Philly Council’s vote to green-light the 76ers’ arena plan revealed new power dynamics and reaffirmed old truths

City Council’s preliminary vote last week to approve the 76ers’ Center City arena plan was the most contentious legislative battle since Mayor Cherelle L. Parker and Council President Kenyatta Johnson took office in January.

The wrangling over the vote revealed some new power dynamics in Philly politics and reaffirmed some old truths.

» READ MORE: City Council members approved the 76ers Center City arena proposal in a preliminary vote

Council’s Committee of the Whole, which includes all members, approved the legislation authorizing the arena in a 12-4 vote, with Councilmember Kendra Brooks, who opposes the arena, absent. The legislation is slated for a final vote on Thursday, Council’s last session of the year. Because a majority of members have already voted for the arena in committee, it is all but guaranteed to be approved.

Here are some key political takeaways from Council’s big vote on the arena.

At the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98’s holiday party on Friday, a sign hung at the entrance with pictures of all 17 Council members.

Five had red X’s drawn over their faces: the members who didn’t vote for the arena.

» READ MORE: How Philly City Council members voted on the Sixers arena

“It’s real simple,” said Mark Lynch Jr., business manager for Local 98. “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.”

The Philadelphia Building Trades and Construction Council, a coalition of more than 30 unions that includes the electricians, spends millions on city and state politics, and they generally win. That’s why most Philly politicians try to stay in their good graces.

The trades played a critical role in electing Parker and her predecessor, Jim Kenney, to the mayor’s office, and they helped Johnson win the top spot on Council last year.

The unions looked like they might take a back seat in Philly politics for a little while after their former leader John J. Dougherty, longtime Local 98 business manager, was convicted on federal corruption charges in 2021. But “Johnny Doc” was replaced by the Laborers’ District Council’s Ryan Boyer, a Parker ally, and the trades haven’t looked back.

Comcast owns the two tallest skyscrapers in Philadelphia, and its glassy towers loom over City Hall — reminders of the cable and internet behemoth’s importance as the only Fortune 100 company in town.

But Comcast didn’t cast a long enough shadow to change Parker or Council members’ minds about the arena.

Comcast Spectacor, a subsidiary, owns the Flyers and the Wells Fargo Center and is the 76ers’ current landlord. The Sixers are hoping to leave the South Philly arena for a home of their own when their lease expires before the 2031-32 NBA season, and Spectacor is likely to lose out big time from the move.

In addition to missing the 76ers’ rent, the Wells Fargo Center will face competition for booking concerts from the new arena and is even likely to see a substantial decrease in the value of the naming rights of the building, given that it will only be home to one major sports team.

Spectacor lobbied intensely against the 76ers’ efforts to leave South Philly, but it came up short. The deal negotiated between Parker and the 76ers even included a “competing facilities” provision that would likely prevent Spectacor from receiving city subsidies if it ever needs to build a new home for the Flyers.

A Spectacor spokesperson declined to comment.

In the 2023 election, the number of Council members with strong ties to Philly’s progressive movement grew from three to four, opening the door for a left-leaning caucus to grow its influence over the body.

All four ended up opposing the arena, primarily because they were concerned about the potential for the arena to displace neighboring Chinatown. But in negotiations, those members operated as two separate pairs instead of a bloc of four.

Brooks and Councilmember Nicolas O’Rourke, who represent the progressive Working Families Party, publicly opposed the project for months and worked closely with the Save Chinatown Coalition organized to fight the project.

Their public opposition mostly sidelined them from negotiations about the deal, but in the final days of talks, they pushed for Council to require the 76ers to increase the amount they paid into the project’s community benefits agreement from $50 million to $300 million.

“It was said best in Council: ‘This whole thing is a sellout deal.’ But this fight is not over,” Brooks and O’Rourke said in a joint statement, referencing a line activists chanted in Council chambers as the committee approved the arena. “We will explore every option at our disposal to continue making the case to all of Philadelphia that this is a bad deal for the city.”

Councilmember Jeffery “Jay” Young Jr., a Democrat who is not close with the progressive movement, at times worked with Brooks and O’Rourke and also voted against the project.

» READ MORE: How Philly City Council members voted on the Sixers arena

Meanwhile, Councilmembers Jamie Gauthier and Rue Landau, both progressive Democrats, declined to take a stance on the arena until the last minute, and ended up being the only true swing voters on Council.

Despite a majority of Council members being all but assured to vote for the project, Johnson and Parker wanted to run the score up as high as possible. Landau and Gauthier, who most expected to oppose the arena, signaled they might vote yes if they could improve the deal by getting significant resources for Chinatown, such as a $100 million version of the CBA that Johnson floated at one point but never brought up for a vote. Another possibility was if Council embraced an anti-displacement plan circulated by the Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation.

In the end, Johnson capitulated to the 76ers’ last best offer of paying $60 million into the CBA, and Gauthier and Landau had no reason to back the deal.

» READ MORE: Inside the 76ers arena agreement approved by Philly City Council members

It’s not hard to see why the two pairs of progressives diverged. Brooks and O’Rourke occupy Council’s two seats that are reserved for minority party candidates or independents. Their base of support is firmly on the left, and their reelection chances hinge on beating Republicans, not Democrats. Opposing the arena was an easy choice.

Landau and Gauthier, meanwhile, have more complicated political terrain to navigate. Both enjoy support from progressive groups, but also have to compete against more centrist Democrats and win over voters outside the far left.

They were in a tough spot. By voting against the arena, they would earn the ire of the deep-pocketed building trades unions and Democratic establishment. By voting for it, they would anger activists on the left, some of the most energized political organizers in the city.

In the end, their choice was also made easy, thanks to the 76ers’ insistence on paying no more than $60 million into the CBA and the relatively small amount Chinatown got out of the deal.

“It is deplorable to learn the 76ers and their billionaire owners think our communities are worth only $60 million over 30 years,” Gauthier and Landau said in a joint statement of their own. “The final deal does not do enough to offset the harm the arena will inflict on Chinatown, Washington Square West, the Gayborhood, and communities across our city.”

» READ MORE: As Chinatown advocates see ‘betrayal’ in 76ers arena win, others see economic opportunity for Philadelphia

Parker spent the first nine months of her tenure all but ignoring the contentious debate around the arena, only to launch a three-month blitz to get it over the line before the end of the year.

Her gradual-then-sudden approach to the project was unconventional. But it worked.

Parker’s administration for months held up the release of impact studies on the project that were commissioned under Kenney. And despite the widespread assumption she would end up backing the project due to her relationship with Boyer, the mayor didn’t officially endorse the arena until September.

Then came the full-court press. Parker held a three-hour event to reveal the details of the deal she had negotiated with the 76ers, organized a series of town halls across the city to sell the project, and had her deputies and commissioners testify in favor of it in extensive Council hearings. On the day before the vote, Parker personally lobbied lawmakers, going door-to-door between Council members’ City Hall offices.

In retrospect, the arena’s fate was secured as soon as Parker won the Democratic mayoral primary in May 2023.

As if to drive home the truism that elections have consequences, former Councilmember Helen Gym, who lost to Parker in last year’s mayoral election, attended the committee meeting when lawmakers advanced the arena legislation. A longtime champion of Chinatown, Gym could have killed the project if she won the mayor’s race.

But it was Parker’s day.

“City Council took monumental action on this $1.3 billion economic development project for Philadelphia that, as I have consistently said, extends far beyond the basketball,” Parker said after the vote.