In a nod to our puritanical past, Mayor Nutter has tried public shaming as a way of squeezing delinquent taxes out of local scofflaws. He’s obviously not doing it right….What about stocks and a pillory set up on the mall near the Constitution Center? Or tattooing a big scarlet D (for deadbeat) on the foreheads of the worst offenders?
Putting their names up on the city’s Revenue website does not seem to be doing much good. (Despite the intimidating photo of Bernard Hopkins, who has had his own financial peccadillos). Monica Wilson is this year’s biggest offender at around a half a mill – and she owes more than she did last year, so clearly the mayor’s tactics are not having much effect on the worst malefactors.
On one level, you have to have a grudging respect for these tax renegades. They’re winning a game of chicken with a city that just blinks instead of taking any action. A city government who allows hundreds of millions of dollars to evade the city’s coffers may be the real miscreants. Maybe if we shamed THEM publicly, they might do their jobs…
It's hard to put any stock in what he's telling us...
