May 31, 2007 Issue                                       

©2007 The Chestnut Hill Local

Opinion

Hurrah for corporate smarts

Often when we read about corporate decisions they send us into a rage. Corporations lay people off. They move their headquarters (and taxpaying jobs) out of our city. They raise their rates. They discontinue products and services we need.

Sometimes corporate decisions simply challenge our perception of sound business practice. Locally, we’re all still scratching our heads over Wawa’s decision to close its Chestnut Hill location because there was “no room for growth.”

So it was refreshing last week to hear a corporate decision that was smart, responsible and really good for the community. Chestnut Hill Hospital will keep its OB/GYN department open despite the ongoing challenges it faces of securing reimbursements from insurance companies and ballooning OB malpractice insurance rates.

Even if you are not expecting a child, or know of no one having a child, this is a good development for three reasons.

First, Chestnut Hill has one of the most progressive OB/GYN departments in the region; it has become a favorite hospital for the practice of midwifery. In fact its reputation as a midwife-friendly hospital was no doubt a major factor in motivating the many local women who prefer midwife services to protest a potential close last month. It’s nice to know this practice will continue right here in our neighborhood.

Second, Chestnut Hill Hospital continues to be the largest employer in the neighborhood. People working in the neighborhood have lunch here and run errands at our local shops. It’s nice to know these employees are going to keep working in the neighborhood.

Finally, it’s just nice to know that babies will still be born in Chestnut Hill

That said, we should be wary of kicking back our heels, satisfied that Chestnut Hill and the local community that relies on Chestnut Hill Hospital has dodged a bullet. The challenges facing quality OB care here and around the state are serious.

If Chestnut Hill Hospital had closed its OB facility, it would not have been remarkable. Many other hospitals its size have been forced to do it, sending expecting mothers and their families to larger hospitals. It’s hard to believe, but something as fundamental as giving birth has become more and more difficult in Pennsylvania and across the U.S.

In a statement concerning keeping its OB facilities open, hospital CEO Brooks Turkel urged people to pressure their legislators to take actions to stabilize maternity and OB care in the state of Pennsylvania through initiatives like a state fund to help hospitals provide maternity care to women who depend on Medicaid.

We need to do that and more. Legislators here must work to stem the tide of diminishing OB resources and rising insurance rates that are driving other practices out of state or into insolvency.

The Hospital has made a tough decision, the right decision. We as citizens need to make sure that we don’t continue to live in a state and a nation that, despite its power and wealth, continues to be a place where fewer and fewer of us have quality health care.

Pete Mazzaccaro

Opinion: A good start
by Jim Foster
CHCA Board Member

It is just about one full year from what was arguably the most contentious election in the history of the CHCA, and possibly the one with the highest voter turnout (unconfirmed statistics on 1968 notwithstanding).

With issues of transparency and financial irregularities at the forefront, a group of dedicated minority board members and new faces challenged the entrenched narrow power base and won a completely unexpected major victory in what I like to call the community version of “DEWEY BEATS TRUMAN.”

But the Truman analogy might go even further when one considers that the American public, after electing a man from grass roots America to take broad-based remedial action and help build a more balanced post-1948 America, literally threw him out of office with a 23 percent popularity rating in 1952 because they did not like his medicine.

Winning 19 board seats in the 2006 CHCA election gave the opposition just enough power to craft an entirely new administration, but some members of the former administration were retained for balance. What was found after almost immediate resignations of the entire CHCA office and financial staff was an administrative and accounting train wreck even worse than imagined.

It took months of aggressive volunteer work just to get a handle on the finances, and then a bitter encounter with the trustees of the Community Fund over the sale of a continuous money-losing asset to offset years of reckless debt accumulation to cover financial shortfalls.

At the same time, constant conflict within the 50-member board (many from the previous administration) often hampered much-needed progress. A re-ignited dispute with a local developer only added pressure to this small cadre of volunteers trying to take remedial action that would last.

Much has been accomplished, but staying power and progress to build a more progressive Chestnut Hill, both as a community and a varied business destination, are essential to the future of this surviving urban community.

My read on one purpose of founding the CHCA in 1959 was to create a powerful alternative to the direction of city government. One might remember that formula and apply it to powerful private interests going forward. The community association and the business association should have common goals, but you can’t tell that from the current atmosphere.

Polarization also continues within the board itself, with more than a few long-term members unwilling to accept the facts about just how far off course the CHCA had wandered. Denial and pushing back only delays needed reform, but the major changes implemented should have staying power.

A new board of trustees for the Community Fund will go a long way in guarding the piggy bank. A fresh approach to independent audits and internal record keeping will keep board members accurately informed of the financial status, and hopefully encourage better oversight. By-law changes and remedial action toward transparency in posting meetings and agendas in accordance with requirements will help.

Most important, in my view, is our newspaper, the Chestnut Hill Local. It is one of the few remaining independently owned area newspapers that is not a manicured newsletter for special interests or a shadow of its former self owned by an out-of-area conglomerate that couldn’t care less if news or even spelling is accurate.

The multiple-award-winning Local almost became one of them, but through the efforts of this reform movement is back on track. Above all, this paper is the conduit for keeping a community alive and vibrant, despite the few who still seem to think the editor needs to be controlled.

Chestnut Hill, you are very fortunate, but make no mistake, maintaining this good fortune is hard work. The needs of Chestnut Hill in 2007 are far different from those of 1959, but convincing some folks of that is proving difficult. The “insider’s club” atmosphere should be replaced by broader and more inclusive community representation. A bylaw change to district representation serves all the residents. Board membership should be seen as much more than simple resumé enhancement. For those of us on the board and working in committees, it has been a most challenging year. I continue to recommend adult supervision.

Enemies of Reading: King of the Freaks
by HUGH GILMORE

When you live among more books than you can shelve, you have to round up the strays sometimes and move ‘em out. Yesterday’s sweep filled six boxes. I took them to the Salvation Army in Roxborough. By some miracle the handle of the last box tore as I pulled it from the trunk and the box fell to the ground and broke, the contents spilling. As I started to gather them up I saw a paperback, Very Special People, with its cover photo of an old familiar face.

Oh no, how’d that get in here? I thought.

The worker who was helping me reached for the book, but I grabbed it first.

“I’m going to keep this one,” I said, “I don’t know how it got in here.”

He opened his mouth to say something, looking slightly peeved as though I were stealing from charity.

Too bad. This book I’ll never give up. I laid it on the passenger seat of my car, pausing to look at the cover again, at the dignified man in formal clothes posing in a fancy chair for his portrait. Francesco Lentini.

Then I helped gather up the fallen books. Driving home, I glanced down at his picture a few times.

I was 19 and a summer carnival had pitched tent on a field near Colwyn. My friends and I walked over.

To today’s kids the word “Carnival” means their church or Rotary has set up some games of chance in a parking lot and is selling raffle tickets, but the carnival that came to Darby that night was one of the last of the old-time, luridly thrilling sideshow exhibitions to tour America. Everything about this carnival and its midway reeked of cheap hustle. The smells, the barkers, the noisy machinery, the loudspeakers. It had rained earlier in the day and it seemed appropriate that we walked in what half a night’s use had turned into mud.

Young men are drawn to noise, so naturally we sauntered over to the “Wheels of Death” show first. Inside a giant barrel a motorcyclist rode faster and faster until centrifugal force let him move up the barrel, round and round till he nearly rode over the rim. That was a thriller.

Afterward, we just walked around as a group, laughing and making fun of things as kids do, feeling the world would be ours soon so we should look over our possessions. The tent shows charged a separate admission, maybe only 50 cents or a dollar, but the charges added up, so we needed to be choosy.

Before a mid-sized tent a barker chanted to the crowd about another show. Bored, monotonous, entirely lacking enthusiasm but determined to draw us in he called, “TWO arms, FOUR legs, and SIXteen toes.”

We turned.

“TWO arms, FOUR legs, and SIXteen toes.”

“Whadda ya mean?” one of us asked.

“TWO arms, FOUR legs, and SIXteen toes,” the man said, aiming his voice over our heads, not even looking at us, wise to the ignorance of teenaged boys.

We paid 50 cents each and entered.

“TWO arms, FOUR legs, and SIXteen toes, step right up,” the voice droned behind us.

The tent was the size of a small chapel and would soon fill up with about 60 people. A few bare light bulbs overhead lit the crowd from the shoulders up, their lower bodies merging into a formless mass. Their heated breathing on a humid summer night made the air thick. No one knew what was coming, but whatever kind of act it was, my friends would make sure it turned to comedy. They were in a rowdy and boisterous mood. God forbid anyone should come out and sing, or … play a violin, or tell a sad story. They had moved up from the back to the small stage. I stayed in the rear, not certain I really wanted what I had just paid 50 cents for — the right to be a gawker at a freak show. I began to feel guilty. It’s okay to be curious about medical anomalies, but at a freak show there’s something so … raw … about the audience. I didn’t want to be one “them.” But I stayed and I’m glad I did.

Then, with no preamble, a man was on stage, sitting calmly in a chair. He was in his 60s and balding. He spoke in a clear, firm voice I easily heard in the back of the tent despite its conversational air. I could sense my friends start to wind up their wisecracks, but the tension left almost at once, as though a wave had built and curled and then disappeared before it could crash. Francesco Lentini overcame them with his otherworldly dignity and self-possession.

He stood so all could see. From his right hip a third leg, nearly as long as the other two, jutted at an angle. From that leg, near his knee, another foot emerged. “As a child,” he began, “I gave my parents such a fright, they sent me away to be raised by my aunt.” Everyone leaned forward to look.

“You see, I was supposed to be an identical twin, but the division was not complete and only this much of us developed.”

He’d been born near Palermo, Sicily, and moved to America when he was nine. He spoke clear, grammatical English with a soft Italian accent. For about 15 minutes he talked about his life, his mission as an educator — as he saw his sideshow life — and about the medical aspects of genetic deformities. He lectured about the importance of prenatal care for expectant mothers and the need for people to understand why others are physically different. By the time he finished his speech and self-exhibition I felt awestruck.

He asked if the audience had any questions.

People were hesitant to seem too curious. One of the guys up front said, “Yeah, you ever win a three-legged race?”

That got a lot of laughs so one of my friends chimed in with, “Yeah, you ride a tricycle?”

This was awful. I couldn’t stand it. I tried to think of a question that would allow him to show off his learning, his superiority to these yahoos. But all I could think of was to raise my hand, and when he pointed to me, make a statement.

I said what I said because I felt sorry for him. I wanted him to know that not everyone there was a lout.

I, only 19, wanting to console a 60-year-old man who’d worked tough carnivals for half a century, called from the back, “You’re an Italian with blue eyes, that’s a nice combination.”

Silence.

He looked at me.

If you could have lifted my occiput just prior, I’d thought: I’m Irish and blue-eyed. My girlfriend is Italian and brown-eyed. The week before I had met a beautiful girl whose father was Irish and mother Italian. This girl had lovely brown skin, dark hair, and blue eyes, my new ideal, just the child my girlfriend and I might have if we married. Okay? That’s where I was coming from. So that’s why I tried to make Francesco feel better by complimenting him on his blue eyes. Get the subject away from the leg thing, you know.

Only he said the worst possible thing he could have said, something that made my hair stand on end.

He said, “What?”

Oh my, how stupid I suddenly felt. The tide had suddenly receded, leaving me naked on a sandbar as a tour boat approached. I tried boldness. Loudly, separating each word, I said, “You’re-An-Italian-With-Blue-Eyes, That’s-a-Nice-Combination.”

He leaned forward trying to spot me in the crowd.

“What? I can’t hear you, come up here, please.” He seemed annoyed.

Everyone turned.

Finally, the freak show they’d paid to see.

They parted easily as I came forward, my face aflame, wanting to run but hoping my good intentions would save me.

Close enough to notice his nice shoe shine, I looked at him, his extra leg on a special stool, and mumbled fast as I could, “YoureanItalianwithblueeyes,thatsanicecombination.”

A lady nearby said, “What? You don’t like Italians?” and my friends started in with “Way ta go, Youueey” and I left the tent as quickly as I could without seeming to flee.

Ever since, I’ve had plenty of time to reflect. When I discovered Very Special People, by Frederick Drimmer, a book about “Human Oddities” with Lentini’s picture on the cover, I bought a copy. I treasure it. How it got in the Salvation Army box I don’t know, but I assure you it’s back on my bookshelf to stay.

I’ve often wished I could have sat in a quiet place and had a glass of wine or two with Signore Lentini. I would have explained what I meant that evening. And then, perhaps, the conversation might have drifted to more philosophical topics, such as the nature of human affliction.

Contacct Hugh Gilmore at gilmorebooks@yahoo.com.