PITTSBURGH | Development Rundown II

[Steel City Scotty]

Originally Posted by dfiler

I'm hoping that rental competition will drive people into my neighborhood, the regents square side of Wilkinsburg. There are currently many vacant buildings but the neighborhood could easily reach a tipping point and be brought back from its ghetto status. This would really benefit the tax base and eventually decrease the ludicrously high property tax paid by the few people with maintained homes. From there it would snowball, and living in Wilkinsburg would once again be appealing. Honestly, the best thing for Wilkinsburg would be to merge with Pittsburgh. (But that's another whole discussion.)

I don't mean to derail the discussion about the August Wilson Center, but you bring up an interesting point.

Is there any chance that Pittsburgh could expand in size in the future if some of the small municipalities bordering the city limits actually became part of the city? I feel like this sort of thing doesn't happen much anymore, and it would obviously have a huge impact on the people who live in those boroughs and townships (taxes, school districts, etc.), but since you brought it up, I was just curious if it would ever be possible.

For instance, the Borough of Mount Oliver is completely surrounded by the City of Pittsburgh, which I believe is the only municipality to have that distinction. Could it ever become part of the city as just an expanded version of the Mount Oliver neighborhood?

Could Homestead or West Homestead join New Homestead as part of the city?

[Johnland]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

It wasn't envisioned to "cater to a very small niche of the population (wealthy, black arts enthusiasts)" at all. But your statement that it was is very telling of the attitude out there.

It was characterized by faulty planning in numerous areas from the get go -- in terms of focus, location, facility, organizational structure, and leadership. Its failure is hardly due lack of political balls to say that it couldn't work. And, the funding foundations most certainly did "speak-up" early on and continue to do so, which resulted in many changes in management and contributions.

It was a bold endeavor (particularly for a city like Pittsburgh, which has long been known as a highly unwelcoming place for minorities -- August Wilson himself couldn't stand living there) that was unfortunately not thought through properly at the onset and thus became severely dysfunctional very quickly. To dismiss the actual problems present and calling it leaders being afraid to be accused of racism is just really sad actually. There's no doubt that today's leaders are going to support its mission in order to support the region's population that has the deepest interest its continued existence and success, especially now that the building stands.

Wow. There's a dimension to Pittsburgh I haven't heard lately. So basically it's just a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away. And all these years I thought it was population loss, industry decline, etc. One's statements can be quite telling indeed.

[SkyPittsburgh]

Originally Posted by Steel City Scotty

I don't mean to derail the discussion about the August Wilson Center, but you bring up an interesting point.

Is there any chance that Pittsburgh could expand in size in the future if some of the small municipalities bordering the city limits actually became part of the city? I feel like this sort of thing doesn't happen much anymore, and it would obviously have a huge impact on the people who live in those boroughs and townships (taxes, school districts, etc.), but since you brought it up, I was just curious if it would ever be possible.

I think it all really depends on the kind of Municipality. Certain kinds are closed off to annexation, while others can be annexed. In fact, the General Assembly of PA must enact all laws pertaining to annexation, something that would receive strict opposition from members in rural districts. Pittsburgh will eventually grow, whether it be in the city itself, or through a City-County merger. The City County Merger would make Pittsburgh one of the largest cities in PA and very large in the US.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by WillyC

And then of course the conservator comes out and says they will have 120 days to use the theater, but that doesn't tell us much if there are limits on certain prime time parts of the year. The center could be essentially boxed out by the hotel and not able to take advantage of those dates.

All that is theoretically possible given the sparse information available, but I don't think it is particularly likely. If the AWC is going to be a prominent tenant, it would be good for the hotel's marketing and PR if the AWC was doing reasonably well, including having a good program of theater events.

In any event, now that the foundations are out, I think this is where public officials could do something productive, namely helping to make sure that the leaseback terms are reasonable.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Steel City Scotty

Is there any chance that Pittsburgh could expand in size in the future if some of the small municipalities bordering the city limits actually became part of the city? I feel like this sort of thing doesn't happen much anymore, and it would obviously have a huge impact on the people who live in those boroughs and townships (taxes, school districts, etc.), but since you brought it up, I was just curious if it would ever be possible.

Right now the easiest thing to work out is shared services. So, for example, Wilkinsburg has worked out deals to share waste and fire services, and there has been some talk about policing.

Full merger is a lot trickier, and as you point out hasn't been done recently. On the other hand, I think it is starting to become apparent that merger could be in the interests of places like Wilkinsburg (for a long time, the conventional wisdom was the opposite, but the City's improving fortunes are starting to lead to a different analysis).

[DBR96A]

Originally Posted by Johnland

Wow. There's a dimension to Pittsburgh I haven't heard lately. So basically it's just a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away. And all these years I thought it was population loss, industry decline, etc. One's statements can be quite telling indeed.

A lot of people conflate blacks with minorities at large. Race relations between blacks and whites in Pittsburgh could certainly be better, but if it was even half the bastion of racism that it's often made out to be, then why hasn't the black population decreased at the metropolitan level since 1990? How is the Asian population pushing 50,000, and how were Baltimore, Buffalo and Indianapolis the only major Northeastern/Midwestern metropolitan areas (1,000,000+ population) to grow their Asian populations at a higher rate between 2000 and 2010? How has the Hispanic population grown at the fastest rate of any major Northeastern/Midwestern metropolitan area since 2010? The Asian population is growing fast enough to exceed 60,000 by 2020, and the Hispanic population is growing fast enough to exceed 50,000 by then as well. The black population is on pace for over 200,000. By 2020, there will be over 300,000 minorities living in the Pittsburgh area, and some people will insist that they're all gluttons for punishment because yinzers apparently all moonlight as Klansmen.

[MattofSloppyVariety]

It appears that the Penn Lincoln Hotel in Wilkinsburg is seeing it's last days. Driving by today I noticed that some of the exterior walls are starting to fall into the street. Also noticed that there were construction crew members in the parking lot attached.

Also noticed that the Carrie Furnace site looks to be just about cleared.

[photoLith]

What are they doing at Carrie Furnaces? I was just there over the weekend and it was almost impossible to sneak onto the property to take photos of the furnace due to all the construction crews everywhere.

[SkyPittsburgh]

Originally Posted by photoLith

What are they doing at Carrie Furnaces? I was just there over the weekend and it was almost impossible to sneak onto the property to take photos of the furnace due to all the construction crews everywhere.

Well, according to the proposed Homestead Works National Park website, they are (potentially) constructing a walkway so that people can access the furnaces safely.

[chucka]

The Penn Lincoln is scheduled to be demolished and will be gone by June or July. They will be starting interior remediation work in the next few weeks.

Originally Posted by MattofSloppyVariety

It appears that the Penn Lincoln Hotel in Wilkinsburg is seeing it's last days. Driving by today I noticed that some of the exterior walls are starting to fall into the street. Also noticed that there were construction crew members in the parking lot attached.

[dfiler]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Right now the easiest thing to work out is shared services. So, for example, Wilkinsburg has worked out deals to share waste and fire services, and there has been some talk about policing.

Full merger is a lot trickier, and as you point out hasn't been done recently. On the other hand, I think it is starting to become apparent that merger could be in the interests of places like Wilkinsburg (for a long time, the conventional wisdom was the opposite, but the City's improving fortunes are starting to lead to a different analysis).

Unfortunately the Wilkinsburg police force was successful in lobbying against merging with Pittsburgh police. They distributed fliers with scare tactics about worse protection, etc. I was disappointed when it was voted down because if enough services were shared, eventually it would make sense to just merge entirely.

My motivation for wanting to merge is to expand the tax base so that the few reasonably valued properties in the borough don't have to support the entire school system via ludicrously high property tax.

Merging all municipalities in the county might have a better chance than a Pittsburgh/Wilkinsburg merger. Merging just the two cities would likely only benefit Wilkinsburg and Pittsburgh residents would end up financially supporting services in Wilkinsburg. Though a county-wide merger might benefit Pittsburgh.

The details are hard to look up and often differ between sources... Wilkinsburg became part of Pittsburgh in the mid 1800s but separated in 1871. Two years later it was annexed back in. Then it re-separated in 1887. I think that battle went all the way to the supreme court. While another supreme court case would be unlikely, the topic would likely be just as contentious today as it was 140 years ago.

[dfiler]

Originally Posted by Johnland

Wow. There's a dimension to Pittsburgh I haven't heard lately. So basically it's just a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away. And all these years I thought it was population loss, industry decline, etc. One's statements can be quite telling indeed.

What started this debate was a study that was picked up by the media. It indicated that the percentage of blacks (or was it all minorities?) hadn't grown in Pittsburgh like it had the rest of the country. Or perhaps it was even on the decline.

The study offered no causal explanation or supporting argument. Instead it just presented numbers and people jumped to conclusions. Where I think the analysis failed was that it didn't look at the declining job market and declining population. In my opinion, that was the true cause, not a behavioral difference of residents.


I always though the AWC was somewhat likely to fail. But that wasn't based on anything having to do with a particular race. Instead it was simply that museums focusing on just one race will likely not be will attended. Granted, that was just a gut feeling and I don't have a great understanding of museum attendance.

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by Johnland

Wow. There's a dimension to Pittsburgh I haven't heard lately. So basically it's just a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away. And all these years I thought it was population loss, industry decline, etc. One's statements can be quite telling indeed.

I wouldn't go that far at all.

Historically, Pittsburgh has not been seen as a friendly place towards blacks particularly, and the city does have the highest poverty rate among blacks of working age when looking at the largest US metro areas.

Though, I wouldn't say that it is "a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away". I'm sure there are all sorts of reasons, causes, ideas, notions, etc. on the topic.

[BrianTH]

Pittsburgh is among the 15 cities selected to advance to the next round of consideration for the 2016 DNC:

http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/5988826-74/convention-peduto-pittsburgh#axzz2zeV7Oo1J
http://www.post-gazette.com/business/bus...mocratic-convention/stories/201404220164
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/201...-running-for-2016-democratic-convention/

As previously mentioned I am a bit skeptical about the sorts of claims people typically make about the direct economic benefits of hosting an event like this, but it could be good marketing.

[BrianTH]

Peduto and Fitzgerald are apparently not happy with the way the AWC conservator sees her duties:

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2...ugust-Wilson-Center/stories/201404220160

I continue to be disappointed with their behavior, while at the same time hoping that this is all just posturing.

[SkyPittsburgh]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Peduto and Fitzgerald are apparently not happy with the way the AWC conservator sees her duties:

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2...ugust-Wilson-Center/stories/201404220160

I continue to be disappointed with their behavior, while at the same time hoping that this is all just posturing.

This might be just a bit of bitterness coming out of the politicians. They sunk millions of dollars into this and it will be an embarrassment to see it fail so quickly.

[Johnland]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

I wouldn't go that far at all.

Historically, Pittsburgh has not been seen as a friendly place towards blacks particularly, and the city does have the highest poverty rate among blacks of working age when looking at the largest US metro areas.

Though, I wouldn't say that it is "a long time bastion of racists deflecting minorities away". I'm sure there are all sorts of reasons, causes, ideas, notions, etc. on the topic.

You do realize you are basically painting the city as racist. Yes, you did not use that specific term, but the intent can only be that. I mean if one it's 'not friendly' to a certain group, then they it must be unfriendly. dance around all you want, but that is your allegation.

Exactly what are the historical facts that support the claim. Just exactly how does a city commit unfriendliness? Do you mean just the white residents, or all the residents decided to be unfriendly to just blacks moving in? Why would a city try to establish the poorest group among the largest metros? Why would the people in that group stand for it? If that was 'historically' the case, is it still true today? If not, has the city redeemed itself?

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by SkyPittsburgh

This might be just a bit of bitterness coming out of the politicians. They sunk millions of dollars into this and it will be an embarrassment to see it fail so quickly.

It may not even be coming from the politicians themselves, since they were not really personally involved. I think the foundations feel entitled to take over the building because they invested so much in it (there is no legal merit to that position, but this is politics), and since they are politically potent in their own right, they are bringing the politicians along with them.

The politicians may also be worried that a for-profit entity taking ownership of the building looks worse than the foundations doing so. I don't think it is at all clear that the former outcome would actually be worse for the cultural program in the long run, but experience has shown it is pretty easy to demagogue any sort of transfer of public or quasi-public assets to for-profit companies, even if that would represent a good deal for the public and good public policy.

Edit: Speaking of what is really in the program's best interests, here is a very interesting perspective from a former chairman of the AWC (he became chairman in 2010, after the AWC was already in dire financial condition, and apparently was still in that role when the foreclosure process began):

http://pittsburghurbanmedia.com/PUM-Excl...n-A-Walton-Former-Chairman-of-the-Board/

The whole thing is very interesting, but this was some very useful background:

A huge thank you goes to the patience of Dollar Bank and many other creditors who did their individual and collective best to help; however, the mountain of debt was just too high. In a last ditch effort to preserve the mission of the Center, and salvage the efforts of so many over time, the Board voted to pursue other options. One such option was the identification of an entity that would loan and/or give the Center sufficient capital to satisfy all outstanding creditors, establish an operating reserve, and allow the Center to re-tool and implement a new business model. The incentive to the perspective investors was granting the right of first refusal for the air rights needed to potentially build a hotel above the Center. Unfortunately, the board was within 30 days of finalizing that opportunity (under a non-disclosure agreement) when the Dollar Bank had no further recourse, given banking regulations, but to petition for foreclosure.

So I actually wonder if the entity they had been talking to is the same developer who made the bid. Among other things, that would explain why that developer felt confident in making a bid that would come so close to paying off all of the outstanding debts on such short notice.

Anyway, here is the upshot:

I view the 9. 5 million dollar offer is more closely aligned with the best interest of all stakeholders, especially those of the African American Community. Approval of the 9.5 million dollar offer would:
· Essentially eliminate the debt of approximately 7-8 million dollars owed Dollar Bank and the banks in the consortium
· Eliminate the .5 million dollar debt owed the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh
· Pay something toward the $1 million dollar debt owed various vendors and individual supporters( many of which are small businesses)
· Preserve the name and mission and of the AWC by allowing it to continue as its own governing organization without the burden of ongoing debt
· Provide the opportunity for an economic development enterprise that would create at least 100 jobs in the case of a proposed hotel
· Leave a legacy of which the African American Community could continue to be proud

Some interesting implicit criticisms of the foundation plan in there.

[Steel City Scotty]

I have noticed that Pittsburgh (and all of Allegheny County) has a shockingly low Latino population, compared to many cities that I have visited.

That is one of the fastest growing groups of people in rural Central Pennsylvania, where I live, but we have a lot of orchards in our area, which is where a lot of Latinos get their work. They are also frequently seen on construction sites.

Anyway, I just wanted to pass along an observation while we are discussing the demographics of the city.

[BrianTH]

Yeah, Pittsburgh dropping off the list of attractive immigration destinations (due to the steel bust and related events) roughly coincided with the Hispanic immigration wave to the United States. Pittsburgh is now well into the process of normalizing its attractiveness as an immigration destination, but meanwhile the net Hispanic immigration rate to the United States has gone way, way down. So, Pittsburgh may never have a typical percentage of Hispanic residents because it appears to have missed the wave. It should be noted that the percentage of Pittsburgh-area Hispanics will likely grow, just probably not fast enough to allow it to catch up with most of its peers. In fact it is very likely births, rather than immigration, will be the dominant source of Hispanic population growth in the U.S. going forward, which also suggests that cities currently significantly below average in Hispanic percentages won't have a mechanism to catch up.

On the other hand, Asian immigration to the U.S. has passed Hispanic immigration, and Pittsburgh appears to be in a good position to participate more fully in that emerging wave. I think that is particularly likely to be true if immigration reforms are passed which allow more education/skills-based immigration.