Allentown Afterthoughts

For once, I’m glad that Bernie O’Hare at LV Ramblings has passed along a press release, Pravda-style. (Bernie, whom I like and respect, slips into campaign flack mode when a favored candidate is up for election.)

In a post yesterday, O’Hare celebrates that Charlie Dent, the GOP congressman up for re-election for PA’s 15th, won the endorsement of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The U.S. Chamber’s endorsement is–should be–the kiss of death. The U.S. Chamber is one of the vilest–as in evil–lobbying outfits in American politics. (The Club for Growth and the National Association of Manufacturers are close contenders). There is no better-funded, more patently self-interested special interest out there–and in the U.S. Chamber’s case, that special interest is big business.

Name your issue–global warming, the fight against corporate welfare, union rights, campaign finance reform, financial regulation–and the Chamber is on the wrong side. And fighting hard, with astroturf groups and boardrooms full of money. (For details, see Sourcewatch.) The big-business front is currently spending millions to gut the financial reform bill working through Congress.

The U.S. Chamber benefits from a fortuitous conflation with the thousands of autonomous, local Chambers–including the excellent Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber–many of which work on behalf of small businesses and even the community at large. Not the U.S. Chamber. If Dent’s good enough for the Chamber, then I plan to work that much harder for John Callahan.

TC Salon-Spa opens today in the old Shanty’s space on 19th Street between Allen and Tilghman. No word yet on the restaurant that will share the space with the salon, but owner Frank Shipman plans an announcement “shortly.”

Via the West End Alliance

Nice to see an upbeat story on Allentown’s public schools–which do pretty well considering the challenges they face and the unconscionable funding disparities with nearby districts. The Call’s Steve Esack reports on the new Space Center at Harrison-Morton Middle School:

The space center occupies two second-floor classrooms and features movie projectors, computers and televisions, allowing students to remotely control robots in a Mars-like setting in a basement boiler room.

Lee Butz–probably the biggest private-sector champion of Allentown public schools–and his construction company helped out.

Nice Call piece on Healthy Youth Peer Education (HYPE), a media education program that works with center city Allentown teens. The idea is to transform them from passive media consumers to active media producers:

[Two participants] remembered one session when they learned how to analyze advertisements and commercials to look at the psychology behind selling products. ”We broke down how they try to sell things to you,” said Rodriguez, a junior at Dieruff High School. ”I’ve never looked at a commercial the same since.”

The program was started by Lora Taub-Pervizpour, my colleague in the Media and Communication Department at Muhlenberg College.

UPDATE: Thanks to a helpful comment, I have learned that HYPE began at Lehigh Valley Health Network 5 years ago. Muhlenberg and Taub-Pervizpour have been partners along the way.

From the WSJ’s Speakeasy blog:

Tribune Co. has unveiled plans for a third round of top executive bonuses, nearly $15 million, bringing to more than $72 million the amount of pay enhancements the media company handed out while operating under bankruptcy protection.

Meanwhile, the Lehigh Valley has lost more than half of its Morning Call reporters.

The LA Times on historic preservation and green building:

Many building professionals will tell you: The greenest home is the one that’s already built. The energy costs of mining raw materials, manufacturing them into construction products and building them into houses far exceeds the “embodied energy” of existing homes.

A good reminder: Living in historic urban houses in Allentown or any other city is far greener than solar-roofed eco-chic dwellings out in the suburbs.

Splashed below-the-fold in today’s Call: “Voices multiply for Sestak to come clean.”

Come clean? Doesn’t that imply that Sestak has done something dirty–in need of cleansing?

The White House offered him a job to drop out of the race. Sure, I’d like to know the details–but Sestak’s cleanliness is not at issue here.

Interesting, balanced piece in todays New York Times on official “arts district” designations (complete with tax breaks), through the lens of a Baltimore neighborhood.

RenewLV, the local smart growth group, is hosting one of its excellent brown-bag sessions on Bicycling in the Lehigh Valley:

• THIS Friday, May 21st
• noon to 1:30pm
• Allentown Center Square (Community Room)
• 15 N. 7th St., Allentown

Speakers include:

• Steve Schmitt, Coalition for Appropriate Transportation (CAT)
• John Schubert, Pennsylvania Pedalcycle & Pedestrian Advisory Committee
• John Sharpe, Bike Allentown

$500k grant from the state for recycling.

Via Valley 610