By Ben Bradlow

I attended my first of the Mayor Michael Nutter’s town hall meetings about his planned budget cuts last night. There’s been a lot of discussion about the evolving stagecraft of the town hall meetings. It was a welcome innovation to have the relevant department heads speak in addition to the mayor, and Nutter was relatively mobile throughout the gymnasium. City officials are distributing forms asking people to say what they view as the city services to be prioritized in the budget, and they’ve already started publishing the results. Still, this meeting seemed stuck between two different political goals: explaining the cuts and seeking input from the public.

Many people fear that Nutter is basically using these meetings as a way to take some political punches in public, so that he can just get on with doing the budget cuts his way. The mayor’s office is empathizing intellectually with Philadelphia residents by asking them to list their priorities on paper. The mayor himself, if he does not actually plan to drastically change his budget cuts, needs to empathize emotionally with his constituents.

These meetings could be an opportunity to show that he understands why it is so hard for many people to accept the cuts. After his opening explanation for the dire financial position of the city, many in the audience began to acknowledge that cuts were going to have to be made somewhere. Some proposed paying taxes for 2010 now, getting together to voluntarily run libraries that the city would close - ideas that varied in practicality, but had a sense of shared civic purpose in common. There is no reason for Nutter to exclude himself from that kind of feeling. It could just be that feeling that gets him through this political nightmare.

There were a couple moments last night that would have been perfect for Nutter, to paraphrase a Clintonian mantra, to feel Philadelphia’s pain. He was patient and listened carefully to people’s questions, but he anything but relished the opportunity to actually talk to the people he serves. This played into the hands of the more hostile segments of the audience. One woman, clearly trying to insult Nutter’s understanding of the fire department, asked him to explain the difference between a ladder company and an engine company. Nutter took the bait, initially responding in kind to the sarcasm-laden question. Later in the night another woman explained her fears and frustrations about the fire department cuts by describing how she grew up praying for her firefighter father every night and now does the same for her firefighter husband. Imagine if Nutter had responded to the first woman like this: “I know there are people out there praying for their husbands and fathers serving in the fire department every day. I know how scary it is. These are tough times. We’re here to assure you that we know how bad it is out there and we’re going to make sure that you get the quality services you deserve from your city government even in a bad situation like this.”

People are angry and scared in this city. The economy is in crisis, city government has to cut back somewhere, poverty is prevalent, and people are worried that, as President-elect Barack Obama put it on Sunday, “things are going to get worse before they get better.” You’ve got to think that Nutter is scared too. So let the public see that he understands how hard it is for city residents. The kinds of problems we’re facing can’t just be solved by the government. The mayor could use these town halls to forge a sense of common purpose between the city government and an engaged citizenry that could become a silver lining to these tough times.

Ben Bradlow is a recent graduate of Swarthmore College and is currently an intern with WHYY.

* Tonight’s Town Hall meeting begins at 7:00pm at Roxborough Memorial Hospital 5800 Ridge Ave in Philadelphia. (see map)