a 42-year-old who graduated from ECA’s weatherization program, said his work with the Connection Training Services staff instilled a sense of confidence in him that he lacked the last time he had been released from jail.

...has worked to give the formerly incarcerated of Philadelphia—where the recidivism rate is 65.3 percent and three-year reincarceration rate is 41.1 percent — the skills they need to land on their feet. Last week, CTS graduated the first crop of participants in their new federally funded Training to Work program.

housing...is cheap...compared to most of Philadelphia’s peer cities. The real issue is the 28.4% poverty rate, one of the highest in the nation. Cheap as the housing is in absolute terms, a sizable segment of the population still doesn’t earn enough money to afford it.

[Philadelphia's] commerce director said that Stallone had done more for Philly than anyone since Benjamin Franklin.

As “Let the Fire Burn” makes clear, whereas MOVE members were imprisoned and killed for their misdeeds over the years, no one who ordered or condoned the bombing in 1985 was ever held to account.

...blends...Baraka and Ishmael Reed with the...stream-of-consciousness of...Hunter Thompson, Terry Southern, and Tom Wolfe, tossing in a dash of Sister Souljah and Donald Goines...Asante’s...chronicle is imaginative, powerful, and electric, written with passion and conviction.

...the guy is an inspiration to what it means to be a creative and a kind soul...While his full-time job serves [is] creative director for wejetset—a modern travel store & creative agency—he’s also a father, husband, proud Philadelphian, app collector and Nike fanboy.

Take a look at the chart above. The cuts disproportionately affect African-Americans and Latinos.

Hundreds of teachers and school staff are being laid off in two of the largest cities in the country—both run by Democrats.  In Chicago and Philadelphia, a total of 4,633 people, including many teachers, will lose their jobs. Both cities, run by Democrats, claim they are closing schools because they need the money. Yet near both cities, money for prisons is somehow found.

Organizers, we are told, "grappled with the limits of neighborhood politics." Even "in cities as large and influential as New York, Chicago and Philadelphia," it was "difficult to translate local reforms to more than citywide importance."