Tube City Almanac

April 06, 2007

More Room For The Rest of Us

Category: default || By officerjim

(Guest Commentary: Officer Jim)

According to U.S. Census Bureau statistics released on Thursday, it took a catastrophic natural disaster to keep the Pittsburgh region from losing more population than New Orleans.

We’ve also got, according to a story in One of America’s Great Newspapers (but not America’s Finest News Source), the rare distinction of having the lowest influx of international immigrants combined with high death/low birth rates.

The article cites, among other causes, a continued “decline resulting from the steel industry's collapse a quarter-century ago, which led to a heavy exodus of working-age people.”

I’m so tired of hearing that. Frankly, I think it’s a bunch of baloney. I realize that the shuddering of the mills and collapse of the steel industry in Pittsburgh has had long-lasting and far-reaching influence in the local economy.

But after 25 years, I don’t think we can still be bemoaning the loss of manufacturing for the continued decline of the region. It’s about high time we got over it and moved on.

Sadly, we have a lot of people who seemingly want to wallow in self-pity and cry about “the good ol’ days of U.S. Steel” while waiting desperately for some “white knight” to come in and rescue the region.

Ain’t gonna happen, people. And until everyone: the politicians, tax-payers, community leaders, analysts, and even the pensioners wake up and admit that we need to rebuild the region from the ground up, we’ll still continue to lose population and have stagnant job growth.

Our infrastructure is archaic. We have crumbling roadways, a dysfunctional mass-transit system, and a colonial-era patchwork of county and municipal governments that more often than not work against each other as opposed to co-operating to better themselves. Until this area starts to drastically overhaul everything, including public safety, public works, public education, and public transportation, we’ll never get anywhere.

There are a lot of young people still in this area. I’m one of them. I’d love to stay here; heck, last year I turned down a job in Florida for a chance to stay here! But it gets increasingly harder to do when nothing ever changes, and no one wants the make any sacrifices.

I don’t have any easy solutions. We need comprehensive reform of our tax codes; we need to consolidate municipalities and municipal services. But moreover, what we really need is a group of brave and far-sighted politicians who are willing to put forth, and force through, these ideas.

I’d love to hear some candidate for borough council somewhere around here campaign on putting him- or herself out of a job, via municipal consolidation.

But ah, therein lies the rub! Nobody wants to do that because, to quote the Honorable Governor William J. LePetomaine: “Gentlemen, we’ve got to protect our phoney-baloney jobs!”

Will it take absolute bankruptcy of every single political subdivision in the county to force change? I hope not. I’d like to think that somewhere, someone is working on proposals for real reform and change to the betterment of the Pittsburgh region.

Of course, I’d also like to think that the Pirates sweep of the Astros is a sign of a winning baseball season. Only time will tell, assuming that it’s not too late already.

. . .

Lest you think that investment and cooperation in the region is all “gloom and doom,” Thursday’s Daily News reported that Our Fair City and the county have entered into an agreement to expedite construction of the proposed “flyover” bridge connecting Lysle Boulevard with the McKeesport RIDC park.

While there is some controversy that this may be detrimental to two current businesses at the proposed intersection, the easier access that it will bring to the industrial park may outweigh the impact it will have. Whether in the long run it will attract more development in the RIDC park remains to be seen, but I’d like to think it’s a step in the right direction.

. . .

Thursday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette also included a mention of McKeesport native Helen Richey on the comics page, under the “My Generation” section aimed at kids. I can’t find an online link to the story (I doubt there is one), but I thought it was a nice write up.






Your Comments are Welcome!

Good piece, although it’s now clear that both Togyer boys have a bad attitude.

I haven’t read it, but Jim Roddey wrote an essay in Pittsburgh Quarterly in which he argues for consolidating municipal governments based on school districts. So instead of 130 municipalities, you’d have 43.

Of course, that still leaves us with too many school districts, a problem that Jason recently addressed.

I’d also like to see us stop throwing tax dollars at sports teams, large corporations and retail developers.
Jonathan Potts (URL) - April 06, 2007



Thanks for a thoughtful and provocative posting. Some random thoughts:

The internet changes everything. Do I identify with the name of my municipality? Hardly. I share ideas and build relationships with anyone, anywhere. Capitalism and communication are shrinking the world. Region is relevant, local is less so.

I pay local taxes to support, among other things, infrastructure development and maintenance and public education. I expect reasonable regulation for the common good and fire and police protection. Economies of scale dictate that those functions are administered most efficiently by entities larger in population than the typical municipal government in Allegheny County.

Effective government requires effective leaders. An engaged citizenry will likely find better leaders in a larger population pool. We need fewer, better leaders and citizens that pay attention.

Stewardship and entrepreneurship are 2 distinctly different skills. I don’t know anyone who is good at both. Entrepreneurial leadership can spur economic g r o w t h. Most local government officials are stewards. I don’t envy them.

We want to attract and keep young people. What is the cultural aspect of that? We made a deal to keep the Penguins. Sodajerk, a rockin’ alt-country music band left Pittsburgh for Atlanta because, according to a founding member, “Honestly, most people (here) are just interested in sports.”

The Pew Charitable Trust completed a study titled Philadelphia 2007: Prospects and Challenges. The document contains a summary that compares Philly to 6 other American cities, including Pittsburgh. About the ‘Burgh — first sentence: “If Pittsburgh were on the East Coast, it would rival Boston and Atlanta as a desirable city to visit and live, work and invest in.” Last sentence: “Despite (or perhaps because of) numerous governmental and special purpose regional mechanisms, there is no coherent, unified strategy for economic development.”

Inertia is not our friend.
Strisi - April 06, 2007



I’ll second the other two comments. It wasn’t quite an issue back in the day when the big steel-related industries paid big taxes, often across several of those small municipalities. The precipitous loss of all those jobs (in what, only 20 years?) was a devestating blow to the entire region. And it came at a time when the entire country was leaving the smokestack industry era. That meant that there were very few options to fill that void. The service economy can work from almost anywhere with today’s telecom availability. The ‘Burg has gotten some of that, but those businessness want 1) highly educated people and 2)not a lot of them. If you’re not flying a keyboard, you’re the one sweeping the floors. It will likely take a major economic crunch to get the region to consider at least some kind of regional economic commission to take a good hard look at the pluses and minuses, and recommend a course of action. There are outstanding opportunities in the region. We just need to tout them while at the same time cleaning up the front yard so folks will want to come and stay.
ebtnut - April 07, 2007



Interesting comment about people still waiting for the mills to return. I really heard that in Homestead, long after the Waterfront was well into its evolution into the economic monster that finally managed to pull Homestead out of Act 47.
I admit however that I’m at a loss for what can be done, particularly with the welfare-state mindset that resists anything that might bring private funds in, rather than spread around an increasingly-scarce cache of tax dollars, war or no war.
Does it matter? - April 08, 2007



Two Togyer boys you say? In the same hemisphere? Has anyone alerted the authorities?
Prof. Windbag - April 11, 2007



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