Increased PWSA Smarminess In the New Year

Maybe you, like I was, were busy around the holidays. Maybe you, like I did, let this little snippet of PWSA (Pittsburgh Water & Sewer Authority) news slip by:

Board member Patrick Dowd said better news is the introduction of optional insurance that will be added to customer bills as of Jan. 1.

"It's the best news of the day, of the year, perhaps of the decade," said Mr. Dowd, chairman of the authority's finance committee and a Pittsburgh city councilman.

So the best news of the decade may be that Dowd and the rest of the PWSA board gave some crafty insurance company a whole slew of free customers with no work on the private company's part? Every year, Dominion People's Plus sends me paperwork on their extra gas-line insurance plan, and every year, I throw away the paperwork. That's my choice. This time, I have to go to a website and click a link to opt-out. Not cool. If people want insurance, they will opt-in. In good news, you still have the next 6 months to opt-out and receive a refund on any insurance payments you've made.

The real questions? How much of that $5 goes to the PWSA bottom line? Who has a nice cushiony job lined up after his board tenure? When can I expect an audit of this insurance company from Michael Lamb that discovers that this plan is making money hand over fist?

And most importantly, what was wrong with the old warranty system (which didn't pass along any fees to the end-user)?

The new insurance will replace the current warranty system that pays up to $6,000 for repairs or work that could cost as much as $28,000 for a customer with deep sewer problems, Mr. Dowd said.

Or does anybody agree with Dowd and want to convince me why this is the best news of the decade? I'm really curious why I should be happy about the PWSA shirking the responsibility of covering the old warranty system and effectively trying to raise my bill by 15-20% as a user who ranges from 1 to 2 thousand gallons per month. Perhaps the person who agrees with Dowd is the one person who had to cough up $28,000 in the past decade? But does that really mean we collectively should be ponying up $5 Million per year (83,000 customers at $5/month)?

And if this blog post hasn't swayed you on the scariness of the PWSA, check out the latest Pittsburgh City Paper article, "Water Torture."

Thank You to the Candidates

Congratulations to the winners of the Pittsburgh Democratic primaries.

To Mayor Ravenstahl: You have earned this victory through rampant spending and incumbency, but also through showing that you can work with Council over the last few months. I was very happy to see you parternering with Peduto and helping to institute some reform changes. Please continue to work with council. I'm sure that last night while you were at Hofbrauhaus, you made some flowery speech about the future of Pittsburgh. If you succeed in the general election this Fall, then I expect that in 4 years, we will have LED street lights, mandatory green building codes, the first tracks laid for a line between Oakland and Downtown, a manageable pension system, and real transparency in city contracting, city maintenance, and campaign donations. Please don't disappoint the constituents that have decided you are worthy of the Democratic nomination.

But most importantly, thank you to all that ran in this election. You make our election process respectable and responsible. Even if you didn't win, you are still contributing to the city by bringing new ideas to the forefront. I am glad that Dowd still has a position in the city as councilman. I hope that he keeps up hammering Ravenstahl when he disagrees with him. I also hope that he can work with Ravenstahl to make this city a better place. It is unfortunate that Carmen Robinson does not have a fall-back position in the city. I greatly admire her motivation and determination to become mayor of this city. I sincerely hope that Ravenstahl (or someone else in a position to do so) sees her connections with the community and initiative and can find her a position someplace in our city government. If not, Carmen Robinson, you must run for another position as soon as you are able.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow's my birthday, so how about as a birthday present the good folks of Pittsburgh vote for Patrick Dowd as democratic candidate for mayor?

Thanks!

Screwing Around With Campaign Finance Reform

Just yesterday, I received a press release from Kevin Evanto detailing how Dan Onorato now supports the stricter campaign finance reforms that Pittsburgh city council has passed. Instead of just ignoring this issue, he's picking up the ball and following the city's lead. This is also in spite of county council members like Amanda Green who say: "It's not a priority for me. I'm not hearing from constituents that it's a priority for them either." I'm happy that Dan has decided that ethics are a priority for the county.

However, it's only fitting that within hours of making me pleased, I learn that precious Dan bursts my bubble by giving a "loan" from his campaign war chest to the war chest of precocious Lukey. Thanks to PGH Comet for pointing this out. Lukey, whose million dollar safety net had previously dwindled to around $350,000. If the way he's managing this campaign is indicative of the way he's managing the city, he definitely needs to be displaced by Dowd who is working with a war ottoman of less than $75,000. But more importantly, how can you take a "loan" from the county executive while both of you are claiming to support campaign finance reform? Am I sensing that a loophole to the new law has already been found? Or is this another thank-god-i-vetoed-the-campaign-finance-reform-bill-last-summer exception?

Maybe Doc Harris or another independent will have a chance in this race as poor Lukey will be out of money and all he'll have to show for it is a black and gold themed website built in North Carolina and some tired commercials.

Or maybe Dowd or Robinson (who both happened to use Pittsburgh design firms to build their websites) will pull out a victory in this David and David and Goliath race.

Whatever the case, Danny-boy is clearly rooting for Lukey, leaving us all to wonder why. Does Danny like posing with Luke that much? Is he afraid Dowd or Robinson won't issue nice soundbites with him? Is he trying to stop Luke from moving on to the Governor's race? (hahahahaha) Or maybe he just wants someone in his pocket when he reaches the highest office in the state? Whatever the case, it's another week of questionable ethics in Pittsburgh. But wouldn't Peduto be out of a job if everybody started playing by the rules?

Biking For Mayor

Even if biking is not your thing, it is still worth-while to peruse Bike-PGHs mayoral interviews. The candidate responses are classic.

Robinson: Terse and to the point, but I think most of us would like to see her giving some longer answers as she is still the unknown quantity in this race. Still, I agree with her ideas. Let's kick some cars to the curb and get some bike lanes on 5th and Forbes in Oakland.

Ravenstahl: Repetitive. Can he be more boring? In answering almost every single question, he manages to mention the bike coordinator and the 2 bike lanes that have been striped in the city. Good things yes, but I'm not satisfied.

Dowd: Well thought out answers. And he bikes to work on a regular basis. I especially like his idea of a city-run network of urban bike rental. How about some city bike lockers while we're at it?

Kudos to all the candidates for taking the time to respond to Bike-PGH.

Bike-PGH can't endorse a candidate because they're a 501(c)3, but I have a strong feeling that if this survey is any indication, the members of Bike-PGH will be voting for Dowd.

4 Reasons to Vote for Ravenstahl and 1 Reason Not To

I have a confession. I voted for Lukey last election. I didn't think DeSantis was the person for the job and I'm still not convinced he was. He was different from the status quo, but different isn't always better. I also didn't watch last night's debate - though I hope it's available on youtube sometime in the future, and my excuse for this one is that I'm in Peru. As an aside, I also wrote this post while sitting on a bus in Peru, so please pardon the lack of supporting links.

So why would I consider voting for Ravenstahl again?

1) Publicity. Pittsburgh suffers nationally because of a lack of publicity. Lots of mid-sized cities share this plight. But Ravenstahl seems to appeal with some sort of national boy-wonder charisma - getting lots of media attention with his stunts. Is there anyone else running for mayor who has the ability to launch us onto the national stage? When's the last time a former president fund-raised for a Pittsburgh mayor? Of course, if he were running against John Fetterman he'd be dead in the water on this count. Maybe after John fixes Braddock, he can move on to Pittsburgh?

2) Grand Ideas. Ravenstahl has lots of grand ideas. He says things off-the-cuff like windmills and redd-up, government transparency and sweeping crime-fighting programs. It's good to have these grand ideas. However, our incumbent has failed on follow-through on most of these items, as many will state and I assume brought to light in last night's debate.

3.) Pittsburgh Promise. One particular idea that seems to have been successfully accomplished during Luke's tenure is the Pittsburgh Promise. While it's funding is currently shaky, it is there and it has already assisted hundreds of Pittsburgh high school students with their college education. This is a very worthy goal.

4.) 311. I admit it. I'm lazy. I hate looking up phone numbers and scrolling through lists of archaic city departments. It's so much easier to call 311 and tell them my problem. Unfortunately, as it stands 311 is a one-way system and needs to be improved upon. If a problem is not resolved to your satisfaction, there needs to be potential for feedback. Currently that is not happeneing and there are lots of 311 calls repeated wasting the time ofo ur citizens and city workers and ultimately our tax dollars.

Why I won't vote for Luke (again)

1.) Superficiality. Luke favors the superficial rather than the down-and-dirty. He'd rather pay millions for security cameras or buy $250,000 of trashcans to install on streets littered with relics of old trashcans than deal with major issues the city faces like PWSA bonds, the pension crisis and crime. Instead, we get witty press releases and manicured joint statements with Dan-the-tax-man. Voting for Luke is like voting for the football captain as the home-coming king back in high school.

Carmen Robinson, one of his adversaries, skewers the mayor on his stance on crime. A former police officer and current lawyer, she's someone who knows a thing or two about crime. She thinks security cameras are a waste of money and wants more better-armed beat cops walking our streets. Sounds good to me. Thanks to the Comet for his solid interview of Carmen.

Councilor Patrick Dowd, the mayor's other adversary in the up-coming election, wants to deal with the pension crisis and the PWSA. I could go on about him and why I like ideas, but I've already done that.

Councilor Bill Peduto has grand ideas that are well-researched like commuter rails and energy efficient street lights, but he's decided to stay out of the ring this time around.

I want a mayor and council who work together to create a stronger Pittsburgh. I don't want a mayor who looks good, but fights with council, says rash un-researched ideas, refuses to compromise, refuses to admit his mistakes and certainly doesn't learn from them all the while profiting from his status as mayor while Pittsburgh stays on the same path.

And The Winner Is?

Last month, the request for consultants was sent out with a March 20 deadline of applying to be a consultant for stepping the city through the complexities of leasing the parking garages. It's been 6 days since that deadline. Did anybody apply? Maybe I should have. I have a few suggestions.

Recommendation #1: I echo Dowd in demanding that we have a complete and properly staffed Parking Authority board.

Recommendation #2: Don't do it now. The State Auditor is currently questioning the recent attempted "fire sale" of a downtown building. Michael Lamb, our County Auditor will inevitably pipe up with an equally practical audit requesting that we not "fire sale" our parking garages in time of economic downturn. Let's cut this off before we spend oodles of cash on a consultant that will inevitably be the uncle of a big city political contributor.

Needless to say, I didn't discover any information on the Parking Authority's website, but I was delighted to learn that they're currently hiring.

Reality Checks

I'm a big fan of www.factcheck.org which I used extensively during the recent presidential campaign.
Since copying is the biggest form of flattery, I've decided to do a little fact-checking myself.

From a recent Ravenstahl campaign announcement (courtesy of the Busman):

"Pittsburgh needs leadership, not a desperate politician willing to do or say anything to get elected. That's why and how he's run for four political offices in the last 8 years with no accomplishments to show for it. While he's talking and done nothing, I have submitted campaign finance reform pending before Council and I am reforming Pittsburgh's decades old procurement practices. Politics as usual from Dowd. Try again, Pat."

Let's get this straight. Back in June, Ravenstahl vetoed the campaign finance bill that City Council passed. Councilman Dowd voted for this campaign finance reform bill. At the time, Ravenstahl said: "It provides an unfair competitive advantage for the wealthy and will have a chilling effect on the labor movement. It will inhibit the ability of challengers to mount successful campaigns against incumbents." Six months later, in January, Ravenstahl and Onorato co-introduced a joke of a campaign reform bill that is clearly too late to affect this year's election, and has ludicrously high limits. Now, "Mr. Ravenstahl said previously that the proposed campaign finance bill will make substantive changes and could hurt incumbents like him." So which is it? Will Ravenstahl, the incumbent, be hurt or helped by campaign finance reform? We're supposed to believe that Ravenstahl will veto a bill that will help him, yet be a proponent of a bill that will hurt him. Ha.

I've already done a report on what I think Dowd has done right over the past year. You can decide for yourselves if you think Dowd has "no accomplishments to show for it." Additionally, in the past week or so, he has also been continuously calling out Ravenstahl on issues from pay-to-play politics to the PWSA bond issue. I wish he hadn't waited until deciding to run for mayor to call out the incumbent, but it's better late than never.

Things Ravenstahl got right:
Pittsburgh does need leadership. And a lot of us are pretty sick of you, Ravenstahl, the desperate politician willing to do or say anything to get elected.

Here Comes the Money

The federal stimulus money has begun its influx into this region. So far, we have new money for biking and walking paths, airport runways, and potholes. Not so glamorous. High on the mayor's original wish list was money for the equally-unglamorous PWSA, which Dowd has been attempting to pin down as of late. Hopefully, when more stimulus money flows in, the current complex issues surrounding the PWSA bonds (which most of us will never understand), that money won't sweep these issues under the rug. Maybe we can spend some of the money on a consultant to actually figure out all these bond shenanigans?

On the flip side of the coin, as null space points out, construction prices have continued to rise in the region in spite of nationwide drops in fuel prices and construction materials. If we have a hope of spending all this shiny new stimulus money, we need more construction workers in this region. The best way to do that? Offer competitive salaries. Wouldn't it be nice if Allegheny County had the highest paying construction jobs in the nation?

In the meantime, if you can hold off on re-roofing your house, you might want to.

What I Like About Dowd

After combing through the last year's articles on Dowd in the Post-Gazette, I've discovered that I do like what Dowd's been doing. That I had to comb through the Post-Gazette's online articles to discover this, I'm not too happy about, but hopefully this will save others some effort while Dowd and company complete his new website.

1) His role in the ICA/Debt Reduction debacle. He's taken a stand on putting our piggy bank in a safe place. That's cool. A real outcome remains to be seen. It surely helps my good opinion of him that my buddy Lamb is in agreement with him on this one.

2) His awareness of all those pesky city authorities and his consistent complaints that the city is not following its rules, especially regarding the very important parking authority status given the mayor's grand plan to lease the garages and potentially give us a respite from our very serious pension woes.

3) His class in cancelling a taxpayer-paid mailing with his face plastered all over it. If only Luke had shown that much class on trash cans. (Though I can see a lovely anti-Luke campaign involving "taking out the trash.")

4) His position on campaign finance reform. Dowd is one of the majority of council to vote for campaign finance reform. Unfortunately, the current mayor vetoed that bill. Maybe next year?

5) His negotiations with Lamar. The Post-Gazette gives credit for Dowd for settling with Lamar out of court and re-instating the proper board approval process. Also, I appreciate that while he joined fellow council members in appealing the original zoning board approval, he did so as a private citizen.

6) His grass-rootsness. This summer he planned a series of neighborhood meetings as coffee shops. His entire council campaign was based on "grass roots" support. He also appears to be quite popular on Facebook, which while not a ringing endorsement, shows that he has popular support and probably some charm and charisma to go along with it. If I may reach out to those supporters, I might remind you that you're not a private club. You might want to spread the word to folks outside your own circle.

I think all that adds up to looking pretty good on paper. So, why do you like Dowd?

Stay tuned. Maybe tomorrow, I'll address the incumbent.