PublicSource | News for a better Pittsburgh (https://www.publicsource.org/category/money-and-politics/)
Supporters of integrated care believe it will better serve patients. Proponents of the current system worry about the loss of local control and funds.
“Much of what I heard today was the same sort of fight that brought me here to council, that I was fighting 20 years ago,” said Pittsburgh City Council President Bruce Kraus. “It was protect the integrity and the sweat equity of generations of homesteaders that made that piece of real estate ripe for development.”
Last spring, Louis Berry III was feeling mildly optimistic. As a labor activist and retired housekeeper with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center [UPMC], he felt for the first time in April 2018 that he and activists might be able to get some concessions from his former employer. In Berry’s mind, he said, the not-for-profit hospital chain and healthcare provider is a behemoth that pays some of its employees too little and causes others to go into medical debt. Last spring, Berry thought he had reason to be hopeful: UPMC needed city approval to build a state-of-the-art hospital in Pittsburgh’s Uptown neighborhood. Some activists weren’t opposed to the new facility but when the city’s Planning Commission made a recommendation that UPMC work on establishing a community benefits agreement [CBA] with the city, Berry and others saw it as an opportunity to demand and negotiate concessions.
Lisa Gaye Middleman, an Allegheny County public defender, announced that she is launching her campaign for District Attorney today. Middleman, who is running as an independent, will face 20-year incumbent Stephen A. Zappala Jr. in the November 5 general election. Her campaign launch comes after another challenger, Turahn Jenkins, trailed Zappala by 20,357 votes in May’s Democratic primary election. Middleman estimates that she’ll need to gather nearly 4,000 signatures on her petition before Aug. 1 to appear on the November ballot but plans to collect well above that amount.
After a Dec. 24 fire at U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works, Allegheny County Health Department officials discussed internally how to respond. The department considered issuing an emergency order to require U.S. Steel to take steps to reduce its emissions, email records show. Officials went as far as drafting such an order, they said. But they didn’t issue it because the company was already voluntarily taking many of the steps the county believed would keep residents safe.
In the City of Pittsburgh, 59 municipal employees — including refuse workers, school crossing guards and administrative clerks — earn below the $15-per-hour benchmark that labor advocates have been pushing for nationally.
In Allegheny County, 169 full-time government workers still need wage increases to hit that benchmark. They include food-service workers and housekeepers at Kane Community Living Centers, among others.
After unsuccessfully challenging District 1 City Councilwoman Darlene Harris twice in recent elections, Bobby Wilson beat the longtime North Side representative in Tuesday’s primary election.
Incumbent District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. beat progressive challenger Turahn Jenkins in Tuesday’s primary election, extending his 20-year stint as the Allegheny County’s top prosecutor.
PublicSource community correspondent Jourdan Hicks spoke with District 9 candidate Randall Taylor about how he plans to unseat District 9 City Councilman Rev. Ricky Burgess, his campaign platform and his vision for equitable housing development in Pittsburgh. The primary election will be held May 21.
One of the more interesting races for a Pittsburgh City Council seat is happening in District 7. It's the only face-off where the Allegheny County Democratic Committee did not endorse the incumbent, in this case Councilwoman Deb Gross. Instead the committee gave the nod to challenger Deirdre Kane, a district resident who works in marketing at Highmark.
