The Worst Legislative Body in the World?

Alas, the legislative affairs of our city will have to wait: The first half of a session is typically consumed by ceremonial presentations for various local notables. Late last year, at the final meeting before Council’s five-week holiday recess — which shouldn’t be confused with its three-month summer break, its Presidents Day Week break, its Election Week break, its Easter Week break, its -Columbus Day Week break, or its Thanksgiving Week break — recipients include the first African-American mayor of York, the vice chairman of the local USO, and the outgoing Philadelphia district attorney. After each speech, members shuffle up to snap a formal photograph with the honoree. This turns out to be a problem: A few months back, the official Council photographers fell victim to budget cuts. At first, members didn’t realize it and awkwardly stood around as staffers took cell-phone snapshots. Aides now carry digital cameras to record the great events.

Finally, an hour or so in, it’s time for legislating. Sort of. Today’s session, in fact, will feature just one bill that passes with something other than a unanimous vote — which is one more than there’ll be in the next four meetings.

But the bill, blowing up the city’s much-maligned Board of Revision of Taxes, represents a triumph. A few months back, legislative action was declared a dead letter, as Council members fretted over axing the disgraced board’s 78 patronage staffers. But now, dozens of ceremonial resolutions later, it’s in place. The vote almost makes the preceding circus seem worthwhile.

THE REAL PROBLEM with City Council’s legislative record isn’t that the votes follow hours of goofy stagecraft. It’s that for many members, the official duties — the lawmaking — are secondary. Rather than wonky policy stuff, the stories that really light up Philly’s local pols are the ones that involve conferring a favor on someone in trouble. Like the tale of Bill Miller’s tuxedo.

It was New Year’s Eve. Miller’s tux was at the dry cleaner’s. And the dry cleaner had closed up for the holidays. So Miller, a savvy PR consultant, picked up the phone and called Marian Tasco, who just so happened to represent the dry cleaner’s district. “She called back and said, ‘Be at the cleaner around six,’” Miller recalls. The dry cleaner drove in from the suburbs, and Miller dressed up in black tie.

In a way, it’s an awful story. Imagine being the small-business owner summoned back to work by someone who could kill your zoning request. Are you going to say no? But Miller, who these days has a six-figure communications contract for Council, says it’s really a testament to a good local politician’s vast network of friendships. “Because she had helped the dry cleaner in the past, she was able to move mountains,” he says.

“We’re the first people who get called when there’s a problem,” Tasco explains. And if freelance problem-solving isn’t actually part of a Council member’s formal job description, it’s the task that animates pretty much every member, from do-nothing back-benchers to hardworking powerhouses like Tasco.