Jerry Balka, lawyer, community activist, and prominent street vendor advocate, has died at 95

Jerry Balka, 95, formerly of Philadelphia, longtime lawyer, community activist, prominent street vendor advocate, veteran, and volunteer, died Thursday, Oct. 10, of pneumonitis at his home in Bala Cynwyd.

A graduate of Central High School, Temple University, and what is now the University of Pennsylvania’s Carey Law School, Mr. Balka represented the 3,000 members of United Vendors of Philadelphia in the 1980s and ’90s during contentious legal negotiations with city officials and other local business interests. His father and uncle sold fruit from a street cart when they first arrived in South Philadelphia from Russia, and Mr. Balka had a soft spot for vendors who were chasing their own rags-to-riches story.

“He felt lucky to have benefited from the American dream,” said his daughter Christie.

Some city officials and the Chamber of Commerce wanted to rewrite regulations to restrict street vendors in the early 1990s. So Mr. Balka represented the vendors in sometimes raucous City Council meetings for several years and eventually helped shape new rules. He even organized a day without street vendors to show the public what it missed without them.

He also represented the vendors in other business disputes and immigration cases. He partnered with the city’s Department of Public Health to develop a safety training program for food vendors and was so invested in their welfare that he ate two food-cart hot dogs for lunch every day for years.

“He knew the name and street corner location of every hot dog vendor in the city,” his family said in a tribute, “as well as the names of their family members, ages of their children, and where the latter were enrolled in school.”

He ran his own law firm from a Center City office for 53 years and spent the last 10 years as partner at Reger, Rizzo & Darnall. He retired in 2023. “We will miss his kind personality and desire to make the world a better place,” officials at RRD said in a tribute.

He spent four years as an assistant district attorney in the late 1950s, and his firm later handled real estate cases, estate planning, and all kinds of other local matters. He also served as general counsel for Prudential Savings Bank for decades and was corporate secretary and director at Dixico Inc. in the 1980s.

His heroes were civil rights lawyers and women’s rights activists. He championed diversity at Temple, took legal education classes just a few years ago, and studied critical race theory.

He enlisted in the Army after law school in 1953 and worked in a counterintelligence office in Philadelphia. “He was incredibly curious,” his daughter said. “He saw the law as an instrument to work for a better world.”

Jerome Roy Balka was born July 20, 1929, in Philadelphia. He grew up in West Mount Airy and knew every turn of every trail in Wissahickon Valley Park.

He was an Eagle Scout and pole vault champion at Central. He earned a bachelor’s degree in history at Temple in 1951, joined the Pi Lambda Phi fraternity, and served as its adviser and loudest advocate for more than 70 years. He never missed a Pi Lam reunion or banquet.

He won the fraternity’s Diamond Chip Council Key for meritorious service in 1971 and its Edward Goldman Alumnus Achievement Award in 1976. In the 1980s, the local chapter established the annual Jerome R. Balka Award for “exemplary conduct.”

“He cared deeply about values, responsibility, and accountability,” fellow members of Pi Lambda Phi said in a tribute.

He met Arleen Berg on the Boardwalk in Atlantic City, and they married in 1953. They had daughters Christie and Ellen and a son, Richard, and lived in West Mount Airy.

Mr. Balka was president of the West Mount Airy neighbors association, active with the Democratic Party, and he sometime canvassed in costume on Halloween with his children. He helped integrate West Mount Airy in the 1950s and ’60s, served as an unofficial legal adviser to many neighbors and friends, and made sure to recently return his 2024 election ballot.

“My father was at his best if there was a crisis to resolve,” his son said.

He liked to ski, hike, and play tennis. He loved ice cream and black-and-white milkshakes. He laughed a lot and enjoyed the joyful chaos of a full house, his family said.

He also lived in West Philadelphia, East Mount Airy, and Bryn Mawr. He made it a point to reside as close as possible to a Wissahickon Valley Park trailhead, and he took campers on hikes and overnights there as often as he could.

“He loved to share his love of the Wissahickon,” his daughter Christie said.

In addition to his wife and children, Mr. Balka is survived by six grandchildren, a sister, and other relatives. A brother died earlier.

Private services were held in October.

Donations in his name may be made to the Philadelphia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, Box 60173, Philadelphia, Pa. 19102; and Friends of the Wissahickon, 40 W. Evergreen Ave., Suite 108, Philadelphia, Pa. 19118.