More Pittsburgh Envy

With more and more people aware of Pittsburgh's relative (not absolute) economic strength, more and more are casting envious eyes at our cities deep stock of assets. Yes, we had slums and relatively poor neighborhoods and towns, but we also had a deep middle to wealthy housing stock and an array of majestic parks, museums, libraries, theaters and assets rare for a city of it's size. Pittsburgh in many ways was built to last.

Null Space has a link to an article in Arizona bemoaning the small number college choices in the Phoenix area and in the state as a whole. While, the state grew and grew and grew, few noticed or cared but now some (like me) wonder just how hollow that growth was. It's a slight exaggeration to say Florida, Arizona and Nevada have shell economies but the number of people in those states who built houses, or sold lumber, or made loans, or built stores or paved new roads based on the needs of new residents is pretty staggering. That's the nature of a bubble--no one thinks it will stop. Why look for alternative investments or different businesses to be in when it's so easy to concentrate on what's booming? Why build communities and wonder if your area is "sustainable'? It must be cause people keep comming.

"That doesn't sit well with Mayor Scott Smith, who is working to lure a major medical school or other college to the nation's 38th-largest city.

"We could put five colleges in here and we wouldn't even begin to match what cities our size in other areas of the country have," Smith said.

He cited Pittsburgh, which boasts a population of slightly more than 300,000 - 160,000 fewer than Mesa - but which is home to prestigious schools such as Carnegie Mellon University, Duquesne University and the University of Pittsburgh, as well as several smaller schools."

This is the comment I left on Null Space.

"I think shows that our much maligned "robber barons" and early Pittsburgh leaders made some pretty sound investments in Pittsburgh's colleges, museums, parks and other city assets. (They also left us some very profitable companies)

Say what you will about Carnegie, He didn't skimp on leading edge technology and efficiency upgrades in his plants and he left a flawed but fairly wise legacy."

What's happened since is very much another story.

Insolvent By Design Part One: Pittsburgh Promise Problems

I hate to gloat, but one of the good things about the economic recession is it's blown sky high a lot of the convenient lies public figures have been telling us. As Warren Buffet said, when the tide goes out you learn who's been swimming naked.

Poor Luke, he's likely far from being our worst mayor, but the tide is out and more and more inconvenient truths about our budget are being revealed. Don't look to anyone else for help, like the county, state or feds, they're naked too.

The cash strapped city received a firm no from a coalition of almost all the colleges, to a "request" by the mayor for 5 million annually from non profits towards the city's general fund. The rejection letter contained this quote.

"a. When you solicited significant contributions to the Pittsburgh Promise from the non-profit community, you significantly diminished that community's capacity to support the City, a fact that you have acknowledged on other occasions."

Ever since the mayor announced the ambitious Pittsburgh Promise program, people have been wondering if there wasn't a wink agreement that contributions would replace tax payments to the city's general budget. It sure looks like that's what many non profit's thought.

The ironic thing is that the mayor needs the money, mostly to fill a massive hole in it's employee pension fund. In other words, we didn't have close to enough money to pay for our previous "promises", and yet Luke piled on some more.

The whole situation is IMHO, likely the product of a long chain of public policies that have worked to put more and more of Pittsburgh's land area in the hands of non tax paying uses.

How did this happen? It's a long story, many details of which I don't know but it sure as hell should be an area of study.

Be back with more thoughts.

Welcome Students

Off-Campus Oakland Primer from Pitt News Multimedia on Vimeo.

We all know that Pittsburgh is now kind of a college town, with an economy tilted towards "Eds and Meds", and an energy level can be measured by the number of cups and vomit pools on Carson Street.

Welcome Freshmen! I found this video to help orient you to Oakland, assuming you are not from Pittsburgh which may also be helpful to yinz types that never crossed the river to see it.