As critical as I have been of The Philadelphia Inquirer, I should note when they do good reporting.

Half the money collected by candidates for Philly mayor comes from outside the city

Some candidates in the crowded Democratic primary field have relied more than others on money from outside Philadelphia than others.

by Aseem Shukla and Anna Orso | Monday, April 10, 2023 | 5:00 AM EDT

Philadelphia’s mayoral race has already drawn millions in fundraising. And half of it has come from outside the city.

Campaigns have already raised more than $17 million. Of that, $8 million comes from the candidates themselves. But an Inquirer analysis shows that of the $9.3 million given by actual donors:

• About half of the money, at least $4.4 million, comes from donors in Philadelphia.
• Roughly another quarter, at least $2.5 million, comes from donors elsewhere in the region.
• The remainder, at least another $2.1 million, comes from donors outside the area.
• A small fraction, under $100,000, came from small donations that campaigns don’t have to disclose, so the addresses of those donors is unknown.

Maria Quiñones-Sánchez recently withdrew from the race.

That there would be donors from the city’s suburbs is hardly surprising: many people who work in Philadelphia don’t live in the city themselves, but have a vested interest in how the city functions.

It’s interesting that former city Controller Rebecca Rhynhart McDuff is tied for the largest percentage raised from city residents, and has, by far, the smallest percentage raised from outside of the area. The Inquirer surprised me when, rather than the furthest left candidate, Helen Gym Flaherty, the Editorial Board instead endorsed Mrs McDuff.

But here’s the money paragraph from the newspaper:

More than the rest of the field, Helen Gym and Derek Green, both former City Council members, have raised money from donors outside the region entirely. Gym in particular has a national profile as a leading voice in the progressive movement, and has significant financial support from the American Federation of Teachers, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C. Over one-third of her money comes from donors outside the region.

The Inquirer previously reported that the city’s teachers’ union has been one of Mrs Flaherty’s biggest supporters. As we previously reported, Mrs Flaherty has earned her reputation of being a major supporter of public schools, but one of her notable successes, keeping Edward T Steel Elementary School from becoming a charter school, hasn’t worked out all that well, as it is ranked 1,205^th out of 1,607 Pennsylvania elementary schools, with 8% of students ranked as grade-level proficient in reading, and a whopping 1% as grade-level proficient in math.

So, why do I care? After all, I no longer work in Philadelphia and its suburbs, and don’t even live in Pennsylvania now. I care because I’ve seen the disastrous effects of big city liberalism, as the City of Brotherly Love has seen a tremendous spike in crime, with annual homicides more than doubling in fewer than ten years as the good people of Philly elected a mayor who is just plain tired of the job and a district attorney who doesn’t want to put criminals in jail. Chicago has suffered through the same things with outgoing Mayor Lori Lightfoot and State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, and just elected police-hating Brandon Johnson, who’s even further left than Miss Lightfoot to replace her as Mayor. Manhattan elected Alvin Bragg to be district attorney, and his chief assistant district Attorney, Meg Reiss has said, “We know incarceration doesn’t really solve any problems.” Me? I believe that our problem is not mass incarceration, but that not enough people are incarcerated, for not a long enough time.

One thing ought to be obvious: the criminal who is already locked up is not out on the streets, committing more crimes.

But Mrs Flaherty doesn’t seem to understand that. She strongly endorsed and campaigned with, George Soros-sponsored “restorative justice” District Attorney Larry Krasner, later saying, “I support reducing the prison population by 50% from 2019 levels. We must center transformative and restorative justice practices in Philadelphia.” She wants to do everything to increase public safety other than getting criminals off the streets! Yet Mrs Flaherty has been receiving a clear pile of money from public school teachers, who are the epitome of the socialist class, government employees who have no responsibility for actually being good at their jobs, and who seem to want to introduce every bit of #woke idiocy and sexual deviance to children.

The policies of the left, when put into government action, have proven to be actively harmful to our society and our civilization. That’s why I fret for Philadelphia, which is already suffering from such policies, and could well be poised to double-down on the stupidity.