Wilson Goode
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Willie Wilson Goode (born August 19, 1938) was the first African-American mayor of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who served from 1984 to 1992, a period which included the controversial MOVE house action in 1985. Goode was also a community activist, commissioner for the state Public Utility Commission, and managing director for the City of Philadelphia.
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[edit] Early Life
Goode was born into a family of tenant farmers in North Carolina. Arriving in Philadelphia in 1954, Goode promptly plunged into the life of the city. After graduating from John Bartram High School, he earned his degree from Morgan State University. After serving as a neighborhood leader, co-founder of the Black Political Forum, and manager of the unsuccessful 1971 mayoral campaign of State Representative Hardy Williams, earned a master's degree in government administration from the Fels Institute of Government [1] at the University of Pennsylvania.
[edit] Service with the Public Utility Commission
After African-American state senators complained that there had never been an African-American member of the state Public Utility Commission (PUC) [2], Governor Milton J. Shapp began actively searching for one. His aide, Terry Dellmuth, knew Goode from his community and political activities and recommended him. Shapp – in Goode's judgment, perhaps mistaking him for someone else – nominated him and the state senate confirmed him despite the chamber's record of obstructing Shapp's PUC choices.
As a PUC commissioner, Goode met with community groups around the state, studied relevant issues, compiled what was seen as a pro-consumer record, and forged good working relations with his fellow commissioners. He was soon elevated to the chairmanship of the PUC, where he continued his pro-consumer policies but worked to limit PUC expenditures.
[edit] Work in the Office of the Mayor
Philadelphia Mayor William J. Green (elected in November 1979) had promised to appoint a black managing director after winning a racially-divisive Democratic primary against former deputy mayor Charles Bowser. Green kept his promise by appointing Goode as managing director at the urging of members of the Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce and key members of the black community. Goode used this position to make himself extremely visible, attending community events around the clock. His campaigning for Mayor had already begun.
[edit] Mayor of Philadelphia
During the primary election of 1982, Green decided not to seek re-election when his wife, Patricia, became pregnant with their youngest child. Goode jumped into the race and defeated former Mayor Frank L. Rizzo in a racially polarizing primary election. Goode went on to win the general election over former Green fund-raiser and Philadelphia Stock Exchange Chairman John Egan, the Republican Party nominee.
Goode continued his heavy public schedule as Mayor. However, he failed to sell City Council on the necessity of a trash-to-steam plant to avoid using landfills, and the economics of landfill use soon changed, lowering landfill costs and raising incineration costs, making a trash-to-steam plant too expensive to be feasible.
Goode's tenure as mayor was marred in the summer of 1985 by the MOVE confrontation, in which police attempted to clear a building in West Philadelphia inhabited by a radical back-to-nature group whose members, under the leadership of founder John Africa, had long been a nuisance to the city by shouting out slogans and statements from a megaphone at all hours of the day and night, ignoring city sanitation codes and barricading themselves in houses when law enforcement came to enforce them. In an effort to remove a bunker from the roof, and the police dropped an incendiary device. This however caused the house to catch fire, and ignited a massive blaze which eventually consumed almost an entire city block, killed 11 people, and left 240 people homeless.
While public opinion initially supported Goode, an investigation by a commission appointed by Goode held extensive public hearings in which Goode's judgement was held up to public scrutiny. The negative publicity helped elect Republican Ron Castille as city district attorney in 1985 and encouraged Edward G. Rendell, a former district attorney and an unsuccessful 1986 Democratic gubernatorial candidate, to oppose Goode for the Democratic mayoral nomination in 1987. Goode defeated Rendell for the nomination and then defeated Rizzo, who became the Republican nominee, in the general election. In both primary and general elections, Philadelphia's black voters stuck by Goode, although with less enthusiasm than he had aroused in 1983.
During the Green Administration, the city budget had been balanced; the first few years of Goode's reign caused the city to go into debt again, this time deeply, and the fiscal irresponsibility continued throughout his tenure. In an attempt to re-balance the city's budget, Goode pushed through tax increases that raised the city's wage tax to an all-time high of 4.96 percent. Yet despite this record tax increase, on the day Goode finally left office Philadelphia was only twenty-seven days away from being insolvent--bankrupt--and Moody's gave its municipal bonds junk bond ratings. His successors, Edward G. Rendell and John F. Street were able to gradually though incrementally reduce the city wage tax and impart a degree of fiscal health to the Philadelphia city government.
[edit] Election of 1991
In the election of 1991, Goode was unable to maintain Philadelphia's black vote as a unified bloc. A well-funded and highly-publicized attempt to purge Philadelphia City Councilman-at-Large David Cohen, a leading critic of Goode's trash-to-steam proposal, backfired as Cohen came in first in total votes in the 1987 Democratic primary for the five council-at-large seats to be filled, setting an all-time record for most votes received for that position in a Democratic primary. (Fourteen years later, Goode was the only former Mayor of Philadelphia to attend Councilman Cohen's funeral. Goode's son and Cohen's City Council colleague, W. Wilson Goode, Jr., eulogized Cohen at a special memorial service held in Philadelphia's City Council.)
In the race to succeed Goode as mayor in 1991, three blacks – former Councilman Lucien E. Blackwell, a strong Goode loyalist; George Burrell, a Goode critic allied with Congressman William Gray; and James White, Goode's managing director – faced white candidates Rendell and Peter Hearn, a former chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association. White withdrew before the primary and Rendell won the nomination, getting 10 percent of the black vote as Blackwell and Burrell divided the rest.
[edit] Post-mayoral life
Goode stayed active after leaving as mayor by attending community meetings, hosting a radio show on WDAS, and holding mid-level positions in the U.S. Department of Education. He became active for a time in the personal development programs of Werner Erhard's Landmark Education, including the Landmark Forum, a successor to est. He earned a PhD in theology at Palmer Theological Seminary, and became a minister, leader of advocacy for faith-based initiatives, and leader of outreach to prisoners. He currently serves as a senior adviser to Public/Private Ventures where he oversees Amachi, a mentoring program for children of incarcerated parents. He was recently awarded the Purpose Prize, a $100,000 award given to exceptional individuals over age 60 who are working to address critical social problems.
| Preceded by William J. Green, III |
Mayor of Philadelphia 1984–1992 |
Succeeded by Ed Rendell |
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