City pays bills for Safe and Sound's care providers

By: Tom MacDonald

Mayor Nutter has made a decision to pay 61 groups owed money by Safe and Sound, a defunct mostly-city funded agency. The payments help close the books on a group that has been the subject of many questions during it’s existence.

By: Tom MacDonald
tmacdonald@whyy.org

Mayor Nutter has made a decision to pay 61 groups owed money by Safe and Sound, a defunct mostly-city funded agency. The payments help close the books on a group that has been the subject of many questions during it’s existence.

Transcript:
Philadelphia Safe and Sound shut down in June after 10 years of working on programs to prevent youth violence. Mayor Nutter voiced concern about the group shortly after taking office, and vowed not to pay the outstanding bills, which totaled just under a million dollars. The mayor changed his mind in February. Shelly Yanoff of Philadelphia Citizens for Children and Youth says it was a good move.

Yanoff: “I think it is very important that these groups who did really good work who did it under the belief that they were going to be paid don’t suffer.”

Former City Councilman Angel Ortiz was part of the Safe and Sound assessment team. He says he believe the programs worked to prevent youth violence and should be enhanced and continued

The money for the checks came from unallocated money in the budget of the Department of Human Services.

Listen:
Click on the play button below or right click on this link and choose “Save Link As” to download. [audio: reports20090316safe.mp3]