As I write this column on the resignation of Chief Deputy Mayor Aren Platt, I wonder which one is going to win: the Angel on my shoulder, or the Devil?
Shortly after Thursday’s City Council session ended, I got a notification on my phone saying that Chief Deputy Mayor Aren Platt, one of Mayor Cherelle Parker’s “Big 3” collaboration of advisers, was resigning.
Platt, Chief Deputy Mayor Sincere’ Harris, and Chief of Staff Tiffany Thurman have been advising the Mayor since her first days on the job. Platt, who had worked with Parker since her days in the statehouse, was in charge of the administration’s planning, and strategic initiatives including 76 Place, the proposed stadium for the Philadelphia 76ers.
His last day is Oct. 25, and he’s being replaced by Vanessa Garrett Hartley, Esq., the city’s current Chief Deputy Managing Director.
Now depending on who you talk with, he’s either leaving because he had rubbed far too many folks in City Hall the wrong way, something that’s not really all that tough to do if we’re honest, or he’s stepping down because the City Charter’s resign to run rule applies to political operatives as well and he’s revving up Parker Mayoral Campaign 2.0.
While she didn’t elaborate on what Platt would be doing next at a press conference held on Friday, Parker made it clear that he wasn’t pushed out.
“He’s leaving on great terms with me and everyone in my administration,” she said as most of the people in her administration stood behind her. “This is not punitive. Aren Platt and I are going to continue working together.”
For his part, Platt referred to his tenure as Chief Deputy Mayor as “the best job he ever had.” He just felt that now was the time to return to the private sector, he said.
When a reporter attempted to ask Platt to elaborate on that, Parker didn’t allow him to answer the question. But the emphasis he put on observing the city’s ethics standards might have served as a hint.
Now if you’re a longtime reader of the Philadelphia Hall Monitor newsletter, you might know why that moment brought back a memory for me and how that memory made it so I had to decide which one of my parents I wanted to be as I wrote this column.
Here’s what I mean by that.
My parents were from Paris, Kentucky, a small town just outside of Lexington, home of the University of Kentucky. I was the fifth of five kids and because my parents were Southerners, we were raised on a diet of politeness and respect.
But that said, my parents were two very different people. My Mom was easily one of the nicest people ever created. The one thing I never wanted to hear from her was “Now, Niecy, you know better than that. That wasn’t nice.” That meant that I had done something that had disappointed her. I never wanted to do that.
My Dad, however, had been through some things. He joined the military, or at least attempted to, when he was 14 and World War II was going on. He was a Black man who went to basic training in the South at a time when wearing your uniform in certain towns could lead to your being lynched by people who resented your being allowed to fight for a country that often had no love for you. Dad had no tolerance for foolishness and didn’t care if you knew it.
I try to be more like my Mom when covering politics here in Philadelphia because you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. But sometimes, people do things that make me remind them that I am also my father’s child.
And in the case of the 2023 Mayor’s Race, Platt was at the center of one of those moments. While I’m not nearly as mad as I was at the time and believe me, I was pretty friggin’ mad, how I was treated during that moment has made me really conscious of how I cover the Parker administration to make sure that there’s no appearance of bias.
(If you want more detail, click here.)
So, here’s what I’ve decided to do.
I’m going to wish Platt good luck in his next venture with the Mayor’s office, which I’m hearing will be revealed in the next two weeks. And I’m going to hope that no matter where we intersect in the future, I’m allowed to be my mother’s child.
Because being my father’s child will probably get me in a whole lot of trouble.
Now, like I said, the hot rumor is that Platt is leaving the Mayor’s office to put together the infrastructure for Parker’s reelection campaign. But hearing that made me think of a conference that myself and Hall Monitor correspondent Vanessa Maria Graber attended recently at Howard University.
Next week, we’re going to talk about oligarchy, and how it manifests itself in places like Philadelphia.
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