{"id":425582,"date":"2025-12-05T03:40:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T03:40:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/425582\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T03:40:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T03:40:17","slug":"bill-passes-to-protect-philly-residents-from-construction-sites-nbc10-philadelphia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/425582\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill passes to protect Philly residents from construction sites \u2013 NBC10 Philadelphia"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Philadelphia city councilmember wants more to be done to keep residents safe from construction sites after an NBC10 Investigators report<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The NBC10 Investigators had reported on Dec. 1 that building contractors who are in the process of having their license suspended or revoked can create an “alter ego” to continue building. <\/p>\n

On Thursday, Dec. 4, councilmembers passed a bill that would require contractors to insure the properties<\/a> next to where they will be building. <\/p>\n

One of the co-sponsors of the bill, Jeffrey Young, said that this should add some accountability to the process, but he says there is still work to do in closing the loophole. <\/p>\n

Councilmember Young spoke about Elaine Thomas in a speech to his colleagues on Thursday. <\/p>\n

Her home was demolished over the summer after it partially collapsed. <\/p>\n

Philadelphia’s Department of Licenses and Inspections faulted Elegance Group for the collapse after the contractor was planning to build a home on the empty lot next to Thomas’ house. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd now today, that same developer that destroyed her home is building under an alter ego,” Young said in the meeting. <\/p>\n

He was citing an NBC10 Investigators report that found that the owners of Elegance Group had their license suspended under a different business name – Expert Builders – just days before Thomas’ home collapsed. <\/p>\n

Having the same owners create or use a different company name to get a new license and keep building is sometimes referred to as an alter ego company. <\/p>\n

The city alleges that that owners of Expert Builders and Elegance Group did just that.<\/p>\n

Young lives and represents part of Center City and most of North Philadelphia where Thomas lived. <\/p>\n

“My office is absolutely looking on all legislative realms to figure out how we can close this loophole,” Young said. <\/p>\n

He suggested perhaps offering a test before contractors receive a license. <\/p>\n

“Make sure they’re actually equipped to do the work. Make sure they actually know how to do the work that they’re set out to do,” he explained. <\/p>\n

Philadelphia License and Inspections could stop a contractor from building by not issuing permits if a contractor has outstanding fines and violations.<\/p>\n

Elegance Group allegedly has more than $20,000 in unpaid fines and more than 100 violations. <\/p>\n

The bill that council passed on Thursday of adding insurance protections to property owners goes to Mayor Cherelle Parker’s desk for her signature next. <\/p>\n

If she signs it, it would go into effect early 2026. <\/p>\n

NBC10 has reached out to Elegance Group but we have not yet heard back. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Philadelphia city councilmember wants more to be done to keep residents safe from construction sites after an…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":418259,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,133537,1448,2830,1311,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-425582","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-nbc10-investigators","10":"tag-pa","11":"tag-pennsylvania","12":"tag-philadelphia","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-united-states-of-america","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115664887834783911","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=425582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=425582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=425582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=425582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}