Fiscal Problems Continue in Pittsburgh

It is no easy job to keep a city fiscally afloat these days. Just ask the folks in Pittsburgh, which is working to avoid bankruptcy like Cleveland did in the late 1970s. Financial pressures have mounted on Pittsburgh City Hall over the past 3 years, as the economic downturn added to the growing financial problems facing the city.

Some observations say that the city's 1990s renaissance was superficial and they masked the growing fiscal problems that have finally caught up with the city.

The city's credit rating hit junk bond status last month. The 2004 budget proposed by Murphy Nov. 10 is more than $39 million out of whack and without help, the city will have spent all of its reserves and likely be out of cash sometime in January.

Pittsburgh Mayor Tom Murphy, who critics say has pushed development to the detriment of the city's neighborhoods, now acknowledges two mistakes: underestimating how long it would take for development to pay off and failing to lobby earlier to change a taxing structure, "written for a city that doesn't exist any more." Pittsburgh, during the 1950s, had nearly twice today's population of approximately 335,000.

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