Southwest Philly residents want to fight neighborhood blight, but say they need the city’s help

It would be hard to imagine a vacant lot of abandoned cars, tires, and trash lasting long in Center City before it got taken care of. But a group of Southwest Philly residents say that’s exactly what’s happening in their neighborhood.

Their relatively new group, the PA Solidarity Project, cataloged roughly 50 instances of blight over the spring, including abandoned cars and houses, illegal dumping, and potholes, and reported them to the city in early June. Longstanding blight is a common concern in the neighborhood, they said. But the city has only taken action on about half of those reported problems since then, the group said.

“In other zip codes this wouldn’t be allowed,” said Andrew Coates, 67, a block captain and Southwest Philly resident for over 30 years. He referenced a recent story by the Philadelphia Citizen, which found higher-income zip codes tend to get their 311 requests addressed more than 50% quicker than lower-income areas like Southwest Philly.

Coates stood in front of the intersection of Paschall Avenue and South Vogdes Street on Thursday, where a vacant lot held several abandoned and busted cars, oil jugs, overgrown weeds, and other trash. He said the constant signs of blight weigh on everybody, and younger generations see them as an expected part of life in Southwest Philly.

“If you’ve grown up and this is all you’ve seen, you think it’s normal,” he said. The PA Solidarity Project aims to break that perception, and said it needs the city’s help.

“We’re resolute about this. … We want the transformation,” he said.

The PA Solidarity Project formed last fall, and began its work by surveying Southwest Philly residents to identify common issues they could act upon together. Blight was a common response, with residents highlighting how the neglect impacted their quality of life. Several auto shops tend to be the source of the abandoned cars and illegal dumping, residents said.

» READ MORE: Thousands of abandoned cars are reported in Philly each month. Getting that number down is a challenge.

“I’m talking about what our children have to see walking down the street. … They send a message that somehow this neighborhood doesn’t much matter,” said Morgana Jackson, 60, another member.

“Southwest Philadelphia matters,” she said.

But residents individually had mixed results submitting requests to 311, and decided the group, which has a small core of about six residents but has gotten about a hundred involved with various activities, needed to act collectively, the organization said.

“When residents report a problem and nothing happens … I believe that shows a lack of respect,” said Towanda Robinson, 56, a PA Solidarity Project member.

The residents conducted a sweep of the neighborhood to note the most troublesome areas and examples, and presented their catalogue of about 50 blight items to representatives from the city’s Neighborhood Community Action Centers program in early June. The initiative is designed to serve as hyper-local city halls in each City Council district, where residents can file complaints, receive benefits, or resolve problems with a city agency.

Group members said they believed the city was receptive to their concerns over multiple meetings, and were encouraged by the city’s promise at a late-June community meeting to put together an action plan for Southwest Philly.

But since then, only about half of their cataloged requests have been addressed, and smaller but noticeable signs of neglect remain. While the residents said they appreciated the work the city has done so far, it hasn’t been enough.

They said they are particularly frustrated since Mayor Cherelle L. Parker has spoken openly about tackling cleanliness and quality of life issues, but the push doesn’t feel like it has reached their corner of the city yet.

City spokesperson Keisha McCarty said the Neighborhood Community Action Centers program has received reports of 16,578 issues citywide from constituents from October 2024 through August 2026, and it has resolved 94% of them. In the district that includes Southwest Philly, 92% of issues have been resolved, McCarty said.

One explanation for the delays addressing the PA Solidarity Project’s full catalog is that a handful of the issues require coordination with the school district and with Verizon to address a wire box, according to McCarty.

Still, “it’s disheartening,” when blight persists, Coates said.

On Thursday, the PA Solidarity Project held a small event in front of the Paschall and Vogdes lot to call attention to the longstanding blight, and called the city to act. The residents who spoke were adamant that they and their neighbors care about the area, and are willing to do their part to fix the problems — Coates and other residents take it upon themselves to do street cleanups in the neighborhood from time to time.

“People do care about this and people want it addressed. But people are limited about what they can do. … They can’t do what the city does,” Coates said.

Jackson said she and the others point out the better care other neighborhoods receive not to argue those blocks deserve less, but instead to argue every zip code deserves equal attention.

“Because we love it, we refuse to accept the idea that blight is something we have to live with,” Jackson said.