How “Some Guy” Sinks Parks

A few weeks ago, I asked myself a simple question: what would President Donald Trump’s proposed “funding freeze” mean for Philadelphia’s parks?

Specifically, I wondered, would Trump’s “freeze” cancel the $2 million grant that the outgoing Biden Administrationpromised for Center City’s Rail Park?Would it cancel two other big new federal grants, for the Eakins Oval and the Schuylkill River Trail?

Those were my questions. Now I have my answer: in February of 2025, it’s allup to Some Guy.

It’s a horrifying answer, unprecedented in modern American governance. To be honest, I feel pretty stupid even askingthe question. Asking about parks under Trump is like asking about deck chairs while the captain packs the ship’s hold with dynamite.

But our parks aren’t going anywhere, even if our Constitution does. Philadelphians have no choice but to consider what Rule By Some Guy will mean for all of our public assets, parks and rec centers included. So, I’ve been considering. 

And here’s my answer: the Trump administration’s lawlessness means that the potential for abuse, corruption and incompetence in any public system is truly bottomless. But at an absolute minimum, we can say this: Rule By Some Guy will make it harder – much, much harder – for Philadelphians to plan and execute the kind of park projects that drive growth and prosperity. 

Why? Not just because Some Guy willhelp cut federal spending – which, as the Republican party’s latest budget proposals show, he’ll do. And not just because Some Guy will personally block already-appropriated funds – which, as Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s recent lawsuit shows, he’ll do.  

No, what will truly cripple Philadelphia’s capacity to plan and fund major park projects is that Some Guy won’t honor anyone’s commitments to anything, ever– not even Congress’s. That’s how autocracies work: lawful process is replaced by the ruler’s whim. That, in turn, renders lawmakers and lawfully-appointed officials – and I say this with all due respect – all-but-irrelevant. When no one in government can make a promise that Some Guy can’t break, no one in government can get anything done with anybody else.

Don’t believe me? Ask your friends at USAID or in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau or in the Department of the Treasury. Ask Shapiro, who had to sue the Department of the Interior to “unfreeze” billions – billions! — in lawfully-appropriated federal funding. Ask them what Some Guy has done totheir plans and projects. 

Some Guy has a name, of course – Elon Musk – but all that really matters is that he’s just some guy, let loose by our president to run amok in the federal bureaucracy, with the stated intention of destroying it.

Again: this is horrifying. There’s no other word for it. I’ve been involved in public affairs as a journalist and researcher for over thirty years. I started my career covering the aftermath of Soviet rule in then-Czechoslovakia, where I learned what corrupt, anti-democratic authoritarian thugs sound and act like. Mečiar in Slovakia, Milošević in Serbia, Orbán in Hungary: Some Guy is one of them. He’s grasping and lawless andignorant and power-addled in the same way they all are. 

So yes, what we’re witnessing in Washington, DC is a disaster at every imaginable level: Constitutional, cultural, economic, and, ultimately, moral. Parks are way, way down the list of things we have to worry about. 

But our parks can help us see what’s at stake. Some Guy will screw them up in the same way he’ll screw up the entire country: by destroying Americans’ ability to work together on any project bigger than a breadbox.

To see how, let’s go back to that $2 million promised for the Rail Park.

A FEDERAL INVESTMENT

The latest Rail Park plan would restore a half-mile of abandoned train trestle in the Spring Garden neighborhood, in the spirit of New York City’s “High Line.” It’s a complex project with a $60 million price tag. Its many champions include Congressman Brendan Boyle, who believes that the Rail Park can “bring people together and breathe new life” into a long-neglected part of the city.

The $2 million is a planning grant,sponsored by Boyle, originating in theBipartisan Infrastructure Bill. With it, the Center City District will create a detailed Rail Park construction plan, which in turn helps the Rail Park raise more funds from the state, the city, philanthropies, and private citizens. 

In other words, that $2 million is meant to help the Rail Park raise tens of millions more, and eventually spur hundreds of millions worth of growth and development in the surrounding neighborhoods. 

It’s a well-established, investment-minded funding model in which federal dollars “leverage” other support. The bike trails along on the Schuylkill and Delaware, the reconstruction of FDR Park, the stormwater upgrades that protect the Wissahickon and Pennypackwatersheds, the new parks planned for Chinatown and Penn’s Landing:wherever we see transformative projects in cash-strapped cities, we’ll find federal grants seeding and sustaining them.

Make no mistake: cancel those grants, and you’re undermining the networks of public and private supporters who make growth-driving projects possible.

WHEN PLANS MEET WHIMS

The Rail Park grant was announced in early January, under Biden. It looked doomed when Trump took office and ordered a blanket “freeze” on federal funding. It got a reprieve when Trump rescinded the “freeze.” Boyle’s office told me the grant was back on track. So did the Center City District’s board chair, Paul Levy, who acknowledged the whiplash effect of Trump’s unpredictability.

“The [funding freeze] directive from Washington created uncertainty across the country for all different types of programs,” Levy wrote in an email. “Now that the directive has been rescinded, we are still working through the details of contracting for the funds.”

For a moment, it seemed the shadow had passed.

But then, early in February, Some Guy emerged as a driving force. First, Some Guy shut down an entire federal agency, USAID, without even a fig leaf of legaljustification. Then Some Guy beganbullying his way past the law and into every corner of the federal bureaucracy, firing staff, cancelling programs, and evidently freezing payments at will. Exactly what he’s doing and how, no one seems to know. 

All we know for sure is that he’s doing it at a massive scale. Shapiro’s lawsuit alleged that the Trump administration was “unilaterally and arbitrarily suspending or restricting … congressionally appropriated grantfunds” totaling $2.1 billion. It took weeks to get the funds released. When Shapiro announced his victory, he called out the Trump administration’s lawlessness in no uncertain terms:

“It’s how our Constitution works,” Shapiro said in a statement. “Congress passed laws that committed billions of dollars to the states …. The president signed those bills into law….The Trump Administration is legally required to provide these funds.”

Shapiro is hardly alone in his understanding of the stakes. Protests against Some Guy’s efforts are mounting in the streets and in the courts, and even some of his own staffare refusing to carry on. So far there’s no specific threat to the $2 million RailPark grant, or the $23 million promised for the Art Museum’s Eakins Oval, or the$13 million for the Schuylkill River Trail, also announced in the last days of the Biden administration. But Some Guy is still out there slashing and burning, and nothing in particular protects Philly’s park grants from his predations. 

Some Guy may openly declare these park grants too “inefficient” or “woke” or “green.” He can quietly snuff them out without a word. Or he can simply fire so many staff at the Department of Transportation that getting the funds in a timely way becomes impossible.

In fact, Some Guy can do almost anything he wants – until he can’t, of course. If Trump decides to ship Some Guy off to Guantanamo Bay, Some Guy will disappear. Trump made Some Guy, and Trump can unmake him. That’s life outside the law.

But for now, he’s in charge, and barring some miraculous show of strength from our courts or Congress, he’ll stay that way until Donald Trump says otherwise.Is that Rail Park grant really coming? Or any grant? Don’t ask your senator, or your congressperson, or your mayor, or your City Council representative. Ask Some Guy. Philadelphia’s growth and prosperity now depends on his whim.