Wolfe’s companions that night. Also missing were the officers who accompanied Furey to the 22nd District, the Roundhouse and then to Hahnemann.

Furey’s mother, Margaret Boyce-Furey, said those five witnesses were crucial to his argument that Furey was not in the wrong.

According to the Temple hearing transcript, Robinson did not want to be in the hearing. Since he was not a Temple student, he could not be compelled to attend. Both Segars and Anderson refused to attend (it is not specified which of the two refused), and the other never responded.

Another discrepancy between the two stories is Wolfe’s vehicle. Furey said Wolfe and his friends were walking down the street before the altercation, while Wolfe said he was in a vehicle. This has added to the Furey’s suspicion that Wolfe’s story doesn’t check out.

Anderson, Segars, and Robinson had attended a party at 1727 Monument St. on April 5, 2008.

At the UDC hearing, Wolfe said he drove from the 16th District up to Monument Street to pick up his friends from the party shortly before the incident occurred at 3:30 a.m.

The Furey family said they are appealing the decision to expel him from Temple.

Temple officials said they do not comment on disciplinary actions.

Travis Wolfe has referred questions to the police press office.

This article can be found on temple-news.com.

Romanelli was not drinking or being rowdy, though. He was taking pictures.
The photos were for a class, Photography for Filmmakers.

On March 17 around 5 p.m., Romanelli was sitting on the grass lawn between Broad Street and the Johnson and Hardwick residence halls. He saw a man exposing himself to Temple students walking on Broad Street past J&H. Soon after, two Temple Police officers arrived at the scene.

Courtesy Brian Romanelli

Romanelli got up from where he was sitting, and walked around the fence separating the sidewalk and the grass, stopping about 10 to 15 feet away to take pictures of the arrest.

He said one of the officers grabbed his arm, pushed him away and said “Get the f–k out of here.”

Romanelli moved back to the other side of the fence and took a few more pictures. Once handcuffs were on the man who exposed himself, Romanelli walked back to the gate, which was about 50 feet away from the police, and took more pictures of the arrest.
The same officer waved him away again, he said.

After the man was in a police van, the two police officers walked over to him.
“You don’t like to listen, do you?” Romanelli said the officer asked him.

Romanelli said the other officer grabbed him by his arm and pulled his wallet from his back pocket.

The police then checked Romanelli’s name to see if he had any outstanding warrants.
“I’m pretty sure I’m allowed to take pictures,’” Romanelli said.

He said the officer who first approached him said “not when the police tell you you can’t,’” Romanelli said.

“He said I was interfering with a police investigation,” he added.

After the officers took down his information, they left, Romanelli said.

“See you at [University Disciplinary Council],” an officer said.

The only witnesses called by the panel were the two officers, Romanelli said.
He called a friend to testify on his behalf.

The panel was made up of three faculty members and two undergraduate students, Ja’Nice Proctor and Chanelle Desir. The chair of the panel was Keith Gumery, an English professor.

The panel unanimously agreed Romanelli was at fault for failing to properly identify himself or to comply with the instructions or directions of a person acting in duly authorized university capacity and gave him disciplinary probation until the end of the Fall 2009 semester and 20 hours of community service, which they recommended he complete with Campus Safety.

Brian Foley, coordinator of the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards, said recommendations are “random” to some extent but can be based on the offense the student has committed.

“Sometimes we deal with certain violations that deal with someone not cooperating with police. We might refer them to Campus Safety,” Foley said.

The panel members are volunteers who go through a period of training, he said. The training includes the various violations of the student code of conduct and different kinds of sanctions, among other things.

Foley said there is an appeals process, which varies with the sanction.

This article can be found on temple-news.com.

The politicians we love to hate are there for a reason. Specifically, we put them there, and we choose to keep them there, even when we know they may be greedy or dishonest.

Such is the case with Vince Fumo, the former state senator from South Philadelphia. Fumo was probably the most powerful man in the state Senate, and for good reason. His influence spread from people in the Board of Revision of Taxes to people in the Delaware River Port Authority to various nonprofits.

In what may be a sign of just how powerful Fumo was before he was convicted of 137 counts of conspiracy and fraud, local politicians were fairly measured in their reactions to Fumo’s conviction.
Mayor Michael Nutter called the outcome shocking even though the guilty verdicts were, if not virtually certain, at least a pretty good bet.

Philadelphia politicians were measured in their words perhaps because they realized that Fumo not only brought money into the city, but he was responsible for the success of quite a few political careers.

The average Philadelphian can afford to be more callous, and if the sometimes-caustic messages on comment walls of articles about the Fumo conviction are any indication, the average Philadelphian really does feel a little more callous about Fumo than the politicians do.

We probably shouldn’t, considering Philadelphians knew Fumo had a sketchy past, having avoided two previous corruption charges by chance and by a technicality. These charges were early in his career, the first before he was elected to the state Senate. At that point, he was still working on the campaign of Henry “Buddy” Cianfrani, who occupied the South Philadelphia Senate seat before Fumo.

Cianfrani was also convicted of fraud and spent time in federal prison.

The point is, Philadelphians knew Fumo had a shady past before we elected him. But, we chose to keep electing him. First, he was a truly charismatic person, and it wasn’t hard to like him. Also, he did bring a school, street cleaners and money to his district. And in return, a few corruption charges didn’t seem bad enough to take the effort to vote him out of office.

Therein lies the moral behind corrupt politicians.

Usually, it’s not their first brush with impropriety. Usually, their constituents have some kind of warning that there is something not completely upstanding about their duly elected representatives.

Until we are willing to demand more integrity from our politicians, there isn’t much point in complaining about them.

This article can be found on temple-news.com.

The celebrity mainstays were on the list, including former mayor John Street’s brother, T. Milton Street, and restaurateur Neil Stein, who owes more than $1.2 million.

Others on the list stand out as well. There is Blair Christian Academy and Child Care Services, which describes itself on phila.gov’s services pages as providing “excellent academic education within the context of a consistent Christian world and life view.” Owing $240,000 in taxes doesn’t sound like giving unto Caesar what is his.

Another on the list is Jeffrey M. Seiken. Seiken owes more than $300,000 in taxes to the city, according to the latest list. Yet, Seiken contributed almost $2,000 to LAWPAC, a state trial lawyers’ political action committee, in the last nine years.

It is absolutely Seiken’s right to contribute to a PAC, just as it is anyone else’s. However, it is his duty to pay his taxes, and when he chooses to support political organizations instead of helping to pay off his taxes, he may as well be flaunting his lack of payment at the city.

What is striking about Seiken and the other people and companies mentioned thus far in this article is that all of them were on the first list that Nutter put out in November. That means they have not paid their taxes, or even tried to. If they did, they would be on a payment plan, which gets them removed from the list.

Nutter and the city are right to start taking delinquents’ properties, especially if they show up on the list for a second time. Especially in a poor economy, there shouldn’t be any leniency for people who want to avoid taxes. Not pursuing tax delinquents only hurts Philadelphia.

As in many cities, people like to complain about taxes in Philadelphia. They are said to be too high, unfair and destroying economic development. This may be true to some extent, but those millions in unpaid taxes could be doing a lot for Philadelphia. Helping to keep libraries open, for one.

Nutter may have angered Philadelphians when he brought up the library closures, but the mayor has to be commended for not letting tax evaders get away with shirking their duties to the city.

The majority of Philadelphia taxpayers do just that: pay their taxes. But those who choose to avoid paying out of greed or lack of diligence need to know they are only welcome in the city so long as they pay their dues to it.

This article can be found on temple-news.com.

Contrary to what the Board of Revision of Taxes Web site states, 1434 W. Diamond Street was bought for $3,750. 1436 W. Diamond St. was bought for $850.
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1434, 1436 W. Diamond St. (Stephen Zook TTN)

Also, Temple is still paying taxes on all three properties, which is costing the university hundreds of dollars – only a drop in the bucket compared to the multi-million dollar operating budget Temple runs, but still noteworthy.

Why is Temple spending money on these properties when they sit vacant? How long will it continue to spend money on properties that could be sold?

The Park Avenue lot cost Temple $617 in the last five years. The two Diamond Street lots cost Temple a combined $653 in the last five years.

If property taxes stay the same for the next five years, the properties will cost Temple $1,380.
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1434, 1436 W. Diamond St. (Stephen Zook TTN)

1436 Diamond St. was, as TTN initially suspected, bought from the city. 1434 was bought from Gwendolyn C. Burke, who was the widow of George Burke, according to the deed. The property was bequeathed to the Burkes by an Adeline T. Read’s will.

The Park Avenue lot is the only one that was actually bought for $1, a symbolic amount used in deeds when a property is gifted. It was bought from Irving Blumberg and his wife, Anne, who lived in Montgomery County. They are not Temple graduates, according to the Office of Alumni Relations.

As stated in a previous post, Ray Betzner of university communications said he was unaware of the properties or any purpose for them.

This post can be found on broadandcecil.com.