By Jason Kleinman
The City of Philadelphia Recreation Department has told It’s Our City that it recently received its largest donation to the Splash and Summer Fund. The $110,000 gift will help keep more city pools open this summer. City officials have yet to release the corporation’s name, but the mayor may make that announcement later [...]

The participants of last night’s budget workshop, held at the Pinn Memorial Baptist Church, posted their messages to the mayor on the “Wailing Wall.”  This was the fourth and final workshop.  Over 400  people showed up to learn more about the projected $200 million budget gap in next year’s budget.

Closing of youth recreation centers. [...]

by Tom MacDonald, WHYY News
The four community budget workshops are over, but work on the city budget continues.  WHYY’s Tom MacDonald spoke with Mayor Nutter about what impact the forums will have on his budget decisions.
Mayor Nutter says there have been many interesting suggestions coming out of the community forums on what areas can be [...]

by Elizabeth Fiedler, WHYY News
The community budget workshops have wrapped up.  Hundreds of citizens gave their input on how the city should address its budget gap.  Last night the final of four forums was held in West Philadelphia.  WHYY’s Elizabeth Fiedler reports some people came determined to lobby for a cause while others offered sacrifices [...]

by Susan Phillips, WHYY News
It seems like enough of a hassle just to remember to take out the trash every week. Now the city is debating whether to charge residents for trash collection, either by a pay-as-you-throw fee per bag of trash, or just a flat cost for collection. WHYY’s Susan Phillips reported on the [...]

Philadelphia Daily News’ Dave Davies says the citizen budget workshops are unlikely to give Philadelphia’s mayor a clear message on what departments to cut or whether to raise taxes. Davies, who attended last week’s budget forum held in Germantown, says the parameters are too rigid to promote creative approaches to find savings.
The game, while useful, is [...]

In an effort to figure out what the stimulus package will mean for Philadelphia and the region, we dispatched online reporter Ben Bradlow (email) to try and find out how (or if) the money will find its way here.  In this first of what we intend to be ongoing explanations and observations of the stimulus [...]

by Elizabeth Fiedler, WHYY News
The recession is hitting Philadelphia area residents of all ages and professions.  The tough financial situation is also putting a crimp in the “Underground Economy,” people who don’t pay taxes or get permits, but who sell all sorts of things including illegal taxi rides, t-shirts, and CDs.  WHYY’s Elizabeth Fiedler has [...]

The Tight Times, Touch Choices workshops on the city fiscal crisis began Thursday.
About 550 people came to St. Dominic’s School in the lower Northeast to offer input in any or all of three forms:
1) Two minute videotaped testimonies.  You can see those through a link on an earlier It’s Our City blog post.
2)  Written comments [...]

The citizen budget workshops are upon us. But the actual group working time is only 90 minutes. That’s not a lot of time to be making rapid fire decision about the possible fate of city departments. But if citizens are prepared that could go a long way.
Still, people will be taking their long held biases [...]