Halfway into his term, support for Gov. Tom Corbett is sinking, according to a Quinnipiac Poll released this week, with a majority of Pennsylvanians saying he does not deserve another four years in office.

“There is no strong base of support for Gov. Corbett among any income or age group, or in any region of the state,” noted the poll, which was released Tuesday.

The governor’s support among Blacks was particularly weak.

Poll data showed that only 28 percent of Blacks said Corbett should have a second term; 57 percent said he shouldn’t be re-elected.

Support among whites was only marginally better.

Quinnipiac found that 30 percent of whites polled said Corbett should be given a second term, 50 percent said he should not.

Overall, the poll found that Corbett’s approval rating has fallen since November — moving from 38 to 36 percent of those polled. That was mirrored in a rise in those who did not approve, a number that rose to 42 percent from 40 percent over the last two months.

In addition, 51 percent of those polled said he should not be re-elected. That compares to 31 percent who said Corbett has earned a second term.

“It’s halftime in … Corbett’s first term and if he were running a football team instead of a state, he’d fire his offensive coordinator,” said Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

The poll found that Corbett has greater support among men than among women, but lacked strong support among both. Even among Republicans he failed to muster support from a majority.

Pollsters found that 54 percent of women said Corbett should not be re-elected; 24 percent said he should. Among men, 48 said he did not warrant a second term compared to 38 percent who supported four more years.

Only 49 percent of Republicans said he should be re-elected.

He has consistently polled poorly among women.

“Corbett has hit the 50 percent approval rating only once so far, mainly because of his bad grades from women,” Malloy said.

The state’s urban areas showed little support for Corbett, but the number of voters who disapprove of the governor was equaled in rural areas too.

In Philadelphia, 53 percent of those polled said he did not deserve a second term. That compares to 59 percent in Allegheny County, whose largest city is Pittsburgh. Those figures were rivaled by numbers in the rural southwest and northeast corners of the state where Corbett garnered disapproval ratings of 58 and 53 percent respectively.

In related findings, Quinnipiac reported that a majority of Pennsylvanians — Black and white —were dissatisfied with the direction the state was headed.

Pollsters found that 54 percent of whites were at least “somewhat dissatisfied” and 58 percent of Blacks were too. Nearly half of Republicans reported being unhappy with the state’s future prospects, with 46 percent saying they were at least “somewhat dissatisfied. That compared to 61 percent of Democrats.

Contact staff writer Eric Mayes at (215) 893-5742 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

If appealed, state’s Supreme Court will make final decision

In a move sure to re-ignite the controversy surrounding the state’s voter ID law, Commonwealth Court Judge Robert E. Simpson has set a date for the case against the law.

The trial will be held at 10 a.m. on July 15 in courtroom 3001 at the judicial center in Harrisburg.

Simpson, the same judge who has twice made rulings on the law — once ordering it upheld, and once delaying its implementation — issued his scheduling order Tuesday. He will preside over the trial, which is expected to last about a week.

The ACLU immediately announced that it intended to file a motion to extend the preliminary injunction, which delayed implementation of the law last fall, until after the trial.

“We will file a motion for preliminary injunction to block enforcement of the law for the [May 21] primary,” said Vic Walczak, legal director of the Philadelphia ACLU.

Anticipating the ACLU’s move, Simpson, in his order, set a Feb. 8 deadline for filing motions to extend. The state was given until Feb. 13 to file its response. Simpson expected to rule on an extension by March 21.

It is a situation that could create some voter confusion in May, Walczak said, adding that the ACLU’s primary concern was delaying the law until after a trial.

“If they don’t have to show ID, that’s the optimum,” he said. “Is some confusion going to occur? I think it’s inevitable. But, our focus is preventing enforcement of the law, which we think is going to lead to widespread disenfranchisement.”

Any decision made in July is likely to be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

Walczak said he expected an appeal no matter which side wins, and that ultimately the case will go before the state Supreme Court, which will settle the matter once and for all. Because the current case deals only with state law, appeals cannot go above the state Supreme Court.

“The only claims we’ve made in this case are under the state constitution,” he said. “So, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has the final word.”

In October, after a court battle that reached the state’s highest court, Simpson, at the Supreme Court’s command to review his previous ruling, ordered that the law be delayed until after the presidential election.

Simpson’s charge from the state Supreme Court was not to rule on the constitutionality of the law, but to delay it if he found that it disenfranchised voters. At the time, he noted that only five weeks remained until Election Day, Simpson said that was not enough to time for all votes to get ID even as the number of IDs issued has continue to increase.

If it stands, the law will be among the nation’s toughest.

A number of states pushed through voter ID laws over the last two years — 16 states require photo identification — a total of 34 require some form of ID.

Pennsylvania’s law was passed in March by the Republican legislature and signed soon after by Gov. Tom Corbett. It required voters to have a state-approved photo ID to cast their ballots. Critics charged that the law was an attempt by the Republican-dominated state government to oust President Barack Obama in November.

Estimates about how many voters it would disenfranchise varied greatly. Most projections suggested it would have a disproportionate impact on Black voters. Numbers compiled by the Tribune suggested that 39 percent of Black and Latino active voters — as many as 152,000 and 37,000 people respectively — in Philadelphia could be disenfranchised by the law. That compared to 20 percent of white voters.

Contact staff writer Eric Mayes at (215) 893-5742 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Just in time for budget season, it’s possible to track city spending down to the penny, through a new Web tool launched this week by Brett Mandel, as part of his campaign for city controller.

“Unless we have the ability to see where every single dollar is spent, we end up having the kind of ridiculous debates we’ve had in recent years, where we take what we spent last year and we only tweak it at the margins,” he said.

Armed with every detail of city spending, Mandel is hoping his Web tool will arm residents with information and provoke a budget conversation that goes much deeper that the typical budget talks.

If you are able to see where every penny of your tax dollar goes you’re able to say ‘wait a second, I’m not so sure we want to be spending here,’” he said. “I want real Philadelphians to get involved in the debates over how our tax dollars are raised and spent.”

Launched on Tuesday, the Web tool is a data tree based on last year’s budget information, provided by the city, which lists spending on all line items across city departments. Users can enter the individual budget item they’d like to see and find all of financial information tied to it.

Data is so detailed that users can search for spending by department or the salaries of individual employees and the travel reimbursements they collect.

Few people, even city officials like council members ever see the city’s budget in such rich detail, Mandel said.

“Nobody – not city council, not the mayor – has seen this level of detail at the click of a mouse,” he said. “They don’t see where every single dollar goes.”

Acknowledging the fact that the Web tool was brand new, Mandel said he hadn’t gotten any negative feedback on the idea.

But, in a phone conversation late Tuesday afternoon, Controller Alan Butkovitz said the information on the site was inaccurate.

“He said I’m making $128,000 but does not note anywhere that I’m giving back about $20,000 to the city since the 2008 economic downturn,” Butkovitz said. “If you’re going to put up a website and say this provides accurate data … the first rule is accuracy. You’ve got to vet this thing and make sure your numbers are consistent. He didn’t bother to check the data.”

Mandel said he hopes the tool will demonstrate his approach to running the controllers should he win his battle to beat Butkovitz.

“I don’t believe the incumbent is showing us where we can be more efficient — more effective,” Mandel said. “So, I put this up to illustrate the fact that I can do this.”

He pledged to continue the tool if elected and include constantly updated budget information.

Butkovitz said it was indeed a demonstration of Mandel’s style.

“It’s the worst kind of uncorroborated gossip,” Butkovitz said. “And, it kind of indicates that he’s a shoot from the hip guy.”

The primary contest for controller is likely to be among the most watched in the city during the spring election season.

Contact staff writer Eric Mayes at (215) 893-5742 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .