[NEWS] Sister Mary Scullion: Let DNC visitors see Philadelphia’s dark side

From Billy Penn:

With the Democratic National Convention in town this week, both the Democratic Party and the City of Philadelphia will do their best to put on a good show. For different reasons, they both want to highlight orderliness, competence, leadership, spectacle, entertainment, compelling drama, and hospitality.

It is normal for Philadelphians to want the convention to be successful and benefit our city, economically and otherwise. But in truth, the best way for Philadelphia to benefit from the convention may not be just to show delegates, press, and visitors our city’s best side, but also some of its worst.

Philadelphia, like most big cities — and in fact like most of the country — needs help. We still struggle with an obscenely high poverty rate. The fragile economic recovery of recent years has hardly trickled down to our poorest citizens, whose plight, if anything, is worsening. Many of our neighborhoods have been ravaged by the long-term economic violence of disinvestment.