Clips – Page 4 – Christopher Wink

Metro: Temple tuition hike warned over controversy

Temple students during summer session. Rikard Larma for Metro.

I covered for Metro Philadelphia the political battle between my alma mater Temple University and another alumnus Rep. John Taylor, who is pushing to hold back a $175 million appropriation for the school because of a closed hospital.

Nathaniel Nnadiugwu says he feels like there’s nothing he can do about a political fight between Temple and state lawmakers that threatens to hike his tuition by $5,000.

Read the rest here, or pick up a copy if you’re in the city.

This Page Two story was my second in Metro today. I also had a front page piece. Below see some quotations that didn’t make it in.

Continue reading Metro: Temple tuition hike warned over controversy

Metro: Double-byline front page on wrongful firing

Daniel Bryant outside the Chop Shop on Temple University's Main Campus. Photo by Rikard Larma for Metro. — The complainant outside the Chop Shop on Temple University's Main Campus. Photo by Rikard Larma for Metro.

I reported on a wrongful termination suit and received a double-byline, front-page story in today’s Metro in Philadelphia.

[He] wears women’s clothes because he says they better show off his feminine features.

~~Read the rest here.~~ The Metro story has been kicked offline, but you can find coverage in the Inquirer here. Pick up a copy if you’re in town and can find it. Below I have some quotations from the owner accused of the wrongful termination below.

Continue reading Metro: Double-byline front page on wrongful firing

Metro: Nutter warns of a Doomsday Plan C budget

A photo I took of the police district headquarters where Mayor Nutter spoke yesterday.

For free daily newspaper Metro Philadelphia, today I covered a press conference and related fallout from Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter warning of the Plan C budget he says he’ll be forced to introduce if two provisions aren’t passed by the state legislature.

I wrote a main brief on Nutter’s use of political theatrics: framing the legislative fight by a fight over cops and firefighters, groups that are taken very seriously in the part of the city he made the announcement.

Mayor Michael Nutter surrounded himself with police officers — and the Northeast Philadelphia residents that lean on them — to continue sending his message to Harrisburg yesterday that the city will be in dire straits without action from lawmakers.

Read the rest here. I also wrote a small sidebar item on some reaction from neighborhood onlookers.

Below see some extra material that didn’t make it into either story.

Continue reading Metro: Nutter warns of a Doomsday Plan C budget

CityPaper: Million Little Stories on Popporn adult film

Tonight I’ll be in attendance at something of a unique event: an adult film world premiere.

I briefed the event for the Philadelphia CityPaper in today’s edition [third item down].

The porn was written by two Philadelphia marketing executives who also lead POPPORN.com, which describes itself as “an adult entertainment blog. We are not a news site as we typically get the news and the details about the news factually wrong on purpose to amuse ourselves. With that being said, do you have some news?”

Continue reading CityPaper: Million Little Stories on Popporn adult film

TP Features: Interview with Chamber of Commerce chief

A big obstacle for developing a respected online news startup is access.

That’s why having a feature interview with the new president of the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce was another in a continuously more consistent stream of serious, originally-reported material for Technically Philly.

Rob Wonderling is losing his office in the Harrisburg State Capitol complex.

On Aug. 1, the two-term Republican state senator from Delaware County will report to the Avenue of the Arts as the new president and CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, as the private, 5,000-member organization announced last month.

By taking the helm of the region’s largest business advocacy organization, he says he’s eager to rebolden the region’s new business community.

“We’ve really lost the language of entrepreneurship [in the region],” Wonderling, 47, says. “Risk taking and capital and job creation are almost scurrilous terms in some political quarters. I feel very passionately that for a free democratic society, we need all of that.” Read the rest here.

After the jump, see some quotations that didn’t make it into the story, in addition to what helped me grab the interview.

Continue reading TP Features: Interview with Chamber of Commerce chief

TP Features: Daniel Delaney of Vendr.TV

I realize links here to larger features I’ve written have been lessening.

It’s not because I’ve been writing less. Rather, I’ve been writing more — just more of it has gone to Technically Philly, the Web product I’m developing with two colleagues. Rather than ignore them, I hope to link out to the larger and perhaps more notable ones, just as I would for any other piece for another publication.

From back in May, I came across some notes that were left over from a feature we ran on Daniel Delaney, a University of the Arts graduate who is now running a popular food podcast.

Daniel Delaney is sorry.

He just finished a bit of a rant about how zoning laws that govern where street vendors can do business are putting a stranglehold on Philadelphia’s food cart culture, and seemed startled when I said I assumed he was now based in New York.

“I didn’t mean that as an insult,” he says. “I just look at this stuff a bit scientifically.” Read the rest here.

Like I do for others, after the jump, see the extra information that didn’t fit into the piece.

Continue reading TP Features: Daniel Delaney of Vendr.TV

Three stories from one interview: Kevin Kiene of ezLandlord Forms

It started with a call about ezLandlord Forms, an e-commerce site with meaningful traffic that was based in Philadelphia.

I interviewed Kevin Kiene, the CEO and founder of the online provider of property-management legal documents with 300,000 members nationally, for a story for Technically Philly. During our conversation, I found out he was a Fox Chase native who now lives in Frankford, the same neighborhood I now call home, so I wrote a story about him for NEast Philly, too.

That got picked up by the father and son team at Frankford Gazette, who do a great job of chronicling the bad and more importantly the good of their native ‘hood. Suddenly, a few hundred new eyeballs know about Kiene and his product.

After the jump links to both stories I wrote, a couple quotations that didn’t make it into either and the video that prompted it all.

Continue reading Three stories from one interview: Kevin Kiene of ezLandlord Forms

Grid magazine: Philadelphia factories are repurposed sustainably

The sustainable renovation of the Globe Dye Works, a former manufacturing complex in the Frankford neighborhood of Northeast Philadelphia, is the focus of a story I have in Grid magazine this month.

For five generations and 140 years, the Globe Dye Works dyed and wound yarn, and employed hundreds at its peak. In 2005, unable to continue fighting the globalization and outsourcing that moved other businesses, Globe closed, ending another vestige of Philadelphia’s past as the Workshop of the World. Its 11 buildings and 165,000 square feet, located off Torresdale Avenue in the Frankford area of Northeast Philadelphia, were shuttered and left vacant. Read more here [PDF].

Check out the PDF and read the story on Page 18.

I also did a small feature on Globe Dye Works for NEast Philly. Grid is a fairly new magazine focused on Philadelphia sustainability and environmentalism, and it’s quickly growing attention for good reporting and sharp design. I’m proud to be a part.

Below see what didn’t make it into print.

Continue reading Grid magazine: Philadelphia factories are repurposed sustainably

Metro: Philadelphia casinos keep eye on prize

Pick up a copy of today’s Metro Philadelphia, in which I have a story.

Unfortunately, it’s currently not online.

Metro, the international newspaper group with a successful outlet in Philadelphia, recently dropped AP content. Though they still use Reuters and other wire services, losing the largest means perhaps more opportunity for interested freelancers. So I got involved.

My story takes perspective from casino experts on just how table games could affect the clientele at currently slots-only casinos. A leading state representative recently expressed his belief that table games should be allowed.

Below see some of what I cut from the final product.

Continue reading Metro: Philadelphia casinos keep eye on prize

CityPaper: Million Little Stories on Shirley Boggs

I’ve become something of a fan of the short briefs that CityPaper, a popular alternative-weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, features. Called “Million Little Stories,” they are actually well-written and worth the investment of time, a step away from the dry briefs with which most newspapers fill space.

I have one in this week’s paper — third down.

The story of Shirley Boggs has gotten around, but only because it seems to be such a good one. She’s made a couple appearances in Philly Weekly and the Daily News and most recently in The Temple News.

It’s worth going to Saturday’s event and/or donating a pair of men’s shoes. Call 215-227-5331 or 267-235-0046 to donate or get more information.