Kenney taps immigrant, Harvard grad as city solicitor

Harvard-educated attorney Sozi Pedro Tulante may become Philadelphia’s next city solicitor.

Mayor-elect Jim Kenney said Tulante would bring a new attitude to the department.

“I think the tension between the Council and the solicitor will lessen because he will listen to them and get them to where they need to be, and he has full rein to do that,” Kenney said Monday. “This is not council versus the mayor.  This is all of us in the same boat, rowing in the same direction”

Before the announcement, Tulante, now a federal prosecutor, spoke or met with all 17 members of City Council who must approve his nomination.

“No one’s ever done that before the announcement,” said Tulante. “I knew that I also represent members of city council they are going to be my clients.”

Tulante and his family immigrated to the United States as political refugees in 1983 from the country then known as Zaire and now Democratic Republic of Congo.

He grew up in North Philadelphia and graduated from Northeast Philadelphia High School before going to Harvard University as an undergraduate, then Harvard Law.