Gov. Josh Shapiro blasted U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Friday for buyinga Berks County warehouse that may be used to detain people.
“I’m strongly opposed to the purchase,” Shapiro said after speaking at an event at the Steamfitters Local 420 in Northeast Philadelphia.
Shapiro said the facility is “not what we need anywhere in Pennsylvania,” adding that he was not alerted ahead of time of ICE’s $87 million acquisition of the warehouse on 64 acres in Upper Bern Township.
“The secretive way the federal government went about this undermines trust,” Shapiro said.
Shapiro has grown increasingly vocal in his criticism of ICE and President Donald Trump in recent weeks as he’s toured the East Coast promoting his new memoir. In addition to voicing his opposition to the warehouse, Shapiro criticized Trump for sharing a racist video attacking former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama.
The Democratic governor, who is widely seen as a contender for the White House in 2028, is in the midst of a reelection campaign against Trump-endorsed Republican Stacy Garrity, who has urged cooperation with ICE.
He said the commonwealth is exploring “what legal options we may have to stop” the ICE procurement, but he acknowledged “those options are very slim, given that the federal government is the purchaser.”
Shapiro told this audience of union workers and apprentices that the Berks County building would be better used for economic development.
At the same event, Shapiro announced a new $3 million Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program (RACP) grant to expand the Steamfitters Local Union 420 Training Center, which he said would help “train the next generation of workers.”
Shapiro criticizes Trump over racist anti-Obama video
Duringthe union hall event, Shapiro also leveled criticism at the Trump administration for sharing on social media a racist video depicting Obama, the first Black president, and his wife, as apes.
When asked for a reaction, Shapiro said, “I actually agree with [Republican] Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina that it’s racist.”
Scott, the only Black Republican in the Senate, called the video “the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House,” after Trump shared it to his Truth Social account Thursday evening.
Shapiro said thatTrump “seems to always find a lower and lower common denominator. We’re not going to get sucked down into the depths that this president seems to reach for each day.”
Trump took down the video early Friday afternoon.
The governor also strongly chided Trump for recently saying the federal government should be in charge of elections.
Specifically, Trump named Philadelphia, along with Detroit and Atlanta, as cities where the federal government should step in to run elections. The predominantly Black cities are in swing states and have long been targeted with Trump’s false claims of voter fraud.
“The president of the United States doesn’t run our elections,” said Shapiro. “County officials run our elections, Republican and Democrat alike.”
“We’re not going to have interference from the White House,” added the governor, who served as attorney general when Trump tried to overturn Pennsylvania’s election results in 2020.
Sonder, the buzzy short-term rental company, is no more. But some of its former properties across Philadelphia are taking on new lives.
At least three of Philly’s last five Sonder properties have new ownership and have already reopened or are about to as boutique short-term rentals.
The former competitor with Airbnb and Vrbo touted modern “apartment-style hotels” nationwide. In November, when Sonder announced that it was closing, citing “severe financial constraints,” it marked a chance for local and national operators to swoop in and snag desirable properties.
As first reported by the Philadelphia Business Journal, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts partnered with the hospitality company Reside to reopen the Sonder property at 325 N. 13th St.in Callowhill in January. The 96-unit building is now called Heid Lofts by Reside.
The Queen Hotel at 628 S. Fifth St.in Queen Village is now being managed by Sosuite, a Philly-based short-term rental company that has taken over other previous PhillySonder properties over the years. The 30-unit property reopened under Sosuite in November.
The Edison at 312 N. Second St. in Old City is working to reopen as a 24-unit rental property in the coming weeks under operator PHL Stays, the Business Journal reported. The company is run by Jake Tovey, who operates a similar business in Pittsburgh called Pittsburgh Furnished Rentals.
As for the remaining former Sonder haunts, The Arco at 1234 Locust St. in Midtown Village is still closed, while the Witherspoon Building at 130 S. Juniper St. in Center City is pivoting to become a traditional apartment building with a mix of 186 studio and multi-family units.
A skill game industry executive who took kickbacks from illegal gambling machine operators throughout Pennsylvania pleaded guilty this week in Cumberland County to money laundering.
Ricky Goodling, an ex-state police corporal and former national compliance director for Pace-O-Matic, contributed to the “disorganized and problematic” skill game market when he accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for quashing complaints about illegal gaming machines, Attorney General Dave Sunday said in a statement.
Goodling, 59, of Mechanicsburg, also pleaded guilty in federal court to evading more than $100,000 in taxes after falsely claiming the proceeds of the scheme were business travel expenses, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Harrisburg.
An attorney listed for Goodling in court records declined to comment.
Pace-O-Matic said in a statement that it was “deeply troubled” by Goodling’s guilty plea. “We are also troubled to know that he violated our trust and intentionally harmed our business interests,” the statement reads.
According to Pace-O-Matic’s statement, law enforcement has assured the company that it is “not involved in or connected with any of the actions of Mr. Goodling, and they have characterized Pace-O-Matic as a victim of these crimes.” The company terminated Goodling’s employment in November 2023 when it learned of the investigation.
The powerful and controversial skill game industry has operated largely by its own rules in Pennsylvania for more than a decade, allowing the slot machinelike devices to proliferate in bars and gas stations across the commonwealth.
Skill games operate in a legal gray area: Courts have ruled that the so-called skill component distinguishes them from games of chance, like slot machines. The state Supreme Court is now weighing the machines’ lawfulness.
The biggest player in the skill games market, Georgia-based Pace-O-Matic, has claimed for years that its machines are the only “legal” skill games — and spent millions of dollars on campaigns and lobbying for favorable regulation and lower tax rates.
While some lawmakers want to ban the machines outright, arguing they attract crime and can be addictive, others see it as a potential new revenue stream. Last year, Gov. Josh Shapiro proposed taxing the machines at 52%, which the industry quickly rejected. In his latest budget, the governor said that regulating skill games, coupled with legalizing cannabis, could generate $2 billion annually.
Illegal gambling enterprises have sought to commingle their machines with Pace-O-Matic’s legal games, in an attempt to give their products a veneer of legitimacy and deflect law enforcement scrutiny, according to an October 2024 state grand jury presentment. Goodling acted as their ally, facilitated straw purchases of Pace-O-Matic games, and laundered the money through a fictitious company, prosecutors said.
Goodling is scheduled to be sentenced April 28 in the state case.
Ever since that touchdown helped the Eagles beat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LII, it’s fascinated Eagles fans — the lore, the backstory, and, of course, the confetti that followed. There have been T-shirts and murals designed to commemorate the play, food specials named after the moment, and a number of tattoos inspired by the event that now decorate the bodies of Eagles fans from all over.
“I don’t know of any other play that people have tattooed up and down their bodies,” former Eagles center Jason Kelce says in ESPN’s new 30 for 30 documentary about the Birds’ first Super Bowl win. “I was in a stadium in Chicago, and a cook raised his sleeve and had the Philly Special X’s and O’s tattooed on his forearm. This is in the Bears’ stadium.”
Now, fans will get a new look behind the play and the people who made it happen in The Philly Special, which premieres at 9 p.m. Friday. The iconic moment, which helped an underdog Eagles team bring the Lombardi Trophy to the city for the first time in franchise history, is told through the eyes of the five men involved — Kelce, Corey Clement, Trey Burton, Nick Foles, and Doug Pederson.
“My wife and I sat down and watched it, and I’m not going to lie, it brought me to tears,” Pederson, the former Eagles coach, said on 94 WIP on Wednesday, the eighth anniversary of the play. “I really felt like they did an outstanding job to me catching sort of the essence and the spirit of Philadelphia, the city, the fans, the passion.”
Helping bring the city to life during the hourlong documentary was Shannon Furman, who grew up in South Jersey and is based in Marlton. Furman, a Penn State graduate, was one of the film’s directors, along with Angela Zender.
Although the play is central to the film, its story begins much earlier. It briefly follows each of the five central characters’ journeys to Super Bowl LII, from the moment they were drafted (or in some cases weren’t) to the moment the Philly Special was called at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis.
While taking a trolley ride through town, with stops at various Philly landmarks, Pederson, Foles, Kelce, Clement, and Burton discuss their first impressions of the city, while Kelce also finds a way to take a shot at Dallas in the process.
“When I got drafted, my agent said, ‘You know, Jason, you’re going to love Philadelphia. It’s got a great spirit to it. I think you’ll fit in pretty well,’” Kelce said. “There’s a humbleness to it. There’s a cockiness to it. A city that was born on the back of blue-collar workers and manufacturing. Stetson hat factory. To all you Cowboys fans, you think cowboy hats is a [expletive] Texas thing. That was created in Philadelphia. So, [expletive] you guys.”
Kelce may have received promising advice from his agent, but Foles was issued a stern warning by former Eagles head coach Andy Reid. He remembers a conversation he had with Reid as a rookie, not long after he was selected by the Birds in the third round of the 2012 NFL draft.
Andy Reid and Nick Foles during the 2012 season.
“I had a sit down with Andy Reid,” Foles said. “I remember he asked me poignantly, ‘Do you have faith or believe in anything?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m a Christian.’ He said ‘All right, you’re going to need that, because this city has torn grown men apart.’”
Some of that “tearing grown men apart” happens on the radio. Burton, the former Eagles tight end who threw the touchdown pass on the Philly Special, recognized that early.
“I remember my first day in Philly,” Burton said. “My cousin picked me up, and he had the WIP radio [station] on. I was like, ‘What is this?’ People calling in from all over the place, talking crazy.”
For Clement, meanwhile, it was a dream to sign with his hometown team. The former Eagles running back, who grew up in Glassboro, remembers telling the team he would be at the facility “in an hour.” Pederson also was familiar with the city, having played for the Eagles (1999) and been an assistant (2009 to 2012) before becoming head coach (2016 to 2020).
“The Philadelphia hiring for me was a whirlwind of emotion,” Pederson said. “You’re a little bit scared in a way because it’s such a big step. I played here. You know the city, you know the fan base, you know exactly what you’re getting into. You’re not going to make everybody happy. You just settle in and you realize, ‘Hey, this is what you’ve been preparing yourself for.’”
The Eagles’ 2017 season was a whirlwind. The team got off to a 10-2 start behind Carson Wentz before the second-year quarterback and MVP favorite tore his ACL in the team’s Week 14 win over the Los Angeles Rams. With their Pro Bowl quarterback injured, Foles was forced into action.
During one of the group’s stops, Foles asked Pederson and Kelce what their confidence level was like with him stepping in.
“Season’s done,” Pederson said jokingly. “I started believing the media.”
Kelce interjected: “Me and a few guys that had been there for the Chip [Kelly] years with Nick; felt confident that Nick could play really well. We had seen it before.”
Eagles offensive lineman Lane Johnson dons a dog mask as he walks off the field after the team’s 15-10 divisional round playoff win over the Atlanta Falcons in 2018.
With the loss of Wentz, those outside the organization started to count the Eagles out. And that underdog mentality fueled the Eagles, who had printouts of media rankings hanging all over the facility, including in the bathroom, and donned dog masks throughout the playoffs.
But Kelce, Foles, Clement, and Burton were used to being underdogs. It was part of the documentary Furman wishes she had more time to tell.
“I wish we could have really gotten into everyone’s backstory a little bit more,” Furman said. “Because those five characters are really, like, real underdog stories, which is what the whole film is.”
Clement and Burton were undrafted free agents. Kelce was a walk-on at the University of Cincinnati — and hardly a lock to stick with the Eagles after he was drafted in the sixth round. Pederson, a former backup quarterback, was heavily criticized nationally when the Eagles hired him. And then there’s Foles.
Foles’ NFL journey was difficult. The backup-turned-starter was twice cast off, including by Kelly after his first year with the Eagles, despite the team reaching the playoffs. He played for six teams over his 11-year career. After his first stint with the Eagles, Foles found himself in St. Louis, where he began to question whether he wanted to walk away from the sport before Reid brought him to Kansas City and helped revive his career.
“I just said, I don’t know if I can do it anymore,” Foles said. “Then it came over me, which one am I more afraid of? Am I more afraid to leave the game? No, I’m not afraid. I’m trying to leave the game. I’m afraid to go back to the game. And my spirit was like, ‘Well, that’s what you need to do.’ Ultimately, that equipped me for what was to come.”
What was to come was a battle the film likened to Rocky vs. Apollo Creed or Ivan Drago. Cliche or not, Foles found himself standing in U.S. Bank Stadium below giant banners featuring one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time, Tom Brady, and himself in a moment one can’t help but compare to an almost identical scene in Rocky, when the title character finds himself staring up at a giant banner of Creed.
Eagles quarterback Nick Foles and Eagles head coach Doug Pederson during the second quarter at Super Bowl LII, at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018.
‘You want Philly Philly’ — or is it dilly dilly?
It’s fourth-and-goal with 38 seconds left to play in the first half of Super Bowl LII and Pederson sent a play to Foles — only it wasn’t the Philly Special. Players looked out of sync, confused. So the coach decided to take a minute to think things over.
“Here we are fourth-and-goal at the 1, and I called a timeout,” Pederson says. “I’m easing back up to [the] coaches box, just looking, just searching for the right play. I’m just searching. I’m listening to the coaches. And I turn my mic off and now I’m talking face-to-face with Nick, and he just walks up and is like, ‘How about Philly Philly?’ My pause was just like ‘That’s it. That’s the play.’
“The coaches heard it, Philly Special, and it was honestly like crickets. I could hear chirping on the headset. Nobody said a word. It was like, ‘Philly Special? In this moment?’”
Once the play was called, everyone involved admitted they had something to be nervous about — except Foles. Clement was worried the snap would go over his head. Burton hadn’t thrown a touchdown pass since high school. And Kelce was worried how he would snap the ball, although he felt like if they could execute, the Patriots “wouldn’t see it coming.”
Meanwhile, Foles was just trying not to smile.
“In my mind, it was just the play that would work,” Foles recalls. “It wasn’t like a play that I thought would be famous. It was like, this will work for [messing up] the Patriots. The one thing I was thinking about when [Pederson] said, ‘Yeah, lets do it,’ when I turned around was don’t smile. Do not smile. Look serious.
“Because I was so excited. I knew it was going to work. That was my one coaching point. Do not smile.”
The only problem, Foles didn’t actually ask for the “Philly Special.” Instead, he asked for “Philly Philly.” And to this day, he still doesn’t know why he called it the Philly Philly. However, the directors had their own conspiracy theory as to why Foles slipped up: the popular Bud Light “dilly dilly” commercials that were being aired at the time.
“Yes, those were on the TV, the ‘dilly dilly’ commercials,” Foles said. “And there is a very good chance that got engrained somehow into my mind. And that’s why people do commercials. Because it somehow, in your subconscious gets ingrained, even if you don’t want it to. That’s probably what it was.
“It was probably me watching the AFC championship game and seeing commercials. I don’t know how Doug knew what I was asking for though. That’s not — he must’ve seen the commercials too. So, that worked on both of us.”
At one point, the film even shows two Super Bowl officials enjoying a “dilly dilly” commercial on the Jumbotron during a break in the game.
That wasn’t the only way the Philly Special snuck into Foles’ subconscious before he asked for it. He also said watching Tom Brady drop a similar pass right in front of him earlier in the game also reminded him that the play was an option.
Throughout the film, there are plenty of Philly fans, notable citizens, and local spots featured — including Reading Terminal Market, Skinny Joey’s, Termini Bros Bakery, Manco and Manco Pizza, and Zahav, where Foles recalls fans serenading him out of the restaurant with E-A-G-L-E-S chants before leaving for the Super Bowl. The group also makes stops at the Philly Special statue outside of Lincoln Financial Field, as well as atop the Art Museum steps, a location Rocky made famous just over 40 years before Kelce’s unforgettable Super Bowl parade speech that captured Philly and its underdog mentality perfectly.
It was important to Furman for this documentary to not only retell an iconic moment in Philly sports history, but to also represent the fandom behind the team.
“They’re just an important part of everything,” Furman said. “Philly fans get a bad rep sometimes. So we’re hoping this film shows where their passion comes from and why this story was so important to them. The first one was a moment Philly fans, some of them, thought they were never going to see it. So that’s why we wanted them to be a big part of the story.”
When Jordan Mason entered the transfer portal last spring, he wanted to be part of a winning program.
It wasn’t his first time in the portal. The senior spent two seasons at Texas State before transferring to University of Illinois Chicago in 2024. He got in contact with Temple coach Adam Fisher in the portal and immediately felt at home.
Mason thought his skill set would complement Temple’s screen-heavy offense. He has since been a catalyst for the Owls.
Temple (14-8, 6-3 American Conference) lacked a true point guard for the past two years. Mason has taken over that role. He’s averaging 11.7 points and a team-leading 4.3 assists in 22 starts.
“I saw the way that the coaches interacted with each other and the way they interacted with me and my family,” Mason said. “It felt like a family right away. It felt like home. It was like I could be comfortable here. I can be myself here.”
Mason developed into a key rotational player at Texas State. As a freshman, he averaged 6.3 points in 32 games (19 starts). His numbers more than doubled as a sophomore (12.9 points per game) and 23 starts in 29 games.
He transferred to UIC for the 2024-25 season and averaged 9.6 points. Mason also was an asset defensively and as a ballhandler. He had 3.3 assists and 1.2 steals per game with the Flames.
“He knows when to pick and when [to] shoot,” Fisher said. “Guys enjoy playing with somebody like that, when you know that there’s an opportunity that you’re going to get shots, and he gets you easy looks.”
Jordan Mason played two seasons at Texas State and one at University of Illinois Chicago before joining Temple this offseason.
Mason quickly established himself as Temple’s main ballhandler in the season opener and created scoring opportunities for his teammates, notching six assists in the 83-65 win over Delaware State.
“Every pass I make, it seems like the shot goes in,” Mason said. “So some of it is me getting a little bit better at passing, but a lot of it is just the talent around me. They’re just really good dudes that make a lot of shots. So it makes me look good.”
His play contributed to the Owls winning seven straight from Dec. 9 to Jan. 14 — a stretch in which he also surpassed 1,000 career points. When he struggled in the middle of January, though, the team’s production took a dip.
Temple lost two straight games, but a road trip to his native Texas helped turn things around.
“He’s the heart of our team,” said guard Aiden Tobiason. “Because he’s so important. He’s really the main guy in principle every single time.”
The Owls won both games at Rice and University of Texas at San Antonio, and Mason recorded back-to-back double-digit outings, 15 points against Rice in Houston and 18 at UTSA — with his family in attendance.
“It was pretty amazing,” said Mason, who’s from San Antonio. “I’ve actually played UTSA as a freshman, and I didn’t touch the floor. That was rough for me because it was my first time playing at home, and it was, to be honest, a little embarrassing not playing. So to be able to come back, full-circle moment my senior year and play in front of everybody and beat UTSA because we lost to [them] my freshman year.”
Entering Saturday’s noon matchup at East Carolina (7-15, 2-7), Temple sits in fourth place in the American and could snatch a top-four seed in the conference tournament in March.
Mason, in his final year of eligibility, looks to make that happen.
“I want to win the conference tournament and go to the NCAA Tournament,” Mason said. “That’s the big goal for our team.”
Narberth’s borough council hasvoted unanimously to bar the municipality’s police officers from cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement under the agency’s 287(g) program.
The resolution approved Thursdaymade clear that “our police department operates to protect our residents and protect the public safety here and does not have a role in immigration enforcement,” said Council President Fred Bush.
ICE’s 287(g) program deputizes local law enforcement officers to carry out immigration actions, including identifying, arresting, and deporting immigrants. ICE has signed around 1,400 such agreements with law enforcement agencies in 40 states, including dozens in Pennsylvania.
In Philadelphia’s collar counties, only the Lansdowne Borough Constable’s Office in Delaware County and the Pennsylvania State Constable Office Honey Brook Precinct 1 in Chester County are 287(g) participants. Bucks County Sheriff Danny Ceisler, a newly elected Democrat, terminated his office’s controversial partnership last month, citing negative impacts on public safety and law enforcement trust.
Neither Lower Merion nor Narberth participates in the program.
Narberth’s resolution establishes that the borough will not enter into any agreement with the federal government, including 287(g), that would commit borough time, funds, efforts, or resources toward ICE noncriminal enforcement activities.
Officials clarified that Narberth’s police department would cooperate with ICE officials if they had a judicial warrant to arrest someone. An internal memo first reported by The Associated Press last month has authorized ICE to forcibly enter people’s homes without a judicial warrant.
Narberth officials acknowledged that the resolution could be seen as “virtue signaling,” given that the borough already does not participate in an ICE partnership. Yet council members said they believe it’s important to publicly signal the municipality’s values regarding immigration enforcement.
The resolution“lets the public clearly know where we stand on the issues, helps reinforce trust, and provides that clarity of what we will do and what we won’t do,” said Dana Edwards, Narberth’s mayor. “From my standpoint, it’s a practical resolution.”
“When our community members trust their law enforcement, they feel comfortable reaching out to them for assistance,” said Councilmember Jean Burock. “We can’t afford to erode that trust.”
Bush cautioned residents against interfering with ICE operations, describing the agency as “poorly trained” and “dangerous,” citing “the actions and the images that came out of Minneapolis” in recent weeks.
Narberth’s resolution came on the heels of a Jan. 30 incident in which two people were taken into custody by ICE during a traffic stop in Penn Wynne.
Following the arrests, Lower Merion affirmed in a public statement that the township does not participate in 287(g) and encouraged residents to call 911 if they observe law enforcement activity with no Lower Merion police officers present.
This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.
By now Arctic air may qualify for a frequent-visitor pass around here, but the version coming this weekend will be of a different quality and have a particular sting.
“It’s going to be a slap in the face,” said Cody Snell, a meteorologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Weather Prediction Center.
After a day in which highs will be around freezing on Friday — a solid 10 degrees below normal — some nuisance snow is possible late in the day or evening and early Saturday, and maybe even squalls. Then temperatures are going to tumble through the teens in the wake of another potent Arctic front.
They might not see 20 degrees in the Philly region until Monday.
Adding bite will be winds that could gust to 55 mph, and the National Weather Service says wind chills of 10 and 15 below are likely Saturday in the immediate Philly area. The agency has issued an “extreme-cold warning” — a relatively new addition to the advisory list — in effect Saturday afternoon through Sunday morning. Wind chills of 17 below zero are possible, and winds could gust to 55 mph, the weather service says.
Said Ray Martin, a lead meteorologist at the weather service office in Mount Holly, “It’s going to be awful.” Among the recent sequence of Arctic invasions, “it looks like the worst.”
What’s more, it’s likely to be a harvest weekend for the ice that is solidifying upon the region’s waterways, a growing concern.
A warm-up is due to begin Monday and pick up steam during the workweek, with highs maybe reaching 40 degrees on Thursday. But it may encounter some resistance, and another storm threat might be brewing for next weekend, forecasters say.
The snowpack already has achieved an elite status
Friday marked the 12h consecutive day in which the official snow cover at Philadelphia International Airport, measured daily at 7 a.m., was at least 5 inches.
With today's snow depth remaining at 5" for Philadelphia, there have now been 10 consecutive days with 5" or more of snow depth. This is the longest such stretch since 2010. If it remains 5" at 7 AM Thursday morning, it'll be nudging into the top 10 longest. #PAwxpic.twitter.com/x4FRHvkg8P
In the 142-year period of record, that ties for seventh place for a snow-cover duration of that depth.
“To hold on to a snowpack like this is unusual,” said Johnathan Kirk, senior hydrologist at NOAA’s Middle Atlantic River Forecast Center, in State College, Pa., which is keeping a close eye on the waterway icing.
The Schuylkill in Philly is ice-covered, as is the Delaware River from Trenton to Washington Crossing.
In addition to an eight-day stretch when temperatures failed to reach 30, the durability is related to the 2 or so inches of sleet that capped the snow on Jan. 25. Sleet is white ice that melts more slowly than snow.
The dry and cold air has been a natural preservative; snow and ice melt more readily when the air is moist.
Another factor was the impressive liquid content of the snow and sleet, Snell said. The frozen mass contained 1.39 inches of liquid, the weather service said, comparable to what is contained in 15 to 18 inches of snow.
As temperatures finally nudged above freezing, some melting did occur this week, which would explain that unsightly slushy porridge at Philly intersections. However, the official snow depth lost only an inch between Jan. 27 and Wednesday.
The snowpack may receive a fresh frosting Friday night into early Saturday with up to an inch of snow, Martin said, but it’s not going to have the same staying power.
What’s different about this Arctic air mass
Any snow that falls is likely to get blown away in a hurry, Martin said, as winds will pick up before daybreak Saturday and gusts howl to 50 mph by late morning.
Typically, cold air pours into the region from the northwest and becomes modified as it passes over land, the Great Lakes, and the mountains.
This is going to be a straight-up Arctic shot. It will come more or less from the north, and the icy lakes are not going to do much to impede it, said Matt Benz, senior meteorologist at AccuWeather Inc.
The weather center’s Snell said a weak storm system moving off the Atlantic coast is forecast to blow up as it interacts with warm Gulf Stream waters. The differences between the cold high pressure with its heavier air over the East and the lighter air of the storm are going to place the Philadelphia region in a frigid sandwich.
Heavier air tends to rush toward lighter air, like air escaping from a punctured tire.
A thaw is coming to Philly, eventually
Just how warm it gets next week remains unclear, AccuWeather’s Benz said.
“Arctic air is hard to dislodge sometimes,” he said, adding that recent model trends suggest the warm-up will not be quite as robust as expected earlier.
A wild card would be a potential storm next weekend. The European forecast model was seeing rain and 60 degrees, Martin said, while the U.S. model was suggesting a blizzard.
On Feb. 5, 2010, 6.6 inches of snow fell upon the airport, the beginning of an unprecedented siege in which 44.3 inches accumulated in a six-day period.
A man shovels cars out under mountains of snow in West Bradford Township, Chester County, during the incredible snow siege of February 2010.
Twelve days after the snow stopped, the official snow depth was down to 4 inches.
Philly will have the largest Semiquincentennial parade in the country this summer to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, along with six nights of fireworks to keep things lit well into the evening.
Sure, Philadelphians find a reason to set off fireworks every night (what are you celebrating at 9:37 p.m. on a Thursday in February?!?), but the big difference is these will be professional.
There is new information about first-time and returning events for the 2026 Wawa Welcome America Festival, Philly’s annual 16-day Independence celebration, but details about other events — like who’s going to headline the July 4 concert on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway — still remain under wraps.
New this year will be the Salute to Independence Semiquincentennial Parade on July 3, which will feature people, performers, and personalities representing the country’s 50 states, its territories, and the District of Columbia.
Miss Philadelphia 2023 Jacqueline Means waves to the crowd near Independence Hall during the Wawa Welcome America Salute to Independence Day Parade in 2023.
Among them will be all Miss America state titleholders, several fife and drum corps, historical reenactors, dancers, 50 marching bands, unicycle riders, stilt walkers, a jump rope team from Maryland, a steel drum band from Michigan, a circus troupe from Illinois, the Milwaukee Dancing Grannies, and the Philly Drag Mafia.
The Louisiana LunaChicks, a group whose members will dress like Mrs. Roper from Three’s Company, will also be performing in “patriotic caftans,” according to a news release. The LunaChicks may want to stay clear of the Segway Riders Club of The Villages, Florida, which is exactly what you think it is and will also be rolling in the parade.
Not to be outdone, three Star Wars cosplay groups — Garrison Carida, Kyber Base, and the Mav Oya’la Clan — are teaming up to represent the lighter side of Pennsylvania (and the dark side of the force).
A storm trooper with the Garrison Carida dances during the Philadelphia Independence Day Parade in 2014.
The parade will also feature international bands from Ghana to Ireland; more than a dozen floats, including those celebrating Indigenous people and women’s right to vote; and a 20-by-40-foot Declaration of Independence.
Wawa Welcome America’s six nights of fireworks begin June 20 (and on June 21) at a new event that has not yet been announced, according to a news release.
Fireworks will also take place on June 25 at the Celebration of Black Music Month at the Dell Music Center, June 26 at the Kidchella Music Festival at Smith Memorial Playground, June 27 at a concert on the waterfront, and July 4, “following the star-studded concert” on the Parkway, absolutely no details of which were included in the release.
Fireworks over the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the statue of George Washington at Eakins Oval during the Wawa Welcome America Festival on July 4, 2023, following a free concert featuring Demi Lovato and Ludacris on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.
Returning events include:
June 19: Juneteenth Block Party at the African American Museum
June 24: Five Points Night Market at Cottman and Rising Sun Avenues in Northeast Philly
June 27: Concillio’s Annual Hispanic Fiesta at LOVE Park
June 28: Gospel on Independence at Independence National Historical Park
July 1: Wawa Hoagie Day on Independence Mall
July 2: Red, White, & Blue To-Do parade, block party, and folk festival at sites across the Historic District
July 2: Salute to Service: The U.S. Army Field Band & Soldiers’ Chorus at Independence National Historical Park.
July 3: Pops on Independence at Independence Park
July 4: Celebration of Freedom Ceremony outside of Independence Hall
A former Villanova professor says in a federal lawsuit filed this week she was fired from the Catholic university after accusing its law school of racial discrimination involving one of her students.
Stephanie Sena, who had been an anti-poverty fellow in the law school and taught at Villanova for more than 20 years, was dismissed in 2024 for what the school said were “student complaints,” according to the lawsuit.
But Sena’s lawyers say the dismissal was due to her filing an ethics complaint against the school for racial discrimination for comments that administrators made around a decision not to give her student a financial award that would have alleviated her debt, citing a speech the student made at a law school symposium.
The student, Antionna Fuller, accused Villanova of racialdiscrimination and failing to appropriately support her with financial aid during a 2021 symposium speech at the university, titled “Shifting the Poverty Lens: Caritas in Focus.” Sena hosted the symposium, during which Fuller also publicly asked for an apology from Villanova.
“How can you say caritas [which means love and charity in Latin] and Black lives matter with no thought to a Black life in front of you, systematically oppressed by your hands?” Fuller said,according to a video of the speech. “It’s not only hypocritical, but it’s embarrassing. We cannot talk about oppression and white supremacy without acknowledging its very presence here.”
Her speech drew a standing ovation, but later caused consternation among law school leadership.
Sena found out that law school dean Mark Alexander, in a letter to the scholarship committee, asked that Fuller not receive the debt relief award because she “maliciously maligned” the law school, according to the suit.
Sena‘s lawsuit alleges that then-law school vice dean Michael Risch said after the student’s speech that the student was “lucky” to have gotten into the law school and that she would not be there if she were white.
Villanova said in a statement Wednesday that Sena’s lawsuit “lacks merit” and that the university “will vigorously defend against these baseless allegations.”
“We look forward to presenting the actual facts surrounding the plaintiff’s separation from Villanova. To be clear, Villanova University does not tolerate discrimination or retaliation of any kind, and the allegations in Plaintiff’s lawsuit are contrary to our written policies and conflict with the core values of our University.”
Sena, 46, of Media, declined to comment.
Fuller, 29, who now lives with her mother in the South, said in an interview Wednesday that she feels both relieved and anxious about seeing the issue aired publicly.
“I am happy, at least relieved, that truth is coming out,” said Fuller, who graduated summa cum laude from the University of South Carolina and got her Villanova law degree in 2022. “I’ve been in such an isolated place and just carrying this trauma for so long.”
She said she sought therapy after the reaction she got to her speech from Villanova administrators and last year wrote a book, I Almost Sued My Law School, about her journey as a first-generation, low-income Black student. She no longer wants to practice law, she said, and is still figuring out her next steps.
But she said she was grateful to Sena, whom, during the symposium speech, she called “my hero, advocate, and my friend.”
“She was the first person to publicly stand up for me,” Fuller said.
Stephanie Sena stands at site of an encampment along Kensington Avenue in 2021.
Fallout from symposium speech
Sena, a longtime activist who has worked to help people experiencing homelessness and opened a homeless shelter in Upper Darby in 2022, was fired in 2016 from her job as an adjunct professor at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts after defending students who accused a classmate of rape. She sued PAFA and the case ended in a confidential settlement.
She also led activists in lawsuits against the city in 2021 over its intentions to remove homeless people in a Kensington encampment. In 2023, the head of Norristown’s municipal council planned to bus homeless people to Villanova’s campus because of Sena’s advocacy for the homeless in Norristown. Villanova at the time was criticized for not defending Sena and making a stronger response.
Sena was hired to teach at Villanova in 2003 and began to work at the law school in 2020, serving as a full-time faculty member and anti poverty fellow. She was also an adjunct professor at Villanova’s Center for Peace and Justice.
In herlawsuit against Villanova, Sena asserts that law school leadership met with her in 2022, several months after Fuller’s symposium speech, and asked her if she had known what Fuller planned to say. Matthew Saleh, former assistant dean for admissions, told her it would be harder to attract Black students to the school because of the speech, according to the suit. Risch, the vice dean, made the comment about Fuller not being at Villanova if she had been white, the suit says.
Saleh, who now is the senior associate dean of enrollment management and financial aid at Rutgers’ law school, said in an interview that he does not recall making that comment and that he doesn’t think it’s even the case that Fuller’s speech would hurt recruiting.
“That would not have even come to my mind,” he said. “I couldn’t reasonably see a way that it would impact recruiting.”
Sena “objected to the race discriminatory and retaliatory comments” made to her in that meeting, according to the suit.
In October 2023, she complained again about the comments in an email to two administrators who headed diversity, equity, and inclusion at Villanova,according to the lawsuit complaint. Then came the award committee meeting on Jan. 30, 2024, where the dean in a letter argued against Fuller’s receiving the award, according to the suit.
Students who were in the award committee meeting and were upset about the law school dean’s reactionapproached Sena and asked what they could do, according to the suit. Sena said the students, who are not named in her lawsuit, could contact the diversity, equity, and inclusion office and file a climate complaint.
Sena, according to the suit, complained again one day after the award committee meeting that Villanova “had engaged in a dangerous pattern of race discrimination” and filed an ethics complaint with the university. She also expressed her concerns in an email to faculty and in a meeting with a law professor, who told her the students had committed an ethics violation by revealing confidential details of the awards meeting they were in, according to the suit.
After filing the complaint, Sena said in her lawsuit, she was “treated differently,” “unjustly criticized,” and “blamed for issues outside her control.”
In June 2024, human resources informed her that she was under investigation after students said she had pressured them to file complaints against the deans, which Sena denied, the suit said.
She was fired July 30, 2024, even though, the suit said, she had no prior performance or disciplinary issues and had received awards and promotions. She is seeking damages including economic loss, compensatory and punitive, and attorneys’ fees and costs.
An apology and acknowledgement
During the symposium, Fuller had said she wished Villanova would apologize and acknowledge what happened. She said that the school had given her $15,000 in financial aid toward her annual $65,000 cost, but that she subsequently learned other students had gotten more, even though her mother worked multiple jobs as a nurse’s aide to support the family.
“I was confused,” she told the audience. “How can a student with seemingly the most need graduate with the most debt?”
She learned of a free-tuition public interest scholarship that Villanova awards to incoming students and sought it after she was enrolled, she said. She was turned down repeatedly, she said, even though Villanova had recently awarded its largest group of the scholarships.
“Am I invisible?” she asked. “To walk into this law school building every day, to be surrounded by wealth and prestige, while struggling and burdened with debt, and while expected to perform like those who are not feels inhumane.”
She said during the speech she would graduate with almost $200,000 in student debt. Villanova officials, she said Wednesday, later accused her of exaggerating because she was including her undergraduate debt, too, and maintained that the total was really $160,000 — $126,000 of which was from the law school.
Fuller said Wednesday she had apologized to law school leadership, hugged them at graduation, and thought everything had been resolved. She said she was surprised to hear that the dean wanted to block her access to the debt award, she said.
“My intent wasn’t to harm, attack or mislead,” Fuller wrote in her book, “but to share my personal experience — my fears and financial anxieties — as part of the larger conversation about finding solutions to reduce poverty, which the conference was centered around.”
Staff writer Abraham Gutman contributed to this article.
Looking down one, the Flyers are buyers, trying to make a playoff push beyond the NHL trade deadline on March 6.
The other road is more well-trodden by this organization: the one where they are sellers. In the distance, maybe one can make out a third road, the one general manager Danny Brière has mentioned, that entails a quiet trade deadline.
But Flyers president Keith Jones and Brière have long said “the players will decide” which road the organization will take. It’s hard to gauge where things are right now.
Standing pat doesn’t make sense, but which direction are the Flyers heading? Are they the team from the beginning of the season or the team that has three wins in the past 15 games? And what about the future, with players like Porter Martone, Alex Bump, and Oliver Bonk waiting in the wings?
The Flyers closed out the unofficial first half of the season with a 2-1 overtime loss to the Ottawa Senators on Thursday. Jamie Drysdale scored late to tie the game after a master class by the Flyers’ six-man unit before Tim Stützle dipped the puck around Dan Vladař in overtime.
“Obviously a huge point for us,” defenseman Nick Seeler said. “But, man, it would have been great to get that extra point. But you know what? I give our group a lot of credit. Fight till the very end.”
The loss left the Flyers with a 25-20-11 record through the first 56 games, as the NHL is on a break for the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics. They sit eight points out of two different playoff spots — third place in the Metropolitan Division, behind the New York Islanders, and the Eastern Conference’s second wild card, which the Boston Bruins occupy. The Flyers also have two games in hand on the Islanders and one on the Bruins.
“Some good, some bad,” coach Rick Tocchet said when asked to assess the first 56 games.
It’s fair for a team that at one point boasted one of the best penalty kills, conceded among the fewest goals, and, for once, has a power play that didn’t completely stink. But after their massive January slide, the Flyers are tied for 16th on the penalty kill (79.1%), tied for 21st in goals allowed per game (3.16) — on Jan. 1, they were 10th (2.85) — and are ranked 28th on the power play (16.1%).
But like a famous ex-Phillies pitcher once said with another team that shall remain nameless, the Flyers are saying: “Ya gotta believe.”
“The season’s not over,” captain Sean Couturier told The Inquirer on Wednesday. “People seem almost like we’ve thrown in the towel, but we haven’t. We still believe in our group, and it’s really on us to just kind of step up and take our game to the next level.
“We’re still in the mix here. A little behind, but we still have [26] games left, so lots of hockey left. Anything can happen from now on, and we’ll just control what we can control.”
Flyers defenseman Travis Sanheim will be playing for Canada at the upcoming Olympics in Italy.
No, Couturier hasn’t gone off the deep end. The Flyers may be a handful of points out of the Stanley Cup playoffs, but they really do control their own destiny.
Of their remaining 26 games, 18 are against Eastern Conference teams, with just three against the two teams below them in the conference, the New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils. After returning on Feb. 25, they have seven games against one of the 10 teams below them in the overall NHL standings.
“We’ll need to get red-hot, I think that that’s kind of it,” Drysdale said. “I think we’re capable of it. Everyone, take this break and reset — good luck to [Travis Sanheim and Vladař] and the guys who are playing in the Olympics — but we’ve got to come out swinging right away, not waste a game.”
Time is definitely not a-wastin’. It’s a bit bonkers to think that the season has just 26 games remaining and will end in 67 days on April 14 against the Canadiens. Where the Flyers will be at that moment is the biggest question mark.
When the majority of the team reconvenes on Feb. 17 in Voorhees for practice, it will be the same squad. There is a leaguewide trade freeze until 11:59 p.m. on Feb. 22. Across the 12 subsequent days — until 3 p.m. on March 6 — there’s a good chance teams, including the Flyers, will start wheeling and dealing.
But sellers or buyers? The recent slide, and with how poorly the Flyers have played this month, are good indicators that the team isn’t in a spot to add pieces; however, as expected, they certainly aren’t giving up inside the room.
“I think just everything we learned in this first half, kind of put it all together and go on a run,” defenseman Cam York told The Inquirer on Wednesday after the team’s final practice.
“We’re young, but we’re an experienced group at the same time, I think, and I think we all want that pressure almost and we expect to make it.”
Yes, teams can go on runs and make pushes. Heck, the St. Louis Blues were last in the NHL on Jan. 1, 2019, and then, after that fateful day in South Philly where they sang “Gloria” at The Jacks NYB, they went on a magical run ending with the team hoisting the Stanley Cup
Of course, we’re not saying the Flyers are heading there, but the point is: As much as losing streaks can happen, so can winning ones. Can the Flyers dig themselves out of the hole they dug themselves and get back to who they were just a month ago?
Flyers general manager Danny Brière will have some tough decisions to make ahead of the March 6 trade deadline.
And who will be there for that?
There is no denying that the Flyers need to make room for the future. So with a team that isn’t far outside the playoff picture, do you upset the apple cart now or wait until, what most expect, the offseason?
Regardless, it’s a tough call to make with the team kind of there but not fully there in the playoff race. While Jones and Brière have said the players will dictate how they go, right now, it’s sell. Because while the message from the players is that they believe, the play on the ice right now is telling a different story.
So, two roads diverge in Philadelphia. Will they take the one less traveled? Or the one that they’ve gone down before?
