A healthy dose of 'realpolitik' for City Council

It's an old truth of politics: A looming election has a way of focusing the mind.

That truth, as much as the organized efforts to halt the plan for gambling halls in Fishtown and South Philadelphia, explains yesterday's City Council vote approving a referendum that would effectively ban the casinos.

The measure is slated for the same May 15 ballot as the races for mayor and for all 17 Council seats. So yesterday's unanimous vote, observers on both sides of the issue said, boiled down to an effort by incumbents to make sure they survive that plebiscite - no matter what fate ultimately befalls the legally dicey referendum.

"I think that it's an unfortunate vote," said Mayor Street, who supports casinos. "It's the kind of thing that happens when members are focused on the next four years."

That's exactly right, concurred a vocal casino foe.

"We put the fear of God into them," said Vern Anastasio, who is challenging incumbent Frank DiCicco in the district hosting both proposed casinos, Foxwoods in South Philadelphia and SugarHouse in Fishtown.

Though DiCicco sponsored yesterday's measure, Anastasio claimed some credit for pushing DiCicco into the anti-casino corner by insistently attacking the incumbent as being insufficiently opposed to slots.

DiCicco, naturally, saw it differently. He said he had been working for 16 months to finesse a way for the city to tap gambling's economic benefits without allowing casinos to wreak the havoc foes claim they will cause in neighborhoods. DiCicco said he embraced the referendum out of frustration with Harrisburg's refusal to allow Philadelphians a say in the process that regulates casinos.

"We are the last line of defense," he said.

As for the timing, DiCicco said it was just about getting a measure approved before casino construction starts.

But the impact on the veteran Democrat's electoral prospects were clear as soon as the Council session ended, as constituents sporting anti-casino posters approached to congratulate a councilman whom many of them had, until recently, called a foe.

Some of their signs read: "We will remember you on Election Day."

The only Council member other than DiCicco who spoke before the vote was Jannie Blackwell, who said she favored gambling because she saw it as an alternative to more taxes. Blackwell, who said she worried that a riverside casino would hurt the port and take jobs from longshoremen, asked DiCicco for a delay in the vote.

But when he refused, she voted with him, part of a Council tradition of deference to the member whose district is affected by legislation.

The vote marked the second time in as many months that a possible backlash from self-styled reformers has sparked rapid action in Council.

In February, Councilman Jim Kenney, a close DiCicco ally, abruptly tabled an effort that would have essentially undone the city's campaign-finance laws. Kenney said the change was necessary to help candidates compete with self-financed millionaires like mayoral hopeful Tom Knox.

But in an angry demonstration at City Hall, a slate of candidates challenging incumbent Council members denounced Kenney's plan as a back-door effort to undermine reform. They vowed to get even at the polls. Many of those activists are also prominent in anti-casino efforts.

Kenney yesterday said the activists had overstated their impact on the casino vote.

"It's not about the NIMBYs, it's not about the activists, it's not about the Council challengers," he said. "We had to do this because our state reps let us down."

But while the contentious politics of gambling have left pols like Kenney dejected - "I don't care if we ever get gaming, to tell you the truth," he said in an interview - the experience has energized the anti-casino candidates, who vowed to tap their newfound energy at the polls in two months.

"What a tremendous victory," exulted Matt Ruben, a leader of the Northern Liberties Neighbors Association and an at-large City Council candidate. "I finally know what it feels like to win in Council."

Daniel Hunter of Casino-Free Philadelphia noted that a half-dozen anti-casino activists are running for Council.

"We really do believe that this process will actually come up with a better solution," he said.