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For years, we’ve been calling for Penn to stop dodging its financial obligations to our public schools, which serve mostly low-income black students. As a nonprofit, Penn isn’t required to pay property taxes to the city of Philadelphia, despite an almost $15 billion endowment and a consolidated operating budget of over $10.2 billion. In fact, Penn is the largest private landowner in the entire city, amounting to many millions of dollars per year in foregone revenue for the school district. Payments In Lieu Of Taxes (PILOTs) are a common way to make up for some of that loss.

Penn’s obligation is particularly urgent at a time when protests against racial inequality and injustice have engulfed our city and country.  Every institution in our society must address the root causes of racial inequality, which include systems of public finance that enrich wealthy, private, majority-white institutions while underfunding public institutions and public services. Disinvestment in public services has exacerbated educational, health, and economic inequalities, with especially punishing effects on communities of color.
Penn is failing our public schools while continuing to invest in the largest private police force in Pennsylvania. As members of the Penn community, we can do more.

From July 27th to 31st, we're organizing a week of action targeting David Cohen, the chair of Penn's Board of Trustees. We know that David Cohen has the power to make this change, but he's shown us that it's more important to him to consolidate Penn's wealth than it is to invest in our city's public schools.

We're not going to let him get away with it.