Northwood Civic Association new 2012 board of directors, from L to R: President Joe Krause, member Gina Panchella, Vice President Frank Bennett, member Renee Hudson and member Lou Kubik. Not pictured: Treasurer Bill Rodebaugh.

New Northwood Civic Association board leadership was introduced Tuesday night, but a familiar voice took hold.

After a debate raged at last month’s meeting around the necessary quorum and other group charter rules surrounding the choosing of new board members, not a single vote was cast at the December meeting.

Instead, new civic president Joe Krause, formerly board vice president, said the board had largely remained the same, except for his promotion and a single new nomination. The group’s charter allows for board nominations to fill vacant seats, Krause said, so no vote was necessary.

Krause is replacing the outspoken and fiery Barry Howell, who retired from the board yet still grabbed the spotlight Tuesday, as he is known to do, by calling for an audit of the finances of the Historical Society of Frankford, something close to a neighborhood sacred cow.

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The historic Frankford Y should be forced into sale with civic approval and could be done so in orphans’ court, said an attorney and Northwood resident present at that neighborhood’s civic association meeting Tuesday night.

The 70-year-old Y, which closed in June 2009 and whose future has been uncertain since its controversial executive director died in January, was the subject of intense criticism from Northwood Civic Association President Barry Howell both at Tuesday’s meeting and last month, when the subject was revisited.

“We don’t know who really owns the thing and what’s going to happen, but I don’t believe we’re going to get the right buyer for that property because that right buyer doesn’t exist. They say the building is worth $1 million. I wouldn’t give them $100,000,” said Howell to a crowd of nearly 40 Tuesday night. “And while we wait for it to get figured out, I think someone is going to get raped, shot or killed in there.”

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Click to visit a larger version of the photo, taken by Joe Kaczmarek.

We knew Hurricane Irene would have an impact on the Northeast, only now are we started to get a better sense of what that impact was.

Above, photographer Joe Kaczmarek takes a shot of Northeast resident Hugh Owens, who just had his truck crushed at Solly and Castor. Find all of his work here, including a flooded Roosevelt Boulevard during Saturday night.

Sadly, though Owens was uninjured, as we reported this morning, a few people weren’t as lucky.

If you have photos, send them to info [at] neastphilly [dot] com, or use our Facebook or Twitter pages.

Below, we share some reader submitted videos and photos of Irene’s path.

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This is part of ongoing coverage in “District 172: The Politics of Change after State Rep. John Perzel,” a collaborative effort with Philadelphia Neighborhoods funded by J-Lab. During the election against his 30-year, incumbent challenger, Kevin Boyle says he changed the focus of his campaign. After hearing residents in a variety of the neighborhoods in the 172nd Legislative District he hoped to represent talk about poorly maintained nuisance properties owned by people not living in the community, Boyle made absentee landlords his signature issue. In fact, it’s that pivot to absentee landlords that Boyle credits with being a major reason behind his beating the legendary John Perzel, who, though facing corruption charges, had overwhelming name recognition. The topic was the first he publicly addressed after being sworn in as a freshman state House Democrat, alongside his brother, in January. It’s a topic he says that has not fallen from being a top priority. continue reading »

Disabled senior citizens were “snuck in on Christmas Eve” to a Northwood home bought in 2009 by Volunteers of America Delaware Valley, says that neighborhood’s civic association president.

“A year ago it was going to be a drug rehabilitation center and we fought it, now they’re putting the elderly in to get around the rules,” Northwood president Barry Howell told two dozen at Tuesday night’s meeting. “We’re not saying anything against the people they put in there, but we have a problem about them ignoring our deed restriction.”

The deed restriction, of course, is the decades-old Burk Deed Restriction that limits portions of Northwood real estate to remain single-family residences. It’s a zoning code add-on that has helped the neighborhood win nearly a dozen variance battles. Howell says the restriction will soon push the VOA operation at 4871 Roosevelt Blvd out, though it was partially city-funded and has government sanction as a necessary part of health services.

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District Attorney Seth Williams at the June Northwood Civic Association meeting.

Seth Williams says he doesn’t always wear his seat belt while driving.  Philadelphia’s District Attorney also says he was recently caught by a red-light ticket camera.

Lessons for enforcing driving in a town whose DA has broken a law or two can be implemented citywide. So Williams told 30 residents at Tuesday’s Northwood Civic Association meeting in the basement of St. James Church.

“It’s not the severity of punishment that changes behavior,” he said. “It’s the certainty of punishment.”

It was one of four hallmarks he gave for his developing administration, before taking questions from a community that has characterized itself in a quality-of-life war against blight and crime.

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At last night’s meeting of the Lawncrest Community Association, Councilwoman Marian B. Tasco presented a citation to Joseph Swing in honor of his 18th birthday. In the video below, Tasco explains the significance of the citation before the nearly 100 Lawncrest residents at the meeting sing happy birthday to Swing. continue reading »

Assistant District Attorney Michael Barry was one of many panelists at yesterday's hit-and-run hearing at Nazareth Hospital.

Senators, advocates and victims packed the Marian Hall Conference Center inside Nazareth Hospital yesterday morning to unite for a common cause. The hearing, hosted by Sen. Mike Stack and Sen. John C. Rafferty, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee, discussed hit-and-run accidents in the Northeast.

The hearing was used to formally introduce senate bills that would toughen and increase the penalties for hit-and-run drivers who flee the scene of an accident that results in injury or death.

“The tougher penalties will help deter people from fleeing an accident,” Stack said. continue reading »

Photo by Jennifer Reardon

The Heavy Hitta’s Boxing Club, located at 6000 Rising Sun Ave. in Lawncrest, had a boxing exhibition and gospel performance Tuesday night.

The newly formed boxing club was hoping to showcase its boxers and advertise its new club to the Lawncrest locals — all while supporting a good cause.

Chief Executive Officer Rick Terrell, 35, and his right-hand man, Chief Operating Officer Lonnie Haile, 42, met and started the club back in July 2009.   continue reading »

Two frequent topics of consternation at recent Northwood Civic Association meetings are being taken to court.

A pair of unanimous 18-0 resident votes urged President Barry Howell and his board to go ahead with plans to request an injunction on the opening of an addiction recovery facility on Roosevelt Boulevard and to sue the Frankford Community Y to open its financial records.

“We oppose this as much as you do,” State Rep. Tony Payton, who circulated a copy of a letter he sent to the city’s chief of the Department of Behavioral Health Arthur Evans,  expressing as much to, said of the opening of a Volunteers of America of Delaware Valley home on the 4800-block of Roosevelt Boulevard. Howell, Payton and others maintain that this in direct conflict with Northwood’s deed restriction.

“I think these court proceedings will bring to light that deed restrictions trump city zoning,” Payton said. “We certainly hope that’s the case.”

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