NBC PHILADELPHIA: The folks outside City Hall protesting corporate greed and political systems that support it could actually be costing taxpayers thousands. The Occupy Philadelphia demonstration against corporate influence on politics has a growing cost to the city. In the first five days since Occupy Philly began last week the Philadelphia Police Department spent $164,000 in overtime costs and $237,000 in regular time, according to Mayor Michael Nutter’s Press Office. The protests use about $80,000 total in police costs daily — of which about $33,000 a day is being paid towards police overtime. MORE
MYFOXPHILLY: The section of City Hall taken over by the “Occupy Philly” movement is getting messier by the day, and a confrontation could be coming in three weeks. Fox 29 has learned that city plans to renovate Dillworth Plaza in three weeks and it might need to evict the “Occupy Philly” protesters from their current site. Our Chris O’Connell is camping out at the site, which has become smelly because of the lack of bathrooms, and messy as protesters building temporary structures. MORE
DAILY NEWS: Roughly 35 officers stood around the barricades near the main entrance to City Hall last night, and others were scattered elsewhere. Ramsey said plainclothes civil-affairs officers were on the scene last night. “We try to keep our presence as low-key as possible,” Ramsey said while visiting officers last night.The protesters say they can police themselves.[…] Gillison and Ramsey disagreed, adding that police are necessary to ensure public safety. […] The preliminary overtime number hardly compares to the cost of police overtime to man the 2008 Phillies victory parade, which totaled $664,000. MORE
RELATED: City last night found naked and barely clothed women, some participating in sex acts, inside a popular Mummers club in South Philadelphia, police said. Eleven people were arrested on prostitution charges. The raid at the Downtowners Fancy Brigade clubhouse, at 2nd Street and Snyder Avenue, began about 7:30 p.m. and police were still on the scene after midnight. MORE
PHAWKER: Cost of exercising your First Amendment rights: Prohibitive. Cost of keeping drunken Mummers from getting blowjobs: Priceless. By way of comparison, we would like to see NBC and the Daily News tally up how much the police department spends baby-sitting men with jackhammers at construction sites around the city. And why aren’t they writing stories about THIS?