Attendance Light at Fed Ed Fundraiser

Allentown Mayor Edwin "Fed Ed" Pawlowski's former Managing Director, Fran Dougherty, entered a guilty plea plea in federal court on Wednesday to bid-rigging a street lights contract at Fed Ed's direction. He's the seventh person to plead guilty in Allentown's political corruption investigation. Even Fed Ed's attorney, Jack McMahon, agrees that Fed Ed is next, and that an indictment is just days away. But what impact does this have on the embattled Mayor's bid for a fourth term? Given the number of candidates running, common wisdom is that he's the front runner. But are people really that gullible? I set to find out last night.

Last night, Fed Ed had a fundraiser at the NB Center for Automotive Heritage, located at 540 Union Boulevard. It's the site of an old drive-in, and I decided to scout it to see how many people were there.

The event ran between 6 and 8 pm, so I arrived around 7 pm. I did not go inside because there was no way I was going to pay the $100 admission fee, even though that's a bargain compared to the $250 that Charlie Thiehl wants from each person at his April fundraiser.

I counted about 20 cars, and sat with fake foxes to watch as a few couples walked in.

This is hardly the kind of grass roots support I expected to see. My guess is that he's in danger of losing the primary,and if there's an indictment, he's toast.

I was told the fake foxes were there to keep geese away.

But they were already inside.