Cable Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon and welcome to the Standing Committee's meeting for Wednesday, May 27, 2026. All Council meetings will be live-streamed on the City's website, and for guest speakers, please do not turn off your microphones. Our first order of business is roll call. Will the Clerk please take the roll? Mr. Charland?

Here. Mr. Coghill? Here. Ms. Gross? Here. Mr. LaValle? Here. Mr. Mosley? Here. Ms. Salinetro? Here. Ms. Warwick. Here. Mr. Wilson. Ms. Strasburger, Chair. Here. Eight members present.

Thank you. Our next order of business is to amend the agenda. Can I have a motion to amend?

So moved. Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Motion passes. Agenda is amended. Our next order of business is public comment. I would like to remind all speakers that the rules of council state that comments are limited to matters of concern, official action, or deliberation, which are or may be before city council, and profanity will not be permitted. Please state your name and neighborhood for the record. You will have three minutes to speak. Our first registered speaker is Dr. Ronald Lynn Miller.

Dr. Ronald N. Miller, downtown, a candidate for President 2028. A concern of this council is clearly the security of the city. On the 30th of January, 2026, I sent the following to the Office of Pittsburgh City Clerk, Kim Clark Baskin, the Office of Pittsburgh City Council, R. Daniel Lavelle, Office of Mayor Cory O'Connor. I request information regarding the legal foundation for a declaration of a city state of emergency, SOE. Provide references from Pittsburgh Home Rule Charter, Pittsburgh City Council Ordinances, Pittsburgh City Code. Questions. Question 1. What are the criteria used to define State of Emergency for Pittsburgh? Question 2. Can an SOE be declared by the mayor without agreement from the president of council? Q3. Is there any legal impediment preventing a group of Pittsburghers declaring an SOE if the criteria for an SOE exists without support from the offices of council and mayor? We think so. Question 4. Is there any legal ground preventing an indefinite temporal extension of an SOE? The status of request for information regarding the City of Pittsburgh State of Emergency SRI, SRI-SOE is not directed to any office of solicitor. SRI-SOE is directed solely to the offices of clerk, counsel, and mayor, and respectfully expect response from these offices and the officers leading them, not solicitors. S-R-I-S-O-E by RLM and the Center for Global Studies International. Interdisciplinary timeframe for responses from the three offices, 30 days from the transmission state of the SRI. We have no response. Even though we have sent a reminder to Mr. Lovell, Mr. O'Connor, there has been no response. We find this to be irresponsible, Mr. Lavelle and Mr. O'Connor, if he's listening. And we find this also inconsistent with the Home Rule Charter, Article 8, 807, and that leads to 810. We are going to proceed for impeachment of you, Mr. Lavelle, and Mr. O'Connor.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Chief Ikohana Halmakina.

Greetings and good day. My title is Chief Ikohana Halmakina, the Grand Inca, the Iroquois Confederacy of Aboriginal American People. And I myself must agree with the previous speaker. They said that we all should step down and teach yourself because you can't do right by the people's finances.

Those P-cards have been a problem for city council since long before Teresa Kell Smith left.

And she was conscientious and truthful enough to say, hey, let's get this right, guys. And since she's gone, I'm not sure the consciousness of the entire council is with the people. And so therefore, I'm urging more people to press for LaBelle to step down. You cannot, cannot do what you please with the people's money. It's egregious, it is wrong, and it's a breach of public trust. And you must step down to allow someone who has ethical long overdue. First, Ricky Burgess, now it's time for you to say, I'm out of here. Well, maybe you could leave with your family name intact, but I think that's already eroded away with the fact that you just feel like you can willy-nilly use the people's money as your personal bank account. And we all know that the LaBelle name, you could have wrote that check yourself. But no, you was in the piggy bank of the people and using the people's money for what you please, and it's wrong. And you know it, but you seem to be very comfortable, as Rick Earl interviewed you, and you seemed like you was in your comfort zone, Lavelle. Shame on you, using the people's money to do what you want. It was a noble act, indeed, but it was unlawful, and it was wrong of you to use and abuse the people's finances.

You are a fiduciary.

You have a fiduciary responsibility. not fund any campaign that you want to fund with the people's money. And you should just step down, Lavelle. Your time is over. You had a good run. Now it's over.

Thank you. There being no further registered speakers, we will now take comments from those in the audience wishing to speak. You can state your name and neighborhood for the record, and you'll have three minutes.

Hi, I am Lori Kulczynski, the general manager of Republic Services. Republic Services acquired the Pittsburgh's primary recycling facility in February of 2025. We currently process all of the city's residential recycling. Over the last 12 months, this facility has reduced city expenses by $1.2 million through commodity rebates. This proposed rezoning would make it virtually impossible to innovate and enhance this critical city infrastructure. There is continued misinformation about our operation. We have been described as always being a problem or a bad operator, but that is far from the truth. Since we took over this operation a mere 15 months ago, we have spent $4.2 million upgrading the facility. We've cleaned the exterior of the property. We've addressed road and elimination. We've installed fencing and new garage doors. We've upgraded the road and entryway. We've replaced outdated equipment. Just ask your environmental services team about the changes they've seen in the last year and how this partnership works to support the city sustainability goals. We have 3.3 million slated for additional upgrades this year, including the rest of the framing and the garage doors to fully enclose the building. We have also been accused of not being transparent with the neighbors. This is another falsehood. I first met with Councilwoman Warwick in April of last year. At that time, we had owned the recycling facility for two months. I told her that we had work to do, and we just needed some time to get it done. we have been true to our word in the past year republic services has joined the greater hazelwood community collaborative we've hosted several community members and the councilwoman at the site offering tours of our operation and answering any questions i personally have presented operational updates to both the collaborative and to the residents at a hazelwood initiative meeting We participated in job fairs at the local Hazelwood Library. We hosted on-site learning with a Hazelwood trade group. And we sponsored the latest Earth Day event in Hazelwood. We also regularly support holiday drives, toy events, and school activities. In conclusion, this rezoning would negatively impact Pittsburgh financially and its residents by unfairly targeting an essential city service that is in an appropriately zoned area. And even more evident through these latest last minute parcel revisions about targeting our specific facility. Please stop this and vote this rezoning down. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Hello, my name is John Ashbridge. I work with the Allegheny Valley Railroad. Just wanted to note, this is the first time that we've seen this amendment to the rezoning, so we really haven't had a chance to go through and really understand, you know, which parcels, which railroad parcels may or may not be, you know, included or excluded. So, you know, we'd just like the opportunity to review that. Really appreciate your time. Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Good afternoon. My name is Yvonne F. Brown. I live at 715 Mercer Street. Excuse me, that's the high rise up on Befford. It's 190 apartments. This morning I came and I was speaking, I spoke to the whole group, but especially to our president, because our president told me when I was questioning about a bus from the top of the hill down to Mercy Hospital, otherwise we had to take two buses and come back to get to Mercy. And this, I was looking through some papers, I think this is 2018, but anyway, I would come and say, Mr. Lavelle, we need a bus, the seniors to get to the bottom of the hill. He never would answer me, but we ended up on the elevator together, and he told me, Ms. Brown, you keep coming down telling me about the bus. County Council. So I did as he said. I went to county council and my councilman for our district is this heavyset large man. And the reason why I say that is because he's a big man, like a fullback. And I had made a statement I was one of the last to speak. And when I look at him, what they do at the end is they all march out together. So that's the end of the meeting. So when he walks past, I'll walk past. I said, well, he's gone. And I'm picking up my papers because you know I have a lot of times. I believe you need to see to see you remember when you see. OK, so. I'm down picking up a paper, and all of a sudden, I just heard screaming, and he's at me and scares me, and he's hollering, screaming and hollering at me, you so-and-so and so-and-so, and all I kept on saying, we'll see, we'll see. Okay, now the reason why that I'm coming to you and bringing this out is because this man is the main reason why Katina, the one that stepped down, which I said he should not have. If you have, listen, Katina made a statement. He apologized. This man didn't make a statement. I mean, made a statement that he will not listen to what we say because he lives in the community. He knows what we need. What kind of... elected official is he what kind do you think about it now you mr wilson yesterday i want to say something usually um like my daughter fusses about you in different ones but yesterday when we had the meeting you said that the people that didn't sign up would only get one minute and that's one minute i said oh you didn't you took and changed your mind and said that they could get to three like everybody else and i want to thank you thank you for doing that i know i come a lot um speak bad about chins because if you don't treat us right thank you miss brown thank you very much for what you did next speaker please

Are there any further speakers? Seeing no further speakers, we will move on to the Standing Committee's agenda. The first committee is the Finance and Law Committee. Supplemental New Papers, Bill 536.

Resolution amending Resolution 840 of 2024, which authorized a professional services agreement and or contract extension with B2G now for the purpose of amending account codes and no additional cost to the city.

Motion to approve.

Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor of Bill 536, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. New Papers, Bill 509.

Ordinance amending the Pittsburgh Code of Ordinances, Title II, Fiscal Article I, Administration, Chapter 218, Capital Budget and Capital Improvement Plan to clarify language to better align with budgetary practices.

Commissioner Proof. Second. Second.

Discussion I Can explain this a little bit if even though there's no apparent questions. I wanted to make sure everyone understood so this was brought to to us by the mayor's office and I When we typically currently when we are approving a new grant application that requires a local match, that is when we have to sort of set aside the funding for the local match. And then regardless of whether we get the grant or not, that money is frozen until at that point. This is changing it so that upon awarding of the grant, that's when we would have to allocate and kind of freeze the local match and apply the local match. I'm not using the exact right language here, but I wanted to explain it in plain terms. And so this is changing the timing of kind of allocating the money for the local match upon the award of the grant, not application of the grant. because in practice what is happening is when we're freezing that money, when we're allocating the money kind of at the time of the application of the grant, it is it's money that then we can't use during these very tight financial times. This will still allow the city council to approve the grant award and approve the local match. It's just changing the timing of that upon awarding of it. It's also not changing anything about notification of grant applications. We will still get the weekly notice of grant applications. So this is just during, again, very tight financial times, allowing us the flexibility to move money around and not have too much that's frozen just because we're applying for an award, a grant award that requires a local match. So, Council Member Warwick.

Yeah, I was under the impression that Oftentimes, when a local match is required, that we need the entity, whether it's PennDOT or whatever, needs to have that confirmation up front that we have the local match.

Would you like to call experts to the table? Yeah, they're here to speak. I don't want to call on your behalf, but yeah, I don't have the answer to that.

Amanda Burkhart, Grants Manager in the Office of Management and Budget. Yes, generally they do require a financial commitment letter, but we just indicate that we would include it upon award if awarded. Like we would include it in the budget if awarded.

But, again, I mean, and maybe I'm wrong, but I thought that it was actually, like, for example, with Green Light Go! grants, that when you know that you have the match, that your candidate, like, your chance for getting the grant is significantly higher than if it's unclear whether or not, like, your chance of getting, I mean, is that, that's my understanding from Domi. I don't know.

Yeah, so generally, like, there's general pots of funds that we could use. You know, like, a lot of times for the trail funds, we use paving, match. You know, that's just general paving budget line items that we can point to. And, like, if we get awarded the Green Light Go Awards, then we point to, you know, the intersection upgrades by an item in the budget. So we have the money there. Apologies. Can you move a little closer to the microphone?

Thank you. Sorry. So I don't understand. So if... Can you explain that again? I guess I didn't understand.

Yeah, so we do have general pots of funds that we can point to if we get awarded. You know, for example, like the budget does indicate like signal upgrade, like line item, that we can point to that and then we can use that when we get the award. We're just not tied to that specific intersection.

But see, that can, so I guess I'm not sure I understand because in the budget process, so for example, right, like I think last year, we set aside in the budget, I mean, for Green Light Go, just for example, right? We set aside in the budget the match for the Green Light Go grant for Mifflin and Interboro. And my understanding is that because we had that budgeted, that match set aside, that that improves our chances of getting the grant. Because we have budgeted for the the match?

Yes. So with Greenlight Go, it's a different scenario. And the majority of the grants that we actually submit are budgeted already. So like 90% of the grants that we submit are already budgeted in budget. So we can point to that line item and be more successful there. But then I don't understand what this legislation is. So the legislation is just not requiring us to assign job numbers and freezing funds to projects that may or may not come to head.

If I can interject on that. Yeah, sure. So during these applications, we are demonstrating to the... awarder of the grant, we do have the funding available. We're just not getting down to the absolute, here's the exact count of, let's say, local match of 50 grand is required. We're not saying here's the account string, the job number with that 50 grand. We have the funding available to meet this, but by essentially enumerating the exact non-fungible 50 grand that we would use, we've essentially frozen that money that we can't use in other day-to-day operations throughout the term of when we're waiting to hear back about the grant award, or for some of the larger ones that we then wait a year or two until we actually receive the award. There are, my understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, there are larger programs like, I think some from HUD and PennDOT, ones where we typically see bigger awards that could be coming to the city. Some of them do, just as a nature of a programmatic requirement, require proof that the legislative branch has a approved that match coming, but that's not the case for every grant, especially some of the smaller ones that we're constantly going after and to stay competitive with where we have to respond pretty quickly to get applications in sometimes.

Got it. Got it. So then, so you would apply for the grant, but so, and then, I mean, just to play devil's advocate, what if council, what if you, what if we get a grant and then council's like, no, I don't, we don't, you know, for something, I don't know, something that we don't want to. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, it would be similar to now, just for sort of just changing the order of operations. Right now, there were, for example, resolutions on today's agenda for the regular meeting of council approving us, identifying specific, very specific pots that we would use for this money, very specific line items. If council voted that down... it would essentially have the same effect. We then can't pursue it further. It would just be changing the order of operations of when council takes that exercise. On top of that, if we do win a grant award and then try to identify a pot of funding and council were to say, while it's on the table, no, we don't want to use that account. We want to use a different account. Council has that power now, and council would have that power if this amendment is adopted as well. Council's power is not diminished. It's just really a change in the order of operations to keep funding flexible while we wait to either hear about the grant award or actually receive the funding.

I mean, so I will... I can give you a scenario in my district that sort of happened. It was sort of before I joined council and then right when I, you know. So there was a project, and I'm not going to name it because ultimately it will end up being a good project. However, it was a street improvement project, right? So I had lots of street work done. on a street that really, that nobody, I mean it was a project that nobody asked for, I will say, right? And there was lots of frustration in the community that we were spending a million dollars to improve this one stretch when, you know, another far more used stretch was. But the response at the time, and this was for me as counsel, was, well, we already got the grant. Like, we can't leave money on the table. We already got the grant, so we have to do it. And if we don't do it, then it's like, you know, that hurts our credibility as a grant, you know what I mean? And all of this, so it was, and that is why I actually introduced the legislation to have the grant application list come every week, right, so that we could review and see sort of what's in the works. So, you know, I recognize you can't account for every scenario, but that, you know, once you have the grant, it's harder for the council member to say, well, You know, I would have rather you applied for the grant for this other thing that, you know, I've been wanting in my district or whatever, right?

Yep. Once we're offered an award, we can always decline to accept it. That's, Council allows us, approves us assigning the grant agreements. But we can decline to accept it, but what we can't do is change what it's for. Some funders you can, but most you cannot. Right. Correct. Right. Okay.

Well, I'll just – those are my concerns. I'll just leave that there. Thanks. Thank you. Councilwoman Gross and then Councilperson Charland.

Thank you. I think I had the same kind of nature of kind of questions. Is there a way to kind of slice this so that – We do a little of both things. So very similarly, over the years, right, we're very appreciative to get grant seeking, right? We're always like, yes, thank you for the outside money. We really, really, really need it. And we could... We've tried to expand the capacity of the grants management office and are trying to make sure that we're not neglecting to apply for grants that might be out there, those kinds of things. So it's very welcome money. But on the other hand, it is also true that sometimes the public is in the dark about what an administration is aiming for for projects and then maybe even opposes them. and so that's a that's a waste of everyone's time and energy and effort if we could align these things better it would be better and having it on the agenda because we don't know everything we can't catch everything like having it on the agenda earlier in the public's eye helps us you know that uh transparency um happens earlier in the process but on the other hand i totally get that we don't want to have funds frozen in a jde line for sometimes there's a very long grant seeking cycles, right? And we need them to be fungible. We need them to be able to move. So did I hear you say that 90% of the grants have their money allocated in the budget? So of the volume of dollars or volume of applications, kind of like where's your 90%? volume of uh applications because some of it are like the big tip grants or something right it's like spc and it's bridges and it's huge and and we we vote basically and the public knows about those projects line items in the capital budget process yeah cool and then so some of the other ones like i had one in my district as well and i talked to administration about it because i was like oh the administration has set aside match money for the C2P2, and I honestly can't remember. Are they DCNR, DCED? They're like community conservation or something. And we don't know if we're going to get that grant or not. We know that it's a project that's had years of community process around, and it's great timing, and it'd be great if we get it. So we know that it's kind of like almost a community-driven project. application, working with the planning department, all that kind of stuff. So we know that that's not problematic. And then, so then the question is, well, do we really have to have that money, JDE number, set aside if we don't? I'd be interested to know whether, like, if you say 90% of the dollars kind of are voted on already in the capital budget process, how big is the 10%? Like, is that $100,000 a year?

It's more than $100,000. Yeah. So generally, we run into projects that aren't in the budget when we're looking at long-term federal opportunities. So opportunities that aren't going to hit for two, three years that we wouldn't even find out about. So that's what we're looking at. So those are generally a larger number than the smaller state grants that we receive, but it's just a very small portion of the amount of grants that we have.

yes i don't i'm wondering like how to do both so if those those sound like they are larger amounts um but they weren't already discussed and the public may not know that you're applying for that project um so how do we do both like how do we also get the kind of citizen input earlier without having the money locked away unnecessarily possibly because we don't get we may not get even half of those grants that we apply for, right? Maybe we're getting like 10, 20% of them? Yeah. Generally. So you don't want to lock away 90% of the money. You don't have to lock away. But on the other hand, where's then there's no real public discussion or way for the public to notice it. So I'm wondering if there's a way for us to do both. I think the grants application notice is still a little post hoc, right? A department might have worked on something for a very long time without public input. And then we get the notice that they're applying for it. it's too late since they've applied for it to tell them that they're off base. And maybe, again, if they've done one intersection over or come at it from with a different input, they'd have broad, you know, widespread support, that kind of thing. So, yeah, I'd be interested to see how maybe we do both, you know, having the funds flexible, but also incorporating, maybe if it's over a certain dollar threshold. Smaller projects, if you're applying for a $100,000 grant with a $10,000 match, it's probably not doing that much harm. You don't want to waste a lot of departmental time, or maybe the public won't, it can't be due too much that they'll oppose. But for something at a higher level or a bigger thing, usually, I mean, you can work on these grant applications for months. Some of them are, I personally, way in a different lifetime, you know, worked on one for several months at a time, and there were like 20 versions of it, you know, by the time it got submitted to federal grant. So we don't want...

to make sure you know make sure that we're not like wasting staff time either kind of going off in the wrong direction so i don't know those are those are my current thoughts if you have any response before i give up before um and amanda speak this better than i can but generally one one concern that i know omb and the grants team has with the idea of setting a dollar threshold for then putting it through the normal three-week legislative process that there are times where we for better or for worse, we learn about grants sort of at the last minute, or even if something where it's a council member or a community group might flag for us, like, hey, here's an issue that just hasn't boiled up to it's been on the front of everyone's minds yet, and we, the manager team might know, oh, this is, just using a random example, this is a landslide issue. There could be a landslide grant available. just happened recently the application happens to be within a few days we want to act quickly like councilwoman warwick said like we can't always plan for every single possible instance but when it comes to both grants and having the availability to move our money especially in these tight times we want to maximize that flexibility as much as possible while still making sure that when we do have to move money or do get an award that we're not disrupting the council process of still having council vote to accept the money, and then vote to actually pledge that match. We just want to be able to do it at a time where we know the grant is coming, we know it's incoming, we know we're going to be able to get to do the project with council approval. We just want to have the flexibility that comes with not sequestering that funding as soon as we hit the submit button on an application.

I hear you. But also having spent a bit of my life as the grant writer, if you're hearing about it last minute, it's probably not a huge award. You wouldn't be able to adequately apply for those funds, right? The bigger the pot, the more time and energy and effort goes into the writing of it. I don't know if you've got that same experience, Mandov.

Yeah, the bigger issue there, though, is the amount of money. So a lot of times, you know, like working with Domi, they don't get me a budget until three days before the grant is due. So, like, isolating, you know, like an up-to number even would be difficult. So we were working on this one federal grant, and it started off at $8 million, and by the time they reworked it two days before the grant was due, it was now $11 million. Yeah.

So that's still significantly more than like 100,000 or 200,000. Right. Yeah.

But like if we would have to go through and like legislate that.

Well, no, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying that there is some flag for, I don't know, some other public process or notification. If you're working on an $8 million grant, it would be better. to get some ground truthing on it through the council person or having some other legislative process that's not a JDM or something different than what we're doing now. But still some discussion of it at the council table because you're not working on, you're not working for a week on an $8 million grant. And an $8 million grant is going to be a substantial project of size and public impact that will have some feedback. And it would be very hard for any city council to turn down that $8 million grant, even if the public is mad about it. So why put ourselves in that position?

We shouldn't be doing things that the public is gonna be really mad about, right?

So, you know, how do we do both, I think, is still worth some time and attention. So, okay. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Councilperson Sharlin.

Yeah, I'll be relatively quick here, but this is a problem that I think myself and actually it was Councilman Wilson's chief of staff back when we were staffers together identified. I can't name a lot of grants, but the one that I do know very well is Green Light Grow. And so when we apply for a Green Light Go grant, which is for a traffic signal upgrade, about $500,000, we have to find $500,000 for that. We hit almost every Green Light Go grant. successfully. So a Green Light Go grant takes what the city has to pay down to $100,000. The state pays $400,000 of that. So instead of doing five times as many signal light upgrades as we could, we have to find all this money on the front end, and then on the back end, hopefully, you know, and Mike and his team do the grant and we get the money back and we're able to receive it that way. Instead of having the community process on the front end of saying, hey, let's do five times as many traffic signals as we originally said we would with the money that we have, we now have to have this laborious process where we find find all this money, lock up our budget, and we do less traffic signal upgrades. We have less community process about what traffic signal upgrades need to be done. It's kind of a no-brainer. We should take this money and make it as easy as possible. And I understand that maybe we ultimately don't want to take that money if we do receive the grant. But Let's make this, especially in lean times, let's make this as efficient as possible. And I think that's what this does. So I've been looking for this for years, probably six years, I guess, or so. So I'm glad we're able to do this today. Thank you.

Thank you. As we kick off second round, a question based off of that comment. It's my understanding that, as Councilmember Warwick pointed out, there are some programs where it's not us, it's not this legislation that's impacting it. There are state or federal regulations that require perhaps a JDE number. Is Green Light Go one of those? Or is that... In that instance, will this fix that issue? Or will that... I'm just curious. Will that...

Yeah, most funders don't require us to have a JDE number. Some funders require that we submit legislation authorizing us to apply. Other funders do not.

And then my second point is, I really appreciate all the possible hypotheticals and the consideration of the grant writer's time here. That said, I can't think of too many instances. There's maybe one instance I can think of where We've received the dollars, and it either is in opposition of what the council member wanted or what the public wants. If it's 10%, and then it's, like, so few and far between that we're experiencing a grant award that is in opposition of what the public wants, and it's still being public, and there's still an opportunity, like, even, it might be hard, but, like, there's still an opportunity for the public to hear it and the council to hear it. We are the representatives. We also get the grants list every week. I feel like there is... perhaps an internal policy of maybe large grants, go to the council member and talk with them, but not, I think this is fixing a critical issue and allows us the flexibility that we need in these lean times without And the harm that this causes outweighs any potential future hypothetical harm that may or may not come to fruition of wasting a grant writer's time. I think this one outweighs the other. So those are my two cents. Council Member Warwick.

Yeah, just to sort of give a little context for the grants list. That was, I mean, that was what we were looking to address, right, with the list. So initially, I had wanted to have every grant come through council for a vote, right, like for the application, and talked with the grants team. And it was like, that is not, right, like that's just too onerous, right, that would just... clog up the the process which is already has some tight timelines as it is so that was kind of like the compromise solution was uh the weekly grants list and i will say i i look at it maybe not every week but i look at it frequently and um it's a very helpful list not only for just kind of seeing what what we're applying for but also for um if there's something where there's like a tbd and you know of something in your district being like hey you know here's an i if if you're if you're still mulling this one over um you know this is something that that i've got in my district or whatever that that could be a good fit um uh Yeah, I think, actually, if you don't mind interrogatory, Councilman, we had spoken at one point about a grants, we're kind of getting a little off topic, but about like a grants fund, meaning like there was like a pot of money that we could use for these matches. Is that what you were referring to earlier?

If we're allowed an interrogatory, that was one of the ways that we were trying to combat this problem, was trying to figure out a grant. Also at that time, I don't think we realized the financial situation, and maybe members did, but myself and Muhammad did not. I don't know that the... There would be no way to do the grants fund right now. We don't have the money for that. This, I think, is the next best option for where we are right now. But again, both ideas are solving the same problem.

I mean, I know for myself, I'm comfortable with the grants list because I know that I look at it, right? So I know if there's something that's in my district that I don't recognize, I can immediately contact the director or whatever.

um let's speak on the public notice we do generally with these larger grants we do get letters of support from the community groups to support our application to show the funder that they are actually wanted in the neighborhood like that's generally one of the questions that we have to answer so we do reach out to bike pittsburgh we did one in lawrenceville so we reached out to the two groups there so we do reach out to them and let them know and see if they can support our applications okay all right i mean that that's all for me i just yeah thank you

Seeing none. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I didn't know if that was a... Councilman Wilson.

Thank you. All right. So my understanding is that if a grant requires there to be matching funds that we show until we're either accepted or not, whether we're granted or not, you'll do that. That's still part of... If the grant requires it, you would point to those funds and say, these are the funds we would use.

Yeah, and we can even say that we would put it in the budget for the future year.

So then we meet the requirements. So then if a grant doesn't require as much stringent, you know, stringency, like would you, we would figure it out essentially whenever the time comes.

Yeah, I mean, in the application, the city stalls to demonstrate. Okay, sounds good. I'm good. Okay.

Further discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 509, please say aye.

Aye.

Abstentions? Aye. Affirmative recommendation, Bill 510.

Thank you.

Resolution authorizing the city to quit claim... any right, title, and interest it may have in and to the property identified as 6491 Stanton Avenue, 11th Ward, to Grace S. and Chebukim Arana for $200 relating to the full and final resolution of a longstanding scrivener's error in the chain of title.

Motion approved.

Second discussion. That's moving gross. Thank you. Yeah, I appreciate the attorney in the solicitor's office talking to me about this. There is. I just want to know that there's really no map of the parcel boundary in the legislation. And since it's. correcting a scrivener's error. Council members, we should probably pass this today, but I may ask for there to be another attachment because it just, it keeps, you know, it doesn't actually show the parcel boundary and that would probably help for the legislative record, so. Appreciate it. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Further discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 510, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. Bill 511.

Resolution authorizing the issuance of a warrant in favor of Omar Cadenas in an amount not to exceed $3,600 over one year in full and final settlement of a claim for damage to his vehicle on Eiler Street from an accident with a city police vehicle on March 17, 2026. Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor of Bill 511, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation, Bill 515.

Resolution, excuse me, resolution amending Resolution 747 of 2025, which authorized the mayor and the director of city planning to extend a professional services agreement with Bromberg and Associates LLC for effective communication services by exercising the contract option to extend the term for six months and by increasing the total spend by $120,000 for a new not to exceed amount of $778,976. Motion to approve discussion.

Second.

Second. Councilman Wilson.

I'm seeing an amendment here and I know it's sponsored by you. Would you like me to make the...

Yes, please.

Motion to amend Bill 515.

Second.

Which reduces the amount to $75,000 for the amount not to exceed...

Thank you. Discussion? Council Member Warwick.

I just, if there's anyone here who can speak, I just want to ask what the effective communication services are.

Yes, this is our ASL interpretation services. Oh, got it. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Further discussion on the amendment? All in favor? Councilwoman Gross, did you have a question, comment? No, no, I'm fine. Thank you. All in favor of amending Bill 515? Please say aye. Aye. Bill is amended. Further discussion on the bill as amended? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 515 as amended, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. Thank you. Takes us to invoices. Is there a motion on invoices?

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of invoices, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. That takes us to P-cards. Is there a motion on P-cards?

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of P-cards, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative. P-cards are approved. That takes us to Public Safety and Wellness Committee, chaired by Councilman Coghill.

Bill 499, resolution authorizing the issuance of a warrant in favor of common plea catering in an amount not to exceed $16,450 for catering services during the NFL draft operational period.

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion?

I do have a question. I can't quite keep straight what was included in the reimbursement or the contribution from the state and what wasn't. I don't know if you have the answer to that or if...

I do not.

Ms. White wants to join us.

Good afternoon. My name is Takina White, Assistant Director of Public Safety.

So we received $2 million from the state for reimbursement for spending, local spending for the NFL draft. Does that cover this? So we submit it, and then the practice is that we will be reimbursed at a later date, yes. At a later date. But this is not somehow outside of the boundaries of what will be allowable? No, this is actually a part of it. We submitted it a couple days ago. Okay, so assuming this will be reimbursable. Yes. Okay, great. Thank you. That was my question. No problem. Thank you. Any further questions? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 499, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. Bill 500.

Resolution authorizing the Mayor and the Director of Public Safety on behalf of the City of Pittsburgh to enter into an Institutional Review Board Authorization Agreement with the University of Pittsburgh, allowing the University of Pittsburgh Institutional Review Board to provide oversight of research conducted by the Bureau of Emergency Medical Services in partnership with the University of Pittsburgh at no cost to the City.

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? seeing none all in favor of bill 500 please say aye aye affirmative recommendation bill 501 resolution adopting the allegheny county hazard mitigation plan is the official hazard mitigation plan of the city of pittsburgh motion to approve second discussion i am full of questions today i do have a question about this if someone is able to come to the table Welcome. You can introduce yourself for the record.

Adam Amil, Deputy Emergency Management Coordinator.

Thank you very much. So I have this hazard mitigation plan in my head because our former planning director really was adamant about the city adopting a hazard mitigation plan to help us unlock future federal funding that is only allowed once the city has a hazard mitigation plan. I was never quite clear if we had adopted the county's hazard mitigation plan in the past, is this the first time we're doing this? And is it really that easy or like what steps were involved in adopting this or contemplating the counties as the cities?

Right. So the city has adopted it every five years since 2016. Okay. Planning for this began back in 2025 through Allegheny County and their contractor. A series of meetings where we discussed with all the other municipalities what hazards were subject to, human-caused natural disasters. We also worked very closely with city planning on this, so they got our input on it. And then from there, they developed the plan. So fully involved with the city along with all the other 130 municipalities.

Mm-hmm. and so is there something that we would have to do in addition to this to be able to unlock that magical spending that might not be that funding that might not may or may not be there at this point but could be in the future or is does this constitute a plan such that we could we would be eligible for that this does unlock the hazard mitigation funds great that's all i was wondering thank you any further discussion seeing none thank you very much all in favor of bill 501 please say aye aye aye Affirmative recommendation. That moves us to Public Works and Infrastructure Committee, chaired by Councilwoman Sala-Nutro.

The firm papers Bill 300, resolution providing for the issuance of a warrant in favor of A. Foligno Construction Inc. in the amount of $481,320 for the purpose of emergency snow removal at various locations and providing for the payment of the cost thereof over one year.

Question to approve. Second. Discussion, Councilwoman? Can I have Director up, please?

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, John.

Give us your name for the record.

John McClory, Director of Public Works.

now john i i've been holding this particular invoice for a little while here while we received some backup uh in addition to the blanket uh invoice they sent us were you okay with what they sent and they backed up you can approve to attest to that that's you know what they did yes that's the only question i had thank you further discussion

Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 300, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. Thank you very much. New papers, Bill 507.

Resolution authorizing the Mayor, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, and the Director of the Department of Public Works to enter into an agreement or agreements with the Environmental Protection Agency for the purpose of receiving grant funds from the Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling Grant Program in the amount not to exceed $1,666,217 to revamp our curbside yard waste collection program. Motion to approve? Second. Discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 507, please say aye.

Aye.

Affirmative recommendation. Congratulations to all involved. Bill 508.

Resolution providing for a reimbursement agreement or agreements with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation for costs associated with the construction phase of the West in trolley trail project and providing for the payment of the cost or have not to exceed $1 million reimbursable at 80% any municipal share of commonwealth incur costs at a cost not to exceed $4,000. Motion to approve second discussion.

Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 508, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation, Bill 516.

Petition from the residents of the City of Pittsburgh requesting a public hearing before City Council regarding maintaining Serpentine Drive in Schenley Park as a pedestrian and bike-only thruway. The petition is valid in accordance with the Home Rule Charter.

Motion to approve. Discussion? Second. Second.

Second. Discussion? Councilwoman Salinetro?

I'd like to call for a public hearing under the request made by the city residents for Serpentine Drive.

Is there a second?

Second.

Second.

All in discussion? All in favor of a cablecast public hearing, please say aye. Aye. It has, I believe, been scheduled, so it is on the calendar. And is there further discussion on Bill 516? Okay. Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 516, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. That moves us to Land Use and Economic Development Committee, chaired by Councilman Wilson.

Supplemental New Papers, Bill 544, Ordinance Amending and Supplementing the Pittsburgh Code of Ordinances, Title VII, Business Licensing, Article IX, Amusement Businesses with a New Chapter, Chapter 74, Licensing of Mechanical Amusement Devices.

Motion to approve discussion. Second.

Discussion. Councilman Wilson.

I'll defer to the bill sponsor.

Thank you, Councilman. I appreciate that. Thank you, Madam Chair. First of all, I want to say I apologize. I have not had the opportunity to speak to each and every member yet regarding this. We did touch on it a little bit when we were up in Harrisburg and got to speak to some of the state officials on it, which was helpful. But we will have plenty of time to go through the ins and outs of what I'm proposing. So I want to begin with saying I first started to entertain introducing this During the time when we were proposing a property tax, I wanted to look for, this to me was an alternative to property tax. It was no secret I was against raising our property taxes. However, I will say, after learning more of the situation we were in, I believe it was the right thing to do. I wasn't fully informed as to our financial difficulties at the time, but I believe that was the right thing to do. And so in doing so, and as the public knows, we passed, you know, 20% tax hike on our property. Since then, you know, we found out, we received a really transparent and realistic look at our financial situation through the administration, which I thank them for. I think at least now we know where we stand. So I decided that we needed to also move forward with this as well because we need to generate more revenue for the city of Pittsburgh, you know, especially when we look back at the facility usage tax. known as the job tax that we lost millions of dollars a year on. And on top of that, the reassessments of our skyscrapers downtown really put a hole in our budget as to what we were expecting to budget for. So I decided we better pursue this as well. Only just one small measure to hopefully bridge the gap between our deficits, but it's a measure. And we did it in three different ways. First, I want to tell you, this is not a new tax. This is nothing new to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. There are one fifth of the municipalities and boroughs throughout the Commonwealth actually have this tax already on the books, some for 40 years. So this is not a new tax. What I liked about it and the reason why I pursued it initially was the fact that it is not on the backs of the homeowners. I never like to raise taxes, but again, we may not be large in population, but we are large in expenses. It costs a lot of money to... operate the city of pittsburgh whether it's our public safety public works bridges we can go on and on we have big ticket items that we need to finance for last year we ran a deficit the first quarter projections for this year tend to point to us running a deficit again this year so i my goal was to get this in place something that we all agree with and can work on so we could budget for it next year, in 2027, because if we go three years in a deficit, I think that triggers the state is allowed to come in and declare us bankrupt and, you know, take over our finances, which I don't want that, and I know my colleagues don't want that. I know the administration doesn't want that, so this is just one small measure. It is a tax. It's not on the property owner, but it's effective. We guesstimated, I will say, and it's hard to figure some of these things out, and a lot of these things will be vetted out as we move forward with our conversations. But $2 million to $3 million of possible revenue for the city of Pittsburgh. That's our best guess. We did it in three different tiers. Tier one would be skills games. That is poker machines, you know, the fruit machines and things of that nature. Tier two, now that would be taxed at $1,000 per unit. I don't know about you all, but I see them everywhere, right? The demand is there. They're obviously making a lot of money from these skills games. I have people who have garages set up with skills games in them. So we're going to put it, initially, $1,000 tax or fee, however you want to phrase it, but it's a tax. It's actually a privilege tax to have this machine per unit, excluding obviously the casino. They're exempt. Tier two would be the claw machines with the animals or really any machine that you really get prizes for. That would be set at $100 per unit. Tier 3 means dartboards, jukeboxes, pool tables, pretty much anything you plug in. And that would be a very modest $10 per unit. So if you have four of these games, it's $40 extra to you a year, whether you're a restaurant or a bar or whatever it may be. So it's a very modest $10 there. I'm going to need to hold it for a public hearing today, but I did want to just bring you up to date as to why and how I got to the point I'm at. I know I've talked to many of you about this in the past, but not in depth. In fact, it took us a while just to get the information. I want to thank my staff and Sean Carter and Blake Plowchak for the research, and Melissa, who did a wonderful job for us researching the other surrounding municipalities that already imposed this tax, and we used them as a gauge. And of those, I will tell you, we took statistics from Avalon, Blonox, Brentwood, Scott Township, Wilkins Township, and I believe Elizabeth Forward. And to the best of our ability, we came up with a formula that we thought would you know, gauge what revenues the city of Pittsburgh would gain from this. It's not exact, and there's a lot more research to be done, but it's a starting point. And through that, we came up with an estimation of about two to three million dollars per year. annually. I tend to think it's going to be more towards the three million, but again, we have to do some more research to figure that out. Important notes I want to make is that this is not on the backs of the tax of our property owners and eventually gets, you know, forced on our renters. So I like that about this from the beginning. I stepped back from it a little bit once we approved the property tax, again, which I'll admit that at the time I didn't feel like we needed, but now having a more clear picture and transparent picture from the administration, I believe that we're forced to do that. And I believe we're forced to look at... avenues like this you know revenues like this doesn't mean I want to tax our way out of things this is again nothing new many municipalities many cities throughout the Commonwealth have been doing this for ages we had a conversation with our law department there was no immediate red flags that our law department threw up but but those conversations will continue and I'll open it up to other members but I just want to say Between now and the public hearing, we wish to coordinate and consult with, number one, council members. I will meet individually or as a group or however to get your thoughts on it and to make sure our T's are crossed and our I's are dotted so that we get to the point where we can implement this. Obviously, the administration will be in on all of those talks. We have to bring PLI in because there's going to be an enforcement measure that we have to figure out. And, you know, we're going to all just have to put our heads together and figure out how we're going to do that. and the finance department. So over the next three or four weeks, I hope and plan to sit with all council members first, the administration, and anybody else pertinent to this and implementing this. We could amend as we go. Nothing is concrete here. Nothing is finite. We put the amounts on it, judging by what the market dictated. Do you know the market dictated? Skills games were everywhere, basically. We didn't want to hurt the people, you know, with the dark boards and the pool tables or impose a big tax on them. I think that's very modest, $10 per unit. And again, I don't like to impose any taxes, but I think we better figure out a way for additional revenues for the city of Pittsburgh. On top of taxes, of course, we have to look at our spending. We have to look at, you know, maybe not hiring through attrition when people retire, if we can get through with a... leader workforce there's many ways this is just one i just want to reiterate this is just one small way that i feel we could be financially solvent here in the end so with that i will you know take any questions as to the point where i'm at with it from many council members but again we'll have to hold for a public hearing so there will be no vote on it today but um with that i'll turn it back to you madam chair thank you council person charlin

Yes, so I'm excited about any opportunity we have for new revenue. I think this is generally an idea that we should explore. I'm trying to figure out if... my friends will save money or spend more money if we start taxing their touchstones um but i will you know i do want to explore that a little bit more i i actually have a call into some of the bar owners to understand a little dynamic of that um but the other thing the other really important piece of this um and talking to friends that you know that work in harrisburg and work around harrisburg It seems like the most pressing issue in Harrisburg right now is what we're going to do with these skill games, these games of chance that they have up there, and how we're going to... how we're going to generate revenue off of that. I do want to make sure that if it's something that there's no way for us to stop, that we do make sure to get what's ours on there. But at the same time, I do think that someone needs to say, and I don't think anybody in Harrisburg can say this, so hopefully we can say this, that It is kind of a dangerous thing to look at folks playing these games in a Kogo's or in a deli or wherever they are. This is not like a night out at the casino. This really is a tax on an addiction. And it's a really kind of a sad thing. when we see that happen and see that exist in a space like that. You know, if you watch as much local news as I do, you saw how heated the election got in the primary here between some of the folks running for, you know, for the Senate seat outside the county. It was truly a proxy war between folks that believe that we should have more gambling available to you at every gas station through in the state and folks that believe that we should have more gambling on your phone. That's really what we were watching when we're seeing that. And it's not a fun thing. This isn't like a night out with friends and playing a little blackjack. This is... know really a scary scary industry that that we've got there so i i do want us to have some caution as we we talk about this i mean i i would like to tax it out of existence if if we have the opportunity to do that but i you know i don't think that's that's within our power here but um excited to to see what what this entails and uh thank you for uh for moving forward with us appreciate it thank you further discussion

I appreciate the way that this is written so that it's very clearly not exceeding our jurisdiction by creating a new tax. It's a fee, right? So these are fees on the various types of amusement, of mechanical amusements.

Well, it actually would be a privilege tax.

Oh, okay. So it is a tax. It is a tax. But it was within the jurisdictional powers that we have.

That's right. Correct. Excuse me, I don't, you know.

Yeah, yeah, no, it's fine.

But yeah, and we took the model of, you know, again, one fifth of the entire Commonwealth cities and municipalities already impose this tax. So again, this is really nothing new. We looked at it and kind of tried to conform it to what we feel the city of Pittsburgh will benefit in revenue by. But, yeah, the precedence has been set. And, again, I don't want to get ahead of our law department, but our initial conversation was, you know, that I don't see any real red flags. They want to talk to us about some of the things. And there's going to be a lot to talk about, you know, moving forward. So, yeah, we're in compliance.

Thank you. Council Member Warwick. yeah thank you and thank you for introducing this any way to increase revenue is you know something i think we should all support um uh just for for you know because i did hear from a few of my local small bar owners right bar and restaurant owners who were very worried like what our pool tip you know what i mean like we're barely getting by and just our our pool table or our dartboard uh so and i appreciate the clarification so that would you know the Those types of games, right, that are not the slots, right, those are the Tier 3, and that is $10 per unit per year. So, you know, a very modest tax for those types of games. That's not... You know, the big ones are the... That's right.

And we intentionally did it that way because, you know, that's amusement only, basically. The second tale would be if you won a prize and, you know, the claw machines and, you know, other machines like that. And obviously, the market... We didn't want to get into the weeds as to illegal gambling and skills games. So that's why we put a mechanical devices tax on it. It covers everything. Modestly, for simple machines like that, if you have three or four, it's $30, $40, $50 a year. Obviously, the demand is on the skills games, and I know the state is talking about it. And if I could reply to Councilman Sharlin's, we don't know what the state is going to do. We really don't. We do know that the will is there for them to take this up, whether they tax the revenue on it, whether they tax the units like we're doing. We don't know if it's going to supersede what we do. We are having conversations. I will be having conversations with my state elected officials that if it does, if they do proceed and put a tax on it, and if it supersedes what we're doing, we want to make sure that we get the benefits back from whatever tax that they imply. So we've got a close eye on that. I don't think it should stop us from moving forward. I think if they decide to tax, say, the revenue on each machine, which they can do, and there is verification from each machine for them to find that out, then I don't think that should affect ours. Ours is a privileged tax, meaning if you want this machine in your establishment, it's going to cost you, if it's a skills game, $1,000 per year. If it's as simple as a dartboard, then $10. So, yeah. Again, it's a small way, but I'm not real concerned. I'll leave it up to the state to regulate and decide what's legal, what's not, and what kind of taxes they can put on it. But I'm just trying to keep us clear of that conversation until they do what they do, if they do what they do. So we have no way really of telling at this point.

Well, you unfortunately are giving my children another reason to ask for the claw machine, for money for the claw machine. It's helping the city. Mom, it's helping the city.

And, you know, there's no way for us to know the profit of a claw machine. I do intend on having conversations with bar owners and restaurant owners. And this is not bar and just restaurant owners. Maybe with the cloud machines and pool tables it is. But, again, the skills games are everywhere. I have a gas station I won't mention. They have a whole garage. 30 or 40 of them. It looks like a little mini casino. So I say we let the casinos be casinos. And, you know, I feel like it's kind of getting out of control. But I'll let the state worry about regulating or taxing that. We're just looking to put a fee or a tax on each individual machine. So we could kind of stay clear of that conversation. If what the state does changes that, then we'll just address it at the time.

Yeah. Any further? Sorry. Further discussion? Councilman Mosley.

Interrogatory.

Sure. Just a quick question. Which tier does jukeboxes fall in again?

Jukeboxes would be tier number... Wait a second. That would be tier number three. That would be $10 fee. Yeah. So jukeboxes, you know, that's really just amusement only. There's no prize. There's no, I don't know how they're making their money. I'm not going to assume they're, you know, gambling with the skills game. But, you know, obviously that's what's in demand. But this is strictly amusement. So there's no, you know, gifts received basically. So, yeah, so they would be in that category. Absolutely. Thank you. Yeah.

That's my only question.

Thank you. Further discussion? Is there a motion to hold for a hearing?

Yeah, I'd like to motion to hold for a public hearing. Second.

Discussion?

Second.

Seeing none, all in favor of holding Bill 544 for a cablecast public hearing, please say aye.

Aye.

The bill will be held. Deferred Papers, Bill 1993.

Bill 2025 1993 ordinance amending the Pittsburgh code title 9 zoning code article one introduction and establishment section 902 of 3 zoning map to rezone parcels. from the RIVGI, Riverfront General Industrial Subdistrict, to RIVIMU, Riverfront Industrial Mixed-Use Subdistrict, in the Hazelwood neighborhood of the 15th Ward and in the 31st Ward.

Motion to approve discussion? Second. All right. I'm going to hand this over to the bill sponsor.

Yeah, thank you. Motion to amend by substitution? Second.

Second. Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of amending Bill 1993, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Bill is amended. Further discussion on the bill as amended? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 1993 as amended, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. New papers, Bill 513.

Ordinance amending the Pittsburgh code title 9 zoning code article one introduction and establishment section 90 to a 3 zoning map to rezone parcels, 1, 25, G, 13, 1, 25, G, 14, 1, 25, G, 15 from residential single unit detached low density to urban industrial in the home with West neighborhood.

The whole cable cast public hearing that kept discussion.

Seeing none, all in favor of a Kimball Castle Public Hearing for Bill 513, please say aye.

Aye.

Bill will be held. Bill 518.

Ordinance establishing an East Carson Street Improvement District for the area shown on Exhibit A at the behest of the East Carson Street Business District Advisory Committee, property owners and business owners to be benefited with specific improvements to be undertaken including, but not limited to, financing of said improvements, method of assessing specific properties to be benefited, establishing a neighborhood improvement district management association to conduct administrative procedures for the neighborhood improvement district, providing for the establishment of a separate account for deposit and withdrawal of project funds, and providing for the cost thereof.

Motion to hold for cablecast public hearing. Yeah, that's what I would like to do.

Second. Second. Discussion?

discussion so this is something most of you know that I've been working on this for a while here I actually believe it was councilman Wilson and our council president when I first took office they were like what is it that you want to do what is the thing that you want to do and this is that legislation so working on this for for quite some time with the uh the help of the pittsburgh downtown partnership who has served as our consultant on this project um the graciously the hillman foundation and upmc have donated um or given us a grant to explore uh what a business district manager in southside would look like for the last year um we've taken vacancy the vacancy rate on east carson street from 24 percent um to about 16.4 percent um and You know, this really is the I believe the most important legislation that we can look at for East Carson Street and for Southside and for the future of one of the most vibrant business districts, the oldest Victorian Main Street in America, and moving this forward here, something we've been looking at for quite some time, years before, you know this group was together there were multiple iterations multiple attempts to do this famously both southside and lawrenceville tried to do this kind of at the same time period and unfortunately neither of those those passed but we're we're looking at it again we've got some really strong support about 94 percent of respondents in our surveys have said that they uh wanted to try this uh to try to do an improvement district on East Carson Street. So the next step here is public hearing. All of the owners that are affected, all the property owners and all the tenants, conveniently, will be mailed in the next week or so. My office will be stuffing envelopes. And we'll be letting them know about a public hearing that we'll have sometime in July. And the hope here is that we can raise revenue locally on East Carson Street, fund an organization that will be controlled by the property owners of East Carson Street and be able to respond to their needs. So this is, again, I think the most important legislation that we can really look at for East Carson Street to really solve our problems moving forward. And I'm really excited about it. So with that, I guess I would ultimately like to hold for a public hearing.

Thank you. Any further discussion? So we have a motion and a second on holding for public hearing. Any further discussion on the bill? Seeing none, all those in favor of holding Bill 518 for cablecast public hearing, please say aye. Aye. Bill be held. That moves us to Recreation Youth and Senior Services Committee, chaired by Council Member Warwick.

Bill 512, resolution amending Resolution 388 of 2025, authorizing the Mayor and Director of the Department of Parks and Recreation to enter into a professional services agreement or agreements with Starfire Corporation for an enhanced fireworks show held in conjunction with the City of Pittsburgh celebration of the 250th anniversary of Independence Day by modifying the code account to include grant funding

by increasing the amount by 261 800 for a new total cost not to exceed 514 000 over three years motion to approve brief discussion discussion yeah just to say um you know our our city parks and special events team put on a really great fourth of july every year um It's funny because we were actually nominated by CBS or something, but we were nominated for a contest to vote on who has the best celebration. And I shared that on social media, and it got more hits and shares and whatever than anything else. I've ever posted ever. So it was really kind of sweet to kind of see how excited Pittsburghers are, how much they like this event, and how excited they were about that nomination. So I hope we win that. And I know that this is going to be really a super, a really great, it's going to be really great this year. So I'm very excited to see what our team puts together.

Further discussion?

seeing none all in favor of bill 512 please say aye affirmative recommendation that moves us to innovation performance asset management and technology committee chaired by councilwoman gross bill 502 resolution authorizing the mayor director of the office of management and budget and the director of the department of innovation and performance to enter into an agreement or agreements with bloomberg philanthropies for the purpose of receiving grant funds from the youth climate action fund in the amount of fifty thousand dollars to strengthen How cities partner with young people to develop local climate solutions.

Motion to approve, brief discussion?

Second.

Discussion? Yeah, we have a few people here from INP, so I was hoping they would come to the table and tell us about this exciting project. Thank you. You can just have seats and introduce yourselves for the record.

Good afternoon, everyone. We actually won the first place for the fireworks.

Oh, we won. I wouldn't ask if it came with a financial gift, does it? I don't believe so.

Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Flo Marion. I'm the Assistant Director for Sustainability and Resilience in the City Planning Department.

Good afternoon. I'm Chris Belasco, Senior Manager of Digital Services and Chief Data Officer for the Department of Innovation and Performance.

Sorry, I'm Andrew Hayhurst, I'm the Senior Manager of Innovation in the Department of Innovation and Performance.

Great, so let us tell the public what we're looking at here.

Yes, so all of us are incredibly excited about this. We won a grant for $50,000 from Bloomberg to try and engage youth throughout the city of Pittsburgh to take on some of our biggest challenges around climate and our Climate Action Committee. So, like, it's very exciting. I kind of laid out, I wanted to make it very simple and lay out what we were trying to look at doing, but essentially we want to go out and work with some of the people the bigger, it doesn't matter, some of the groups out there that engage youth to work on climate action. This just lays out, we can essentially give up to $50,000 in micro grants, up to $5,000 per project, and the goal is to try and get up to 50 projects that we can have proposed out there, and then we'll create a selection committee that will decide which projects we want to fund and move forward with that. But the idea is... If we can do this quickly, we can also get additional funding from Bloomberg. That's what they said. So the faster that cities give out, they may double the amount that we give. So hopefully we want to stand this up so that in July we can start accepting applications from cohorts. Our team will go out and kind of talk through what our climate action plan is and do some human-centered design activities to get problem-solving and brainstorming from youths age 15 to 24. and then have them come up with projects that we will then fund.

Well, this is great timing. We've been talking a lot about youth in the age range of 15 to 24 in the city of Pittsburgh lately. Councilman Mosley just hosted a big and thorough post-agenda last week, and the public has suggested that we find more things for people in this age range to do and to feel comfortable meaningful right to to make the project meaningful and not just you know like lip service I think is the way it was framed so you mentioned cohorts were those age cohorts themed cohorts what kind of cohorts are you thinking of

Yeah, I think we were trying to help kind of group them by organization, you know, like which organizations wanted to come forward to make, you know, resources available to the youth that they already work with and help them raise the voices of those youth to carry out activities that the youth come up with.

And so in front of us, we have things like 412 Rescue or Grounded, and these are groups that work with either food redistribution or... land care type activities, Boys and Girls Clubs, which are kind of more after school time, after school time, and sports, Assemble is kind of crafting, and arts workshop, STEM workshop, Tree Pittsburgh, high school and university students. So I guess right now you're just kind of getting suggestions from the public, but then you'll be between now, which is we're almost at the beginning of June, so you basically have June.

Yes.

to figure out kind of how you're putting parameters on the grants requests.

We're going to stand up an Engage PGH page that will then allow cohorts to apply. And, you know, we will give them resources to go out and help kind of lead these events with use. So that's the idea, though, is that we'll use Engage PGH, like that known website. And we'll also use that page to, you know, to get the applications in. So, like, when the students have put together applications, they'll be able to submit it through there.

How soon? If someone sees this today or is watching right now and wants to get in touch with you, is the Engage page going up momentarily? Can they reach out to one of you? Yeah, absolutely.

They can reach out to me for sure. Andrew.Hayhurst at PittsburghPA.gov.

Well done. I regret that.

But the timeline on the Engage page, we just had our first coaching session with Bloomberg Philanthropies, and so we hope to get that up in the next couple weeks.

Fantastic.

And there will be some press around that once we do.

Okay, fantastic. So watch out for media, watch out for the Engage page going up, and if you've got opportunities for reaching out to youth who are city residents... and have ideas for getting them to apply or can help them apply for mini-grants for climate-oriented action, and the city's current climate action plan is also on the city website somehow. I'm sure it'll be linked on the Engage page. It's 2.0, 3.0? What are we on? It's 3.0. It's 3.0. Read the 3.0 one, member of the public, if you're out there. Don't read the old one. Read the new one. And align some projects that are meaningful impact for microgrants for climate solutions. Got it. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Further discussion? Congratulations. This is terrific, and look forward to seeing how it comes together.

Thank you so much.

Thanks. Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 502, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. That moves us to Intergovernmental and Educational Affairs Committee, chaired by Councilman Mosley.

Bill 503, resolution authorizing the mayor, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and the director of the Department of Public Works to enter into an agreement or agreements with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for the purpose of receiving grant funds from the Economic Development Initiative Community Project Funding in an amount not to exceed $250,000 to recreate community at the Thaddeus Stevens Recreation Center.

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 503, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation, Bill 504.

Resolution authorizing the issuance of three warrants payable in favor of Connect Congress of neighboring communities for one-year membership dues for all three branches of government in an amount not to exceed $27,563. Motion to approve. Second. Discussion? seeing none all in favor of bill 504 please say aye aye affirmative recommendation bill 505 resolution amending resolution 680 of 2020 entitled resolution authorizing a cooperation agreement or agreements with the urban redevelopment authority of pittsburgh in connection with the URA's application for a redevelopment assistance capital program grant of up to $1,500,000 for the former Homewood School Project, Council District 9, to increase the total grant award, adjust the match, and assign an additional job number.

Motion to approve.

Second. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 505, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation, Bill 506.

Resolution adopting plan revision to the City of Pittsburgh's official sewage facilities plan for 2200 Railroad Street at no cost to the City.

Motion to approve. Second.

Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor of Bill 506, please say aye. Aye. Affirmative recommendation. That exhausts our Standing Committee's agenda. We do have meeting announcements. Tomorrow, Thursday, May 28th at 1.30 p.m., Council will hold a cablecast post agenda pertaining to Pittsburgh's noise ordinance as it relates to restaurant and bars. I will be chairing that. I hope to see you all there. Next Monday, June 1st, 2026, council will hold a cablecast public hearing on Bill 2026-426 as it relates to zoning in the north side. Also, council will hold its regular meeting on Tuesday, June 2nd at 10 a.m. and their standing committee's meeting on Wednesday, June 3rd at 10 a.m. To register to speak at these meetings, please fill out the sign-up form on the council meeting webpage by the deadlines. You may also call the clerk's office at 412-255-2138. Is there anything for members? Seeing none, I'll take a motion to approve a minutes and adjourn the meeting. All in favor? Meeting is adjourned.