Mayor Cherelle L. Parker has appointed nonprofit founder and Democratic ward leader Anton K. Moore as the city’s director of public engagement and neighborhood affairs.
Moore, who founded the South Philadelphia-based group Unity in the Community, effectively replaces Hassan Freeman, who was fired from the Parker administration about two months ago following a verbal altercation outside City Hall with City Councilmember Isaiah Thomas that the lawmaker described as “negative and disturbing.”
Freeman, who worked under Chief Deputy Mayor Sinceré Harris, was director of neighborhood and community engagement. Parker said she renamed the role to reflect added responsibilities while appointing Moore, whose work will now fall under Chief of Staff Tiffany W. Thurman’s portfolio.
The Office of Public Engagement and Neighborhood Affairs will manage the city’s 10 Neighborhood Community Action Centers, which are meant to be “neighborhood City Halls” where residents can access services closer to home. The centers are a major part of Parker’s efforts to follow through on her campaign promise to create a city government “residents can see, touch, and feel,” and there is one in each Council district.
Moore, the Democratic leader of the 48th Ward in South Philadelphia, has strong political connections, and his nonprofit work has been praised by numerous elected officials.
“This is the piece of the puzzle that we needed,” Parker said Monday at a City Hall news conference, before addressing Moore: “You now have an opportunity to do what you did in South Philly but you’ve got to do it all over the city.”
Moore’s salary is $195,000, according to the mayor’s office.
“We’re going to work, we’re going to have fun, and we’re going to deliver the services that the city of Philadelphia deserves,” Moore said.
Police Commissioner Kevin J. Bethel said he has worked with Moore, 39, on youth employment and engagement efforts and leaned on him as an “adviser of my process to help me understand what is going on in the streets.”
“There is nobody better connected to our community. There is nobody better trained to take on this task,” said Bethel, who later added he would “go through a wall for this kid.”
Founded in 2008, Unity in the Community provides a variety of services, including connecting residents with housing aid and students with scholarships, and its parent organization is Soul Food CDC. The group has partnered with 76ers player Joel Embiid to give residents Giant gift certificates and former teammate Ben Simmons, now with the Los Angeles Clippers, to provide Christmas gifts to children.
The group also received $417,900 from a city anti-violence grant program founded during the surge in shootings and homicides that followed the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
In a report about poor oversight of that program, The Inquirer in 2023 reported that Unity in the Community received about 60% more in funds than the $258,000 the group had applied for. The paper also found that a staffer for the Urban Affairs Coalition, which administered the grant program, raised questions about management of Unity in the Community’s project, expanding a youth carpentry training program in South Philadelphia.
The staffer wrote in a 2022 email he was “very concerned” about accounting issues, including $75,000 in funding for which the organization had not submitted invoices. Moore said in 2023 he would work to fix the paperwork errors and defended the group’s work.
His application for the anti-violence grant was supported by Thomas and State Sen. Anthony Williams (D., Philadelphia), an indication of Moore’s support among Philadelphia’s political class.
Council recently named a block in South Philly in his honor. He was appointed by former Gov. Tom Wolf to the Pennsylvania Commission on African American Affairs. At Monday’s news conference, Ryan Boyer, a Parker ally who leads the politically powerful Philadelphia Building & Construction Trades Council, heaped praise on Moore and joked that he “will be a great director of whatever the mayor called it.”
Parker’s chief of staff, Tiffany W. Thurman, praised Moore as “someone whose heart beats with the rhythm of our streets in every neighborhood.”
“Your mandate from the mayor is very clear: You are now the direct link between our administration and our neighborhoods,” Thurman said at the news conference.
Freeman’s dismissal followed a September incident in which he allegedly confronted Thomas at the lawmaker’s parking spot. In an email Thomas sent administration officials that was obtained by The Inquirer, Thomas wrote Freeman “spoke to me in a disrespectful manner, a hostile tone, and addressing me outside my name and title.”
Freeman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Parker declined to comment on the ordeal, except to say “some personnel adjustments were made.”
“I’m not looking back on anything associated with yesterday,” Parker said in an interview. “I’m thinking about how we are going to keep moving Philadelphia forward.”
Staff writer Ryan W. Briggs contributed to this article.
