Welcome

First off, let me tell you that this is site is completely unofficial. I do not do this on behalf of any organization. I am not here to give you anyone's 'mission statement' nor tell you some spin. The organizations out there already pay plenty to have people do that, and none of them are me. However, in recognition of their efforts, I do include a link to them if you actually want some spin.

Pro-Workers

This holds two meanings. One is professional workers, which I feel we all are (and should be). The other is friendly to workers, which I don't really see much of out there anymore. (Hence the building of this place.) Now most people assume that when you're pro-something you're automatically anti-something-else, but I don't feel that should be the case. However, when all it says in the news is how Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA) is being held up as some kind of example to the rest of the world - I don't really see too much about the workers that are actually facilitating these positive changes. If the media-spin is to be taken at face value, these changes all occurred with the sweep of a pen alone.

And I think that's nonsense.

Our Side

The workers at PHA don't get the recognition they should for the job they do. Yes, you could say that the little 'thanks for everything' sentence fragment that gets put in those cute glossy newsletters they give us once a month is recognition that they get a little help with these innovative management strategies they're getting so famous for, but it's not. It's just a backhanded 'good for you making me look so good', and you'll find more sincerity in a car dealers convention than that newsletter.

You ever read the articles in those newsletters? They all follow the same basic format: Look at all these programs we're starting and running and oh, what successes they are because of us. And some people that might actually do the stuff, but they're not that important, really. Could replace them at any time. Easy.

You might think that this place is decidedly 'anti-management' but only if you enjoy being wrong.

See, management? They're PHA Workers, too. Forgot?

Believe it or not, management is a pretty tough gig. The workers generally hate you. The tenants generally hate you. And your bosses generally worry that you're going to steal their job, and hate you. Add in that you can't get what you need when you need it because of red-tape out the wazoo for everything more expensive than a stapler, and most of the vendors hate you because even more red-tape stops them from being paid immediately after providing goods or services. I know that I probably couldn't handle having the deck stacked against me that deep every day.

And when the bigwigs have those big meetings about what to do next, the supervisors are the same as anyone else. We're all pawns, only with different colored shirts.

Funny thing about pawns, though... You can't play the game without them.