Not surprisingly, for years critics of the patronage pipeline have wondered what the BRT workers do and how hard they work.
Retired Common Pleas Court Judge Leon Katz served on the tax board in the early 1980s. Back then, he said, few employees showed up.
"I'd walk by, and it was very quiet up there," he said. "It was like a hospital."
A top union official says the work ethic is stronger now but still far from perfect. She blamed a lack of supervision.
"It's not that management hasn't been told that people aren't working; it's that they don't act on it," said Catherine G. Scott, president of Local 2187 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the union that represents the tax board's non-patronage workers.
"I don't think it's fair to say none of them work," she said. "The level of work varies greatly."
Board members say they stopped the worst abuses by installing a swipe-card system to track employees' comings and goings.
"Years ago, maybe they were ghost jobs. But that hasn't been the case for several years now," said board member Dintino, the former GOP ward leader.
He and other BRT members say the patronage workers handle many important duties that help evaluators, such as visiting properties and looking up records.
"They're the nitty-gritty," Dintino said. "They're the soldiers of this army."
To read the series online and check out special interactive features, go to http://go.philly.com/brt
Contact staff writer Mark Fazlollah at 215-854-5831 or mfazlollah@phillynews.com.
