Phila. City Council has the longest summer recess in the U.S.

The contestants have been polled, the results are in, and the winner for the longest city council recess in the country is . . . Philadelphia!

That's right. No other city comes close to Philadelphia's three-month recess, when no City Council meetings of any kind are scheduled.

Phoenix, which in recent years has nudged Philly out as the fifth-largest U.S. city, comes closest, with a break for most of July and August. Columbus, Ohio, comes in third at 48 days. New York, Indianapolis, and Memphis don't have a break. Houston gets a week.

Does Council do any work in the summer? Current and former members say yes, there is plenty of policy work, field research, and meetings in the districts.

"We don't take a break," Councilman Curtis Jones Jr. said during a Friday lunch meeting at Reading Terminal Market during which he went over a to-do list of more than 65 items, including preparing for this weekend's Block Captain Boot Camp.

Councilman Darrell L. Clarke, the majority whip, said summers had always been packed with things to do in the district. While an aide to then-Council President John F. Street, Clarke plastered fliers by day announcing street-corner meetings at night, and Street held court with constituents outdoors in a way he never had time for when Council was in session.

But there's no doubt that the pace slows down in summer, and Council members with beach houses are harder to find.

A number of members will say privately that the break, which began June 19 and will end Sept. 17, is too long and that one meeting a month is a sensible alternative especially when the budget, labor negotiations, and the future of the Board of Revision of Taxes remain unresolved.

"Based upon the current state of the city, with the crisis we seem to be facing, it is a legitimate concern that a coequal branch of government - and one that wants to be a coequal branch of government - is not in session," said Dan McElhatton, a councilman from 1992 to 1996.

Angel Ortiz, a councilman from 1984 to 2004, said Council should hold hearings on a number of critical issues, including the scenarios if state legislators refuse to approve pension changes and the 1-cent sales-tax increase required to balance the city budget. "If that doesn't happen, it will be like a tsunami that will hit the different neighborhoods, and I don't think the people are prepared for that," Ortiz said.

President Anna Verna has said Council is prepared to convene if needed to act on the budget. She had not returned to work last week after the death of her husband June 13. Clarke said he would hold hearings on stimulus money available to the city. Councilman Jim Kenney said he would hold informational hearings on issues facing returning veterans.

How did Council, which met semi-regularly during the summer until 1983, wind up with a three-month recess?

Street, a councilman for nearly 19 years before he entered the 1999 mayoral race, explained its origin via e-mail:

"The summer recess was started in the mid '80s primarily because there was NO business for Council to do. We found ourselves holding bills from one week to the next just to have something to vote on," Street wrote. "Public hearings were difficult to have as members of the administration, City Council, and witnesses were not generally available. Serious matters couldn't be considered because people were generally tuned OUT, not in, on local government. So having Council was more for show then real business."

Under President Joseph Coleman, Council noted that "very few other legislative bodies were in session 12 months a year," Street wrote. No transfer ordinances are generally needed at the start of the budget year, "and thus we instituted the practice." Council took heat as if it were taking a "10-week vacation," Street said.

Republican mayoral candidate John J. Egan Jr. at the time called Council "irresponsible" for its break. But over his 28 years in and around city government, Street said, "I can never think of a time when we benefited from having Council in session in the summer, and conversely I can never think of a time when we suffered because we didn't have Council in session in the summer."

Committee of Seventy president Zack Stalberg said he didn't believe that all Council members did nothing during the summer, "but I think many of them don't do very much."

He said Council should meet through the summer. "Every other organization I know doesn't stop doing business" over the summer. "This is one of the many things they could do to build respect for City Council and keep the government moving forward," said Stalberg.

Kenney said that he would meet every week if necessary, but that no meetings didn't mean he wasn't working. "I don't mind the use of the word recess," he said. "I bristle at the word vacation."

Councilman Bill Green said his staff had done some of its most important work last summer, amending his historic-interiors bill and researching other measures. To anyone who has complaints about the long break, Green offered some comfort and humor, quoting Benjamin Franklin: "No man's life, liberty, or fortune is safe while our legislature is in session."