Office Of The Mayor
Thomas M. McMahon


Mayor’s Report To City Council
April 10th, 2006

McMahon Plan for Reading

This administration will continue to address issues coming to the forefront of my attention in terms of the four major tenets of the McMahon Plan. The major elements of the plan are:

1. Tackling Crime and Public Safety issues
2. Creating economic development opportunities and family supporting jobs
3. Building neighborhoods
4. Getting the City’s finances in order

The Mayor cannot be at the Council meeting this evening as he had a late afternoon appointment with Mayor John Brenner of York and Mayor Stephen Reed of Harrisburg to work on slum and blight legislation which will benefit all of our communities.

Crime and Public Safety

As many of you know, Police Chief Heim did an excellent job in his presentation of the crime plan to the public last week. For those of you who may have missed the presentation, it is on the City of Reading’s website. You can view it by clicking here! Efforts are now being made to look for additional funding and grants to support some of his new programs.

Economic Development

1) The groundbreaking of the new housing development of market rate housing on Penn Street will be Thursday, April 27th at 10:00 a.m. hosted by the City, the Reading Housing Authority and the developer. Our thanks to Adam Mukerji and Dan Luckey for putting together this project which will aid in our Penn Street corridor effort.

2) I had the opportunity to attend the conference on “Reinventing Older Communities” put on by the Federal Reserve Bank last week in Philadelphia. Just as we are looking at the downtown revitalization in the form of an destination corridor here in Greater Reading with the ICGR project, many communities are actively engaged in economic recovery and it is good to share ideas and best practices for everyone’s benefits.

Neighborhoods

The 13th Annual Great American Clean-up will be held on Saturday, April 22, 2006 beginning from Reading Area Community College at 8:00 – 12:00 P.M. Register by calling Vicki Sylvain at 610-655-6277 or e-mail at vicki.sylvain@readingpa.org

This is a tremendous opportunity to get outdoors with your family or friends and contribute service hours to beautify our community.

1) Last Wednesday, at a Mayor’s Mega Meeting at the Kesher Zion Synagogue, we announced the new Mayor’s Neighborhood Matching Grants (MNMG) program, which provides funding to assist neighborhoods in undertaking projects to improve the quality of life in their communities. The MNMG program is designed to provide Reading’s neighborhood organizations with grants of $500 to $2,500 to implement projects that address neighborhood needs and improve the quality of life in Reading’s neighborhoods. Neighborhood or resident organizations, whose primary purpose is neighborhood enhancement and development, may apply for a Mayor’s Neighborhood Matching Grant (MNMG). To qualify, eligible organizations must:

a. be located in the City of Reading city limits;

b. have a majority of the organization’s members living or operating a businesses in the neighborhood;

c. not discriminate and actively seek membership from neighborhood residents;

d. represent its neighborhood and have democratically elected officers;

e. be an active member of the Reading Council of Neighborhoods

f. have been organized for at least six months before applying for a grant.

Finance

1) Management Partners have finalized their review of both the Finance Department and the Police Department Operations Analysis and will be briefing the Administration and Council tomorrow evening at 5:00 p.m. in the Penn Room.

Upcoming events:

Earth Day will be celebrated in the City of Reading on April 23 from 12:00 – 5:00 p.m. in Centre Park.