City Council's Final Session Of Term Is Do Or Die For Some Significant Legislation
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Philadelphia City Council will meet Thursday for the final time this session. Some major bills are expected to pass and other measures are likely to die as a result of inaction.
Two big items hanging fire are the Comcast franchise agreement and the bills paving the way for development of the city's second casino in the stadium district. Councilman Bobby Henon is confident the Comcast deal will pass, boasting that even with Seattle's attempt to match it, it's still the best in the country.
"The Seahawks may have won the Super Bowl more recently than the Eagles, but Philly is one step closer to tackling the digital divide," Henon says.
The casino bills are more controversial, but are still likely to pass. One bill that won't survive is the ban on cigarette sales at drug stores. This disappoints Health Commissioner James Buehler, who asked the bill be introduced.
"We have very high rates of tobacco-related disease," Buehler says. "We believe it's antithetical to the mission of a pharmacy to provide tobacco that can offset the goal of trying to get well."
The bill drew strong skepticism from the council president and never even went to a hearing.
Council is also expected to approve the transfer of hundreds of vacant lots to the city's new land bank.
Land bank champion, councilwoman Maria Quinones Sanchez, says this day has been a long time coming, but...
"We are seeing some much-needed progress in ramping up what is an important tool for the city of Philadelphia," she says.
Sanchez says it was a massive effort to work out how to acquire property and identify which property is right for the land bank. In her district, for example, there are 4,000 potential lots. She's proposed transferring 700 to the land bank. Three other council members have proposed transferring about a hundred more.
"We're showing and demonstrating that we really want to ramp this up," she says, "and make it work."
Sanchez believes with continued effort, the land bank could be the solution to the problem of blight in Philadelphia's inner-city neighborhoods.
