Philly lawmaker proposes Zohran Mamdani-inspired affordability package | City Council roundup

City Council’s most progressive members are set to spend the fall pushing to pass several pieces of legislation aimed at what they consider an “affordability crisis” for Philadelphia’s lowest-income residents.

The effort is shaping up to be the most significant legislative package introduced to date by freshman Councilmember Nicolas O’Rourke, a member of the progressive Working Families Party. The legislation would:

O’Rourke is calling his initiative “Affordable Philly Now,” using language reminiscent of the New York City mayoral campaign run by Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist. Mamdani won the Democratic primary election there earlier this year on a platform focused on affordability.

His success, O’Rourke said, “is an example of the fact that this is an issue that cuts across the country.”

“It should be a lesson to those who are paying attention to those sorts of campaigns to see how the people are responding to that,” he said. “Of all the things that you could campaign on, why wouldn’t you campaign on the thing that the people are telling you they want you to address?”

Water, water everywhere, and not a drop for sale: To amend the Philadelphia Home Rule Charter to prohibit the future privatization of PWD, O’Rourke would first have to persuade voters to approve the change.

There is no publicly known major push to sell off the city’s water utility at the moment. But former Mayor Michael A. Nutter attempted to sell the city-owned Philadelphia Gas Works as recently as 2014. And private water providers have made inroads with smaller municipalities and counties in Pennsylvania.

O’Rourke — whose proposal calls for the “perpetual City ownership and operation of the City’s water supply system and facilities” — said he wants to proactively limit privatization and the “neoliberal corporatist playbook.”

“I would rather we get ahead of that. It has happened across the country. It has happened across the commonwealth,” O’Rourke said. “We have seen municipalities get in a pickle, then sell off the water to a private company, and as a result, rates go up. … I don’t want that situation to happen with Philly.”

But O’Rourke’s proposal might not be as simple as it seems. It’s possible, for instance, that the charter change would prohibit PWD from adopting the management model currently employed by PGW, which owns gas delivery infrastructure but contracts out management of the system to a city-controlled nonprofit, giving it some added flexibility.

Additionally, PWD already contracts out some tasks, and it is unclear if the proposed charter amendment would affect those practices.

A Parker administration spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the proposal.

Hoping for an introduction: Parker’s goal of building or preserving 30,000 units of housing in her first term was always going to be a heavy lift.

That goal could become even more daunting due to legislative delays that are threatening to prevent the administration from issuing its first tranche of bonds for the initiative until early next year.

When she unveiled the Housing Opportunities Made Easy, or H.O.M.E., initiative in the spring, Parker initially hoped to issue $400 million in bonds this fall. But when Council authorized the bond sales in a vote in June, it inserted a provision requiring the administration to get lawmakers’ approval of a resolution laying out the city’s plan for spending the bond proceeds each year.

» READ MORE: Council takes up Mayor Cherelle Parker’s $800M housing bond request — with a catch

The administration sent that measure to Council in July, but Council President Kenyatta Johnson did not circulate it with other members until last week. The $195 million draft first-year budget included $37.5 million for affordable housing preservation, $34.8 million for the Basic Systems Repair Program, and $25 million for Parker’s proposed One Philly Mortgage program. But members are still hashing out details on the plan, and no one introduced the resolution at Thursday’s meeting.

“We are still going through the process of reviewing it with my colleagues and just doing our due diligence before we move forward,” Johnson told reporters after the Council meeting.

Johnson declined to comment on whether the issuance of the bonds might be delayed.

Meanwhile, some Council members and the administration are engaged in a behind-the-scenes debate about the timing of the legislative process for the resolution and whether the administration has to wait for Council to issue the bonds. But it’s unlikely the city will move forward with a bond sale if lawmakers could still change the size of the initiative’s first-year budget.

» READ MORE: Mayor Parker’s $195 million plan for the first year of her H.O.M.E. initiative is drawing criticism about who will benefit

It remains possible Council could fast-track the resolution and approve it in time for the administration to issue the bonds this year. But it now appears more likely that the money will not begin flowing for Parker’s housing initiative until early 2026 — about two years before the end of Parker’s first term.

Looking ahead: While discussing a resolution honoring the Overbrook School for the Blind, Councilmember Curtis Jones Jr. praised the school, spoke about his struggles, and encouraged the city to be prepared to handle visitors with impaired vision next year, when Philadelphia will host several high-profile events, including celebrations for the Semiquincentennial.

Staff writer Jake Blumgart contributed to this article.