PublicSource | News for a better Pittsburgh (https://www.publicsource.org/author/author-jeffrey-benzing/)
The Ixil immigrants in Pittsburgh are almost exclusively from Santa Maria Nebaj, often referred to as Nebaj. In 2014, unaccompanied Central American minors had just begun to arrive en masse.
Pittsburgh city officials on Friday announced a trio of gun control bills in response to the Oct. 27 shooting deaths of 11 people at Tree of Life synagogue.
In the past four years, residents and journalists have filed at least 4,540 requests for public records with the City of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County. About half the time, the city or county agreed to release all or some of the records.
While the city granted more records than the county, city records came at a higher price. The city charged requesters a total of $13,000 in copying and other costs, showing its reliance on paper records. In all but six cases, the county released records at no cost and in digital format whenever requested.
City Councilman Corey O’Connor said now is the time for Pittsburgh to take bold action on gun control, even if it means confronting lawsuits and the ire of a Republican-controlled state Legislature and powerful gun rights groups like the National Rifle Association. “We will fight this. Pittsburgh will take a stand,” O'Connor said, holding back tears at a council meeting three days after a heavily armed man killed 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue. “And we will get sued... You want to fight?
East Pittsburgh is grappling with the fate of its police force, leaning on solutions like consolidation that have long-been discussed in the fragmented region, largely without success.
Will crisis force change? In East Pittsburgh, officials hope so. But interviews with numerous chiefs and leaders in the region reveal a persistent status quo, where funding drastically differs across a patchwork of boroughs and some communities struggle to recruit officers to work breakneck hours for dismal pay.
PublicSource made independent requests for policies held by 15 Mon Valley police departments.
The City of Pittsburgh doesn't want to talk about its cybersecurity. Its top tech official is staying tight-lipped, saying the stakes are too high to say much publicly.
With numerous warnings of the financial, public safety and privacy threats that hackers pose to local governments, Pittsburgh officials purposefully give residents little insight on the city’s security flaws.
Except Pittsburgh spilled its own secrets.
Rosato-Barone indicates that an internal investigation she initiated through the city’s Office of Municipal Investigations (OMI) into Souroth Chatterji was wider in scope. Besides Chatterji, it targeted former Chief Cameron McLay and key police personnel, including former Assistant Chief Larry Scirotto. These individuals were all involved in the McLay administration’s scrutiny of software projects involving Rosato-Barone and Plum-based B-Three Solutions.
