Reply #24: Very true. I remember reading about him and was very impressed. [View All]

[PA Democrat]

http://www.popcitymedia.com/features/fetterman0425.aspx

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Knowing that education programs alone would not change Braddock, in’05 he ran for mayor – expecting to lose. Instead, he won -- by a single vote. Crediting a younger constituency for putting him in office, “it was a way to advance their agenda,” Fetterman says. “I wanted to bridge the gap between generations, between those viewed as thugs and those considered out-of-touch. I’m comfortable with either crowd.”


These days he’s everywhere, opening a playground and a basketball court, adding to the 200-odd kids he’s helped get GEDs, working such real estate ventures as a Braddock Avenue urban farm and transforming the eight-story Ohringer building into an artists colony.


Hm. All this hustle and flow, all this sweat equity, for two-thirds of a square mile, 13-by-five blocks, 2,900-odd souls – down from a 1950 high of 20,000, and declining every day. A borough with 300 vacant homes, a quarter of which are slated for demolition, Braddock’s “loss,” Fetterman says, “has been catastrophic.


“Anyone who thinks upgrading Braddock is going to be easy is deluding himself,” he adds. “I, for one, am well aware of the difficulties. Rose-colored glasses don’t work out here. This isn’t Mayberry. Braddock will never be what it once was.”