Re-Arranging the Deck Chairs in Philly

The pique behind the scenes on DHS
Publicly silent, Mayor Street grew frustrated during days of meetings over child deaths. The result: Two officials gone.
By Marcia Gelbart, Ken Dilanian and John Sullivan
Inquirer Staff Writers

Last Sunday, Mayor Street sent an e-mail to his closest advisers.

He was disturbed, sources said, by The Inquirer's investigation into how his Department of Human Services had handled the cases of children who were later killed.

Day after day, Street said nothing publicly, even as lawmakers were calling for hearings and state regulators were swooping in for a review. Instead, as is his style, he hunkered down in meetings, conducting a methodical examination of child-death cases.

That was where Street grew frustrated, city officials said. He kept hearing that the rules were being followed - as he stared at files detailing the brutal deaths of helpless children. He finally decided he'd had enough.

There was a need, as he later put it, "for fresh eyes and a fresh approach."

On Friday, Street broke his silence in dramatic fashion by announcing the removal of two top officials at the department.

Commissioner Cheryl Ransom-Garner was asked to resign, and her deputy in charge of abuse investigations, John McGee, was fired. Street named Arthur C. Evans, Jr., who directs the city's mental health office, as acting commissioner.

"We think we can do better," Street said at City Hall Friday, in a tone more matter-of-fact than defensive.

And this action was followed by,...

Workers walk in protest
By Kera Ritter
Inquirer Staff Writer

Social workers at the Department of Human Services walked off the job Friday after learning that their boss, Commissioner Cheryl Ransom-Garner, had resigned and Deputy Commissioner John McGee had been fired.

The changes came just days after The Inquirer published stories about children who died after their families had come under the agency's scrutiny.

"The articles that have come out in The Inquirer really haven't told the whole story," said Cathy Scott, president of Local 2187 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents about 1,300 of the agency's 2,000-plus workers.

Employees returned to the building about 5 p.m.

At least 300 DHS workers marched in protest to City Hall, cramming the hallway outside Mayor Street's second-floor office about an hour after he announced the dismissal.

Hundreds of other workers spilled into the streets in midafternoon, blocking traffic. The state Department of Public Welfare, which oversees DHS, put its workers on alert to ensure the city child-abuse hotline was answered. But DHS workers who answer those lines remained on duty, Scott said.

One union official worried aloud that few staffers were at their posts. "We have 1,500 workers in a total uproar," said Rita Urwitz, in the crowd outside City Hall. "Hopefully nothing serious happens to a child this afternoon."

The TrekMedic pundits:

The Department of Human Services (there's a Philly oxymoron for you) is yet another patronage-filled office full of people collecting a paycheck and looking the other way. 40 years of social engineering brought the City to this point and laying off the top heads won't change a single thing!