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** 1. Chester County’s 13% tax hike blamed on ‘big ticket’ items — but budget tells a different story ([link removed])
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By Todd Shepherd

For two hours, the residents vented their anger.

“I know we’ve got a tremendous increase that’s being proposed to our taxes. I know what it’s like to struggle to make ends meet and the county, the state, the federal government — everybody has to deal with that. The problem here is the county can at the stroke of a pen, just get more money. You can impose that on every citizen that’s here. Myself and every citizen that’s here can’t do that. We have to seek other means. In other words, we’ve got to tighten our belt and we’ve got to cut the fat.”

Pat Carnevale wasn’t alone. He was one of dozens of voices expressing dismay and frustration last December as Chester County was on the cusp of approving a thirteen percent real estate tax increase — three times larger than the previous four percent tax increase in 2020.

Why It Matters. Just before casting his ‘yes’ vote, Chairman Josh Maxwell (D) said inflation and other minor issues had nibbled at the edges of the budget, but citizens could rest assured knowing most of the thirteen percent increase was really due to two “big ticket” items: a county-wide refresh of the radios used by every law enforcement agency in the 759-square mile county, and a series of upgrades to the county prison.

Despite Maxwell’s reasoning, a Broad + Liberty analysis of the last ten years of budgets for the county seriously undermines that rationale. The county disputes many parts of the analysis, which will be generously incorporated into the story.

The analysis shows for the millions of dollars devoted to prison upgrades, much of that up-front capital was provided by a bond sale — in other words, the county took on debt, and would be paying it off over the course of several years.

As for the radios, a sizable chunk of the money set aside for that category of spending in the budget was coming from federal and state grants.

Continue Reading ([link removed])


** 2. Shapiro sends $5M grant to mosque that called Jews the ‘vilest people’ ([link removed])
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By Daniel Greenfield

Gov. Josh Shapiro attended an iftar dinner at a mosque where an imam had previously declared that “Jews are the vilest people,” and announced a huge grant for the hate mosque.

The $5 million grant, described as the largest ever given to a Muslim institution, came only five years after the Al-Aqsa Islamic Society in Philly was forced to apologize for postinghateful Islamic sermons ([link removed]) by an imam delivered at its mosque declaring that the Arabs were superior to all races, that Jews were the “enemies of Allah” and the “vilest of all people.”

Why It Matters. According to Gov. Shapiro, who is Jewish, however the massive $5 million grant was necessary because “as we’re facing tumult overseas, and we’re facing a lot of rising hate here at home.”

The $5 million giveaway could also be seen as a kind of political payback since Marwan Kreidie, the director of the Arab American Development Corp, is a spokesman for the mosque and had come to Shapiro’s defense during Kamala’s “Veepstakes” when he was being accused of “Islamophobia.” Kreidie wrote an op-ed claiming that Shapiro had phoned to check on him the day after the Oct. 7 attacks, hates Netanyahu and is angry over the deaths of Muslims in Gaza.

Continue Reading ([link removed])


** 3. Lightning Round
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* Guy Ciarrocchi: Philadelphia’s ‘secret voucher program’ ([link removed])
* Beth Ann Rosica: Dear President Trump, please use your superpowers for good, part two ([link removed])
* Dwight Evans violates STOCK Act with Tesla, Amazon trades ([link removed])
* Paul Davis: Beware of government impersonation scams ([link removed])
* Eric Tuwalski: Philadelphia can help provide for the common defense ([link removed])
* Robin Heller: Biden’s last-minute tax regs threaten small businesses ([link removed])


** 4. What we're reading
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A new report this week from BlueStateRed ([link removed]) breaks down the 2024 election in Pennsylvania and makes for fascinating reading for anyone interested in the massive shifts in voter sentiment and the emerging party realignment. BlueStateRed principal (and Broad + Liberty co-founder) Albert Eisenberg breaks it all down, showing how racial, religious, and ethnic minority voters shifted rightward like never before, delivering the presidency and Congress to Republicans in 2024.

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With gratitude,

— The Editors at Broad + Liberty
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