There are 9/11 memorials all across the region and now, finding many of them in the Garden State is much easier. NBC10's Ted Greenberg has the details.

Politicians and organizations in Philadelphia are raising money to help pay for applications for a soon-to be-ended program that allows young immigrants without legal status to remain in the country.

Officials on Monday announced the launch of The Dreamers Initiative, a fundraising effort to cover the $495 fee needed to renew an application to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or DACA program.

President Donald Trump's administration last week announced plans to end the program. The initiative says the program will end in March 2018 but people with permits that will expire before then can apply by Oct. 5 for a two-year renewal.

"We ... strongly urge Congress to reevaluate the DACA protections, craft legislation that supports those protections, and last but most assuredly not least, protect the lives of all Dreamers," the Philadelphia Youth Commission said in a statement.

DACA protects about 800,000 people who were brought to the United States illegally as children or who came with families who overstayed visas.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Wilmington, Delaware are both competing to be the new home for Amazon's headquarters. The HQ should boost the economy. NBC10's Ste

One viewer says her family was stuck paying for an internet service that wouldn't connect in the home. NBC10 Responds and Telemundo 62 Responde Reporter Ines Ferre got to the bottom of the problem.

Irma moved into the Carolinas and Georgia, leaving a new path of destruction. NBC10's Keith Jones has the details. Click Here if you'd like to donate to victims of Irma.

Surveillance footage led Philadelphia police to the suspects accused of killing 38-year-old Gerard Grandzol, a father of two who was shot in the face last week while shielding his daughter from a carjacking, police said Monday.

"It's one the most horrific things I've seen," Capt. John Ryan, commanding officer of Philadelphia police homicide unit, said. "It's hard to watch."

Marvin Roberts, 16, allegedly opened fire on Grandzol after he and his older brother, 21-year-old Maurice Roberts, confronted Grandzol on the 1500 block of Melon Street Thursday evening in an attempted carjacking, police said.

Grandzol handed the two brothers his wallet but refused to turn over his car keys because his 2-year-old daughter was still inside, police said.

That's when he was shot twice in the face, police said. Investigators have not recovered the 9 mm semiautomic gun used to kill Grandzol. They suspect Roberts acquired the weapon by either stealing it or buying it illegally. Sources told NBC10 the two brothers could be heard laughing as they fled the scene.

When first responders arrived, they found Grandzol's daughter crying in the back seat, sources said.

"It's a touch of evil. There's no way to explain [the shooting]," Ryan said.

On Saturday, Marvin Roberts was charged with murder, robbery, carjacking, criminal conspiracy, possession of an instrument of crime, reckless endangerment and several other violations, police said.

Police released his mugshot Monday afternoon. 

His older brother fled Philadelphia following the shooting but U.S. Marshalls arrested him in New Jersey Saturday evening, police said. The 21-year-old is currently in police custody and will be sent back to Philadelphia after a formal hearing.

Brendan Fernald, Grandzol's friend and neighbor, rushed over to help and try to keep him alive.

"[I] jumped down and started putting pressure on his wounds. Then, scooping the blood out of his mouth so he could breathe," Fernald said.

A vigil for Grandzol will be held Monday at 6:15 p.m. at the corner of 15th and Melon streets.

Roberts' older brother was also arrested in connection to the carjacking and shooting. Both brothers have prior arrests, investigators told NBC10.

Puppies carrying a common germ have infected 39 people, putting nine of them into the hospital, federal health officials told NBC News.

The cases are all linked to puppies sold in seven states by the pet store chain Petland, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. The infection, called Campylobacter, is common in dogs and it can pass to people easily.

“The ill people are from seven states (Florida, Kansas, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Wisconsin),” the CDC said. The illnesses go back nearly a year, to September of 2016.

Dogs infected with Campylobacter might look perfectly well, but they can also have diarrhea, vomiting, or a fever. In people, symptoms include diarrhea, sometimes bloody; fever; stomach cramps; nausea and vomiting.

Flying bugs are creating a bad buzz in Philly neighborhoods and the surrounding suburbs.

Several people on Facebook and Twitter reported seeing swarms of insects, believed to be either gnats or winged ants, covering various Philadelphia neighborhoods, including South Philadelphia and Fishtown, as well as parts of Bucks County and South Jersey.

“It’s pretty nasty,” one woman told NBC10. “The swarms that went from Frankford and Thompson to near my house at Memphis and Montgomery Ave. We were covered in them from head to toe. Yuck.”

Garrett O’Dwyer, who lives in Philly’s Bella Vista neighborhood, said the insects were flying ants.

“My block has been taken over by flying ants,” he tweeted. “Apparently this is what they do to mate: grow wings and throw a party.”

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NBC10 viewers also reported seeing the swarms of insects in parts of Bucks and Chester County, Pennsylvania as well as Cherry Hill and Salem County, New Jersey.

Philadelphia Police admitted they weren’t sure where the insects were coming from, making light of the bug invasion with a Simpsons reference. 

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The Philadelphia Health Department is also unsure and included a funny Simpsons tweet of their own.

"We've been monitoring reports online and unfortunately, the Health Department doesn't have any jurisdiction over flying ants," a spokesperson  told NBC10.

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Similar swarms of flying insects have been spotted in other cities and states in recent weeks, including Connecticut. An insect expert told our affiliate NBC Connecticut that the bugs appeared to be winged ants coming above ground to mate. Most ant colonies swarm around the same time each year to mate and begin new colonies. It’s unconfirmed however whether that’s the case in our area. The swarms also typically occur in late spring and early summer rather than late summer.

Here are the 10 things you need to know to start your day from your friends at NBC10.

TODAY'S TOP STORY 

Swarms of Flying Insects Spotted in Philly Area: Flying bugs are creating a bad buzz in Philly neighborhoods and the surrounding suburbs. Several people on Facebook and Twitter reported seeing swarms of insects, believed to be either gnats or winged ants, covering various Philadelphia neighborhoods, including South Philadelphia and Fishtown, as well as parts of Bucks County and South Jersey. “It’s pretty nasty,” one woman told NBC10. “The swarms that went from Frankford and Thompson to near my house at Memphis and Montgomery Ave. We were covered in them from head to toe. Yuck.”

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YOUR FIRST ALERT FORECAST  

Tuesday is expected to be mostly cloudy with temperatures in the high 70s and low 80s. Spotty showers are possible for Wednesday. Get your full NBC10 First Alert forecast here.

WHAT YOU MISSED YESTERDAY

Teen Posts Racially-Charged Death Threats Against Students: Students at West Chester East High School in Chester County were on high alert Monday after death threats and racial slurs aimed at freshmen were posted on social media. “I feel bad for ya’ll,” a teen posted on a now-deleted Instagram account Sunday night. “Because ya’ll think it’s a joke. Each and everyone on sic those n****** will be killed tomorrow.” Other posts from the account threatened specific students, the majority of them black or Hispanic, and included racial slurs. West Goshen Police announced Monday that they found the student responsible for the threats. While the teen has not yet been charged, an arrest is pending. West Chester Area School District Superintendent Dr. Jim Scanlon alerted parents of the threats, which he said were tied to other threats made at other schools, including Central Bucks West in Doylestown, on the anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

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AROUND THE WORLD

Battered Florida Assesses Scope of Damage: Aid rushed in to hurricane-scarred Florida early Tuesday, residents began to dig out, and officials slowly pieced together the scope of Irma's vicious path of destruction across the peninsula. Even as glimmers of hope emerged from parts of the state forecasters once worried would be razed by the storm, the fate of the Florida Keys, where Irma rumbled through with Category 4 muscle, remained largely a question mark. Communication and access were cut and authorities dangled only vague assessments of ruinous impact. "It's devastating," Florida Gov. Rick Scott said after emerging from a Monday fly-over of the Keys. A Navy aircraft carrier was due to anchor off Key West to help in search-and-rescue efforts. Drinking water supplies in the Keys were cut off, fuel was running low and all three hospitals in the island chain were shuttered. The governor described overturned mobile homes, washed-ashore boats and rampant flood damage.

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Florida Begin to Reopen After Irma: After thousands of flights were canceled and major airports throughout Florida were closed because of Hurricane Irma, travel operations are beginning to resume. Miami International Airport said on Twitter early Tuesday that passenger and cargo flights had resumed at the airport on a limited basis according to the airlines' schedules. The airport endured nearly 100 mph wind gusts and sustained significant water damage from Irma Sunday, according to Aviation Director and CEO Emilio Gonzalez. "The damage is in the gate areas, where water leaked in from jet bridges and the roof. The terminals with most damage are J, H, G, F and E," MIA Airport spokesman Greg Chin said. Hurricane Irma, a once-Category 5 storm, had led to the cancellation of more than 4,200 U.S. flights scheduled for Monday — and more than 9,000 since Saturday — according to tracking service FlightAware. Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport officials expected to resume operations at 4 a.m. on Tuesday.

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SPORTS SPOT

Patience for Phillies Hitting Coach: Phillies hitting coach Matt Stairs believes Maikel Franco has potential. Get your full sports news at CSNPhilly.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

See more Top News Photos here.

THROUGH IGER'S EYES

@pixbykrys captured this cool black and white pic of a Philly fire truck.

Have an awesome Instagram photo you'd like to share? Tag it with #NBC10Buzz.

TODAY'S VIRAL VIDEO

Check out these old records: Click here to watch.

Philly Residents Help Irma Victims in Caribbean: Residents in the Philadelphia area are lending a helping hand to Hurricane Irma victims in the Caribbean.  Read more.

That's what you need to know. We've got more stories worthy of your time in the Breakfast Buzz section. Click here to check them out. 

The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission is removing all of the yellow emergency call boxes from the shoulder of the highway. Officials say 1,000 boxes are now obsolete as most drivers rely on mobile phones. Drivers should dial *11 on their phones to report an accident or emergency.

A man rushed back into his burning Delaware home because he thought his wife was still inside.

He wouldn’t make it out alive, but she did, rescued by a neighbor.

The man, who is in his 50s and identified by family as "Archie," rushed in and out of his home on West 37th Street near Tatnall Street in Wilmington, Delaware, after flames broke out around 11:30 p.m., neighbors told NBC10’s Katy Zachry.

He grabbed a garden hose in an attempt to put out the fire, then rushed back in, saying he was looking for his wife, but she had already made her way out of the home, witnesses and family said.

"Came back in to try and find her but she is outside yelling his name the whole time," said the victim’s son, Archie Moweray. "He did what any husband should do with a wife, he went in there to try and find her and he didn’t make it out."

Moweray said his stepmother suffered serious injuries but should survive. A neighbor suffered non-life-threatening injuries catching the woman after she jumped from an awning, Wilmington firefighters said.

It took crews about one hour to bring the fire under control, firefighters said.

A 5-year-old girl who lives with the couple happened to be staying at another home at the time of the blaze, family members said.

The cause of the fire remained under investigation Tuesday morning.

A New Jersey oceanographer has made it his life's work to study and predict storm surge flooding in storms such as Hurricane Irma. Brian Thompson reports.

New Jersey officials have launched a piliot amnesty program for people to confess abuse of Medicaid benefits, after more than two dozen fraud arrests in the booming community of Lakewood.

The Office of the State Comptroller, Medicaid Fraud Division, said the program would start Tuesday and run for three months. Under the Ocean County Recipient Voluntary Disclosure Program, people would have to repay benefits they received while ineligible, plus a civil penalty.

They would also have to agree not to accept Medicaid for one year. But if they meet all the program requirements, the comptroller's office will not refer them for prosecution, and the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office said it will not pursue charges.

For now the program is open only to residents of Ocean County who have received Medicaid, have not settled already with the comptroller's office and are not already facing charges.

In late June and early July, state and federal authorities charged 26 people from the Ocean County town of Lakewood, including a prominent local rabbi and a special-needs school leader, with a laundry list of fraud counts.

At the heart of the charges is the allegation that they all, in one way or another, failed to report or otherwise concealed significant income that would have made them ineligible for the assistance programs in which they enrolled. In total, state and federal prosecutors have said the families collected more than $2.4 million in benefits. 

The charges shook Lakewood, whose population tripled since 1980 as the Orthodox Jewish population there surged. The town is now one of New Jersey's largest as a result.

The Asbury Park Press has reported that hundreds of Lakewood residents contacted town officials after the arrests, seeking amnesty or guidance on whether they had broken the law.

The Lakewood Vaad -- a council of Orthodox religious leaders and businessmen -- supports the amnesty program, the paper said. 

The Ocean County Prosecutor's Office, in a blog post Monday, pushed back against criticism of the amnesty and complaints it was not acting aggressively enough to pursue more fraud cases in the town.

"In terms of the Amnesty program that the NJ State Comptroller’s Office initiated: The amnesty program came from them. We have no authority to mandate or monitor how a state agency does business," the office said. 

People have been stranded in Florida for days. Some people can head back to Florida Tuesday, as airports across the state reopen follwoing Hurricane Irma. There are limited flights to and from Florida. NBC10's Matt DeLucia has the details of what flights are going to and from Florida.

NBC10 is welcoming two Philadelphia-area natives home.

Meteorologist Steven Sosna and reporter/anchor Dray Clark will join NBC10 in the coming weeks. Sosna will begin giving forecasts in mid-Septemeber while Clark will join Rosemary Connors on the NBC10 Mornings weekend anchor desk in October.

“We are thrilled to have Steve and Dray join NBC10 and return to their hometown of Philadelphia,” Anzio Williams, vice president of news for NBC10 and Telemundo62, said. “Both are extremely talented and demonstrate an unparalleled drive to provide viewers with reliable information through impactful storytelling and connecting with the community.”

A Montgomery County native, Sosna was born in Sellersville and raised in Lansdale, Pennsylvania. He comes to NBC10 from NBC 4 in New York where he was senior weather producer and fill-in on-air meteorologist for MSNBC. Sosna is also one of the first meteorologists to use NBCUniversal Owned Stations’ state-of-the-art mobile Doppler radar StormRanger to track Tropical Storm Hermine.

Sosna graduated from Kean University and earned a bachelor’s degree in Earth Science with a concentration in atmospheric science. He is a member of the American Meteorology Society and National Weather Association. Prior to joining NBC 4 New York, Sosna worked at KAAL-TV in Rochester, Minnesota where he was a weekday morning meteorologist and on occasion appeared on KSTP-TV in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. He started his career at NBC 4 New York recording local weather updates for NBC Weather Plus and was a freelance meteorologist for News 12 Connecticut and News 12 Weather and Traffic.

Born and raised in Chester, Delaware County, Dray Clark has worked in television for 17 years. He comes to NBC10 from WABC in New York. Prior to that, Clark worked for five years as a reporter and anchor at KYW-TV in Philadelphia. He has also worked at television stations in Cleveland, Ohio, Grand Rapids, Michigan and Macon, Georgia, where he landed his first television job in 2000.

Clark has earned numerous awards and nominations including three Emmy awards for his reporting as well as awards from the Associated Press and Press Club of Cleveland. He earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Lincoln University. Clark is also a member of the esteemed Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc.

Students at West Chester East High School in Chester County were on high alert on September 11 after death threats and racial slurs aimed at freshmen were posted on social media.

“I feel bad for ya’ll,” a teen posted on a now-deleted Instagram account Sunday night. “Because ya’ll think it’s a joke. Each and everyone on sic those n****** will be killed tomorrow.”

Other posts from the account threatened specific students, the majority of them black or Hispanic, and included racial slurs.

“Even though people posted pictures of individuals and singled them out, we were all a victim in some kind of way because we are all minorities,” said Quincy Griffin, a senior at East High.

West Goshen Police announced Monday that they found the student responsible for the threats. While the teen has not yet been charged, an arrest was pending. 

West Chester Area School District Superintendent Dr. Jim Scanlon alerted parents of the threats, which he said were tied to other threats made at other schools, including Central Bucks West in Doylestown, on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

“I want to reiterate to all of our students that any student engaging in this kind of behavior will face disciplinary action from our school district, in addition to any action taken by police,” Scanlon wrote.

While police believed the school was safe, extra officers still patrolled the campus Monday.

“We’re all just trying to learn,” said Tianna Jones, one of the targeted students. “We’re all just trying to have a good time, but we can’t because we’re worried we’re going to get shot in the hallways.”

No violent incidents were reported though many students were on edge, with some leaving early.

“I was just there for first period,” Sael Rivera, a freshman at East High, told NBC10. “My mom came to pick me up because she was scared.”

Dayna Spence, the mother of one of the targeted students, organized a meeting for students and parents in the high school’s auditorium Monday night. More than 100 people attended to discuss the incident and what needed to be done to bring about change.

“I believe that the school district has a huge problem that they’re not willing to acknowledge,” she said. “They have their head in the sand.”

Dozens of protesters gathered in Center City to demand more information from federal immigration officials, who recently backed off plans for a masssive national raid.

Led by local community group Juntos, the demonstrators delivered a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The request asked for details regarding several planned raids, including Operation Mega, a sweeping immigration roundup that was canceled when hurricanes Irma and Harvey struck earlier this month.

“We will keep fighting,” Philadelphia Councilwoman Maria Quinones-Sanchez said in Spanish. “This will be a long struggle and we will use all the assets available to us through the state and the constitution to ensure this government is more transparent.”

Operation Mega would have targeted roughly 8,400 undocumented immigrants nationwide and would constitute "the largest operation of its kind in the history of ICE,” sources told NBC. The raids were scheduled to begin this weekend.

“The Trump administration has let loose an unaccountable agency against our people,” Erika Almiron, executive director of Juntos, said.

“The recent announcement of Operation Mega is the latest in a list of rogue tactics aimed at our community. Since the federal government isn’t checking their corruption, we are filing FOIAs locally and across the country to begin to monitor it and bring it to light.”

The local FOIA request is part of a coordinated effort throughout the U.S. that included a total of 24 requests filed at ICE field offices across the country.

“We’re telling them they don’t have the right to maintain a wall of secrecy,” Philadelphia demonstrator Leah Reisman said. “They need to give us the information we need to protect our community, so we’re telling ICE ‘show us your papers.’”

ICE officials did not respond to questions about the FOIA requests, but a local official told NBC10 that "ICE continues to focus its enforcement resources on individuals who pose a threat to national security, public safety and border security."

ICE has removed more than 2,800 undocumented immigrants from Pennsylvania, Delaware and West Virginia since October. More than 1,800 were convicted criminals, an ICE official said.

"All of those in violation of the immigration laws may be subject to immigration arrest, detention and, if found removable by final order, removal from the United States," the official said.

This latest move by immigration advocates added to a string of actions aimed at fighting the Trump administration’s crackdown on border security. While deportations were at an all-time high under former President Barack Obama, earning him the dubious honor of “Deporter in Chief,” activists maitained that ICE arrests and detentions are increasing under President Donald Trump.

“We are not going to let ICE operate with impunity,” Jacinta Gonzalez, field office director for national group Mi Gente, said. “We want to make sure ICE operations meet constitutional standards,” including upholding the right to remain silent.

This is not the first time local governments have challenged President Donald Trump's immigration agenda. 

Mayor Jim Kenney declared Philadelphia a sanctuary city earlier this year. After U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions repeatedly threatened to withhold grant funds for local law enforcement unless police began turning over immigration information to ICE, Kenney and City Solicitor Sozi Pedro Tulante sued.

One week later, when President Donald Trump announced he would end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) in March, Pennsylvania joined Delaware and other states in a separate lawsuit against the federal government.

DACA, enacted under Obama, allows young undocumented immigrants, brought to the U.S. by their parents, to work and attend school.

News of DACA’s demise triggered a flood of calls to city and community organizations from concerned recipients questioning what would become of their status. As a result, Philadelphia launched the Dreamers Initiative, a fund to help DACA recipients pay the $495 renewal fee before their legal protections expire.

“Those who are eligible for renewals are facing a really tight deadline of Oct. 5 and that’s why Philadelphia has sprung into action,” Miriam Enriquez, director of Philadelphia’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, said.

Approximately 21,000 DACA recipients live in Pennsylvania and 5,000 of those live in Philadelphia, Councilwoman Helen Gym said.

“Pennsylvania Dreamers will not have to face the challenges ahead alone. At the highest levels of our city, state and nation, we are with you and we are fighting for you,” she said.

The design for the new iPhone 10 was revealed by Apple Tuesday afternoon. NBC10's Ted Greenberg gets reactions from people from our area on the design and price.

They were barely old enough to remember the Sept. 11 attacks, but that didn't stop two volunteer firefighters from climbing 110 simulated flights of stairs Monday in honor of the first responders who risked their lives 16 years ago.

Zachary Long and Garrett Pickford, volunteers for the New Hanover Volunteer Fire & Rescue Services Department in Montgomery County, went to a Planet Fitness gym wearing their firefighter gear and climbed 110 floors using gym equipment.

“It’s kind of like a firefighter challenge to represent the amount of work the 343 firefighters that perished on 9/11 went through in order to help,” Long told NBC10. 

Long’s girlfriend, Melissa Garris, recorded the two as they "climbed" and made a touching video tribute.

Long, who is now 23, was 7-years-old when planes struck New York City's World Trade Center. Long recalled “a school teacher walking into the room and my grade school teacher kind of told us what was going on.”

Long visited the New York memorial recently with his girlfriend and her family. He says he felt the “impact of everything that went on that day."

“I love my country a lot. I would hate to see all those guys ever forgotten for all that they went through and all that they sacrificed. We had several people walk by us saying, ‘How many more stairs do you have to go?’" Long said.

“You definitely felt the burn after a while,” he added.

Neither he nor Pickford trained prior to the challenging task. Pickford threw up half way through the 45-minute climb, Long said, who even took Pickford's air tank for part of the "climb" to help his friend.

"A lot of fire departments are really struggling right now with the number of volunteers... every last one of us work for free," he said, adding that volunteer firefighters are needed now more than ever.

As the city continues to debate whether or not a statue of former Philadelphia mayor Frank Rizzo should be removed, a cultural arts program is sparking new dialogue with its latest sculpture.

Mural Arts Philadelphia installed a sculpture of a 12-foot Afro pick topped by a black power fist at the southwest corner of Thomas Paine Plaza, approximately 50-feet from the 10-foot tall bronze Rizzo statue, which stands outside the Municipal Services Building near 15th Street and John F. Kennedy Boulevard. The sculpture, titled “All Power to All People,” was created by multimedia artist Hank Willis Thomas.

The sculpture is part of the Mural Arts’ new public art and history project “Monument Lab,” which features work from 20 artists placed at 12 sites in the city over a nine-week period.

Thomas, 41, told Philly.com he had been working on the sculpture for nearly a year and that it was not created in response to the Rizzo statue or the controversy surrounding it. Thomas, who resides in New York but spent part of his childhood in Philadelphia, and Mural Arts founder Jane Golden also stated they didn’t initially intend to place the sculpture near the Rizzo statue. Golden did admit however that Mural Arts pushed for it to be placed there after the recent Rizzo protests began in the city. 

Rizzo served as mayor from 1972 to 1980. Critics argue he reigned over a corrupt police department and used his power to alienate minorities. Supporters say he was a devoted public servant who spoke his mind.

Besides protests, both Rizzo’s statue and mural in the city have been vandalized numerous times. The incidents included a series of eggings and the spray-painting of “Black Power.”

The recent string of vandalism followed renewed calls for the removal of public images in cities around the country in the wake of the deadly violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in August and national discussion over how to handle statues and monuments linked to racism and other emotionally-charged issues.

Philly councilwoman-at-Large Helen Gym began pushing for the Rizzo statue’s removal last month, reigniting the debate over the legacy of the controversial mayor, who died of a heart attack in 1991.

Some call the statue and mural reminders of Rizzo's strained history with the African-American and gay communities during the late 1960s and 1970s.

Rizzo, a hard-charging, big-mouthed icon of head-cracking law enforcement in Philadelphia, served as police commissioner for four years before serving two terms as the city’s mayor from 1972 to 1980. His friends, family and fans remember him as a devoted public servant unafraid to speak his mind. Thousands of people signed a recent online petition to keep the statue in place.

Lowlights from Rizzo's time as police commissioner include an incident in 1970 of officers raiding the Philadelphia headquarters of the Black Panthers and forcing the men to strip in public.

Supporters of Rizzo claim he wasn't a racist however, citing the fact that he integrated police cars with African American and white officers during his time as mayor.

“Frank Rizzo means many things to many people,” Gym said. “He was known & loved by those who knew & loved him. Moving the statue doesn't take that away. The hatred and violence I and others have received also points to a legacy of racism/violence by those who profess to honor his memory.”

In response to the controversy, Mayor Jim Kenney said it was the “right time” for a conversation about the statue. City officials say they’re taking suggestions from the public in regards to the statue’s fate.