So here’s something to do tonight if you’re short of cash, nostalgic or just into 1980s movies. A movie from the 80s will be screened outdoors at Drexel Park (32nd and Powelton) every Thursday (except July 4) from tonight until August 15.

Screening tonight.

Tonight you can catch Poindexter, Booger and the gang in the 1984 John Landis classic Revenge of the Nerds. Apparently there will be 1980s seat cushions available free while supplies last. We’re not sure if they are actually from the 1980s or they are day-glo colors or what, but they’re free.

The screenings start at dusk.

Future films include:

June 27 – Adventures in Babysitting
July 11 – Spaceballs
July 18 – Pee Wee’s Big Adventure
July 25 – Die Hard
August 1 – Batman
August 8 – A Nightmare on Elm Street 3
August 15 – The NeverEnding Story

Architect Cecil Baker discusses a proposed building plan for 4224 Baltimore Avenue. The plan essentially divides the structure into two parts, with retail space (beginning near his hand) running along 43rd Street and Baltimore Ave.) that would include residential units above and a larger residential section with underground parking (behind his head).

Developers unveiled a couple of possible design plans on Tuesday for 4224 Baltimore Ave., the vacant plot of land across from Clark Park. A key remaining question is whether the building owners, who have the right to start building whenever they want, will go for one of the proposals.

About 50 community members attended the public meeting Tuesday night at the International House on Penn’s campus to offer input on building proposals that include underground parking, retail, possibly owner-occupied condos and one catch – more units. The land owners, Clarkmore Group LLC, currently have a “by right” permit to build a 92-unit residential building with no retail and only six parking spaces. They could start building tomorrow if they wanted to, with no community input. Instead the firm hired U3 Ventures, a development firm headed by former University of Pennsylvania executive and neighborhood resident Omar Blaik, to come up with alternative building plans and present them to the community.

The proposals unveiled on Tuesday included a residential and commercial structure divided into two sections. The first, closer to Clark Park near the southeast corner of 43rd and Baltimore would sit on an angle, opening the entrance to the park and allowing many of the existing trees on the property to be saved. This section would include some 8,000 square feet of retail on the first floor that would front both Baltimore Avenue and 43rd Street. Under one plan, this section would be five stories. Under another plan, just two stories.  Continue Reading

West Philly resident Siduri Beckman, Philadelphia’s first Youth Poet Laureate, has aimed her pen at Gov. Tom Corbett and state Republicans for education budget cuts that have disproportionately hurt poorer school districts. In A Word from the Cripples, which she gave us permission to reprint below, Beckman, a graduate of Penn Alexander and a Masterman ninth grader, speaks for the city’s public school students, the ones most impacted by the cuts.

The poem has received national attention – for good reason.

A Word from the Cripples

by Siduri Beckman

Siduri Beckman (Photo by Albert Yee Photo and reprinted from the Generocity website.)

I’ve got something
to say.
It won’t take long
Just as long as it took you
to snatch everything away
One fourth of the body is
the leg
You have crippled us
Cursing us to hobble
all of our lives.

You see us as a problem
the classic class problem
INNER CITY streaked like mud across our faces
they’re all on the street anyway.

Thrusting fear
into our hearts
Why make us feel
so small
helpless
Forgotten by the people
whose duty it is to remember

Turn your back on your city
that chose not to choose
you
Because they feared
and now do all fears dawn true.

We will show ourselves to be
as formidable a foe
as all of those frackers
who you refuse to tax.

Dismiss us
We cannot vote.
But in this country
we can speak.

Lois Zucker, owner of Lee’s Hoagie House – a neighborhood institution. (Photo by Mike Lyons/West Philly Local)

Lee’s Hoagie House, a Walnut Street institution on the west edge of Penn’s campus for 28 years, is closing for good tonight at 10 p.m.

Lee’s owner, Lois Zucker, is retiring and a new restaurant is moving into the space at 4034 Walnut, which is owned by Campus Apartments.

Lois has run the business on her own since her husband Jan died 14 years ago. “He was the heart and soul of this business,” she said.

Lee’s is a licensed chain that once had several independently owned shops. Lois and Jan opened the Walnut Street location in September, 1985. Its closing leaves only two Lee’s shops left in the city. The rest are in the suburbs.

A possibility remained that Lee’s would stay open under another owner. But Campus Apartments, which owns the Lee’s property and is one of West Philly’s biggest landlords, “wanted a change” for the storefront location, a valuable property on a block that has nearly exclusively student housing, Lois said. The potential buyer of the Lee’s license is scouting other locations in the neighborhood.

It remains unclear when the new restaurant, which will specialize in chicken dishes and “savory pies,” will open. There will be extensive renovation to the space.

The Zuckers built their shop around the area’s student presence and Lois said that students returned to the shop long after they graduated.

“The kids now come back with their own kids,” she said.

Lee’s also delivered subs via Fed Ex to Philadelphians or Penn students who had moved out of the region. She recalled sending two hoagies to a woman in Texas who was pregnant.

“She said all she wanted was tuna hoagies from Lee’s,” Lois said.

So there are just a few hours left to get a Lee’s hoagie in the neighborhood. Be sure to thank Lois. She’s the one in the green Lee’s t-shirt and ever-present white apron.

By the way, they don’t have any of their iconic t-shirts left to buy. We asked.

– Mike Lyons

A mural at the Alexander Wilson School.

The Alexander Wilson School (46th and Woodland), which is one of two dozen public schools slated to close in a couple of weeks, is being eyed as a possible location for a charter school.

A public meeting has been scheduled for Thursday, June  13 beginning at 6 p.m. to discuss that possibility. Speakers will include Marc Mannella, CEO of KIPP: Philadelphia Schools and Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell. The meeting will be held at the 46th Street Baptist Church, right across the street from Wilson at 46th and Woodland. All parents, students and members of the community are invited to attend.

While the fate of most of the closing schools is unclear, it is likely that some of them will become independently run charter schools. Some 57,000 of Philadelphia’s public school students were enrolled in charter schools this year, about 37 percent of all students.

Begun in 2003, KIPP: Philadelphia Schools currently operates one elementary school, KIPP Philadelphia Elementary Academy, two middle schools, KIPP Philadelphia Charter School and KIPP West Philadelphia Preparatory Charter School, and one high school, KIPP DuBois Collegiate Academy. The company hopes to operate 10 schools in West and North Philadelphia by 2016, according to its website. Those plans include adding one elementary school per year between 2013 and 2015.

– Mike Lyons

Penn Alexander School parents and education advocates will hold a phone bank in the school’s cafeteria next Tuesday (June 11) to push for school funding as the school district’s “doomsday budget” took a step closer to reality last night with an e-mail from Superintendent William Hite to thousands of school employees notifying them of possible layoffs.

The phone bank, which is open to all parents (from any school) and community members, will be set up to call voters in key Pennsylvania districts. The goal is “to motivate voters to contact state representatives requesting increased, stable funding to all Pennsylvania public schools,” according to an announcement. The phone bank will run from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Babysitting will be provided.

A representative of Education Voters of PA will be on hand to give an overview of state education funding issues and conduct a mini workshop on how to make an effective call. They will also provide a list of voters to call. If you can’t stay for the phone bank, feel free to take a list of voters to make calls during the following days.

Be sure to bring your cell phone to the phone bank.

As parents step up pressure on legislators, Hite had the somber duty of informing a few thousand school employees of impending layoffs (see the text of his email below from The Notebook). The School Reform Commission (SRC) approved the “doomsday budget” last week that has no funds to pay for staff other than a head principal and classroom teachers at most schools. Art and music teachers would be laid off, as would librarians, counselors, school aides and other support staff.

The formal layoff notices reportedly begin to be mailed out today.

Some jobs could be spared if money can be returned to the budget. Mayor Michael Nutter proposed an increase in alcohol and cigarette taxes that could restore some funds to the school budget, but those have not yet been approved. The state legislature and Philadelphia’s City Council have yet to grant requests for additional funding.

Nutter and Hite were in Harrisburg earlier this week to make the case for the $120 million the District is requesting from the state.

“So one of the things we hear is that year after year after year the district comes asking for money,” Nutter said in a statement. “Well you’re right, because year after year after year the District doesn’t get what it has asked for, and when you shortchange someone, they have to come back year after year after year.”

Nutter told legislators that the $304 million the District is asking for ($60 million from the city, $120 million from the state and and $134 million in labor concessions) would bring it into alignment with a balanced five-year plan.

“This is the moment to solve this crisis so we’re not back here year after year after year,” he said.

Here is the text of Hite’s e-mail to school employees (from The Notebook):