In so many areas of life in our region — education, environment, equity, public health and safety — the gears of history continued to turn, and sometimes to grind, in 2023. PublicSource highlighted emerging trends and dug deep into the data, documentation and human-level impact.
Here are some of the stories we reported, many of which will echo into 2024 and beyond.
What happens after a camp is cleared?
The year 2022 closed with the City of Pittsburgh removing an encampment along Stockton Avenue on East Allegheny’s edge and sweeping aside with it a longstanding agreement.
The tents went down just as Allegheny County’s new Second Avenue Commons shelter prepared to accept displaced people while the Smithfield United Church of Christ’s basement doors creaked open.
Howard Ramsey talks in the tent he stays in on Oct. 29, in downtown Pittsburgh. Ramsey, who works days in an industrial laundry facility, says he was a kicked out of a shelter after living there for months. He is part of Pittsburgh’s growing population of people who are unhoused after the pandemic. (Photo by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource) If anybody thought those developments would noticeably blunt the effects of the housing crisis, they were quickly disabused of that notion.
The early days of Second Avenue Commons were marked by staffing problems and safety questions , while this autumn saw ramped-up evictions from its single room occupancy units. The Smithfield shelter, meanwhile, became a haven for hundreds but a bugaboo for Downtown businesses, until its June closure demonstrated just how tattered America’s safety net has become.
“I understand that it can’t exist indefinitely, but this haphazard closure is going to cause death and we need to hold people accountable for that.”
AUBREY PLESH, FOUNDER OF TEAM PSBG, WHICH OPERATED THE SHELTER AT THE SMITHFIELD UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST, DOWNTOWN
With cold weather’s return came a slow-motion rollout of the county’s and city’s plan for emergency shelter. The persistent presence of at least 200 people on the street, though, left leaders looking for…
A path to long-term affordable housing
The affordable housing shortage has been well documented for at least a decade , though never so viscerally evident as it was in 2023. Yet one of the most versatile tools for addressing housing needs — the Housing Choice (Section 8) Voucher — had become rusty and blunt by the time PublicSource documented concerns of landlords, tenants and former Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh [HACP] insiders. That reporting spurred pledges of prompt improvements in customer service in the program, but the year ended with curbs on the portability of vouchers .
“This is coming at the cost of tenants losing their apartments. Landlords don’t get payments, and they don’t stick it out. They’re forced to let their tenants go.”
DEANNA VAUGHN, A LANDLORD AND FORMER HACP ADMINISTRATOR
City development officials, meanwhile, scrambled to preserve affordable units that might otherwise fall into disrepair or convert to market-rate status. A $50 million federal grant raised hopes for more and better Hill District homes.
U.S. Rep. Summer Lee and Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey pose alongside other officials with a celebratory check for $50 million dollars for the redevelopment of Bedford Dwellings, the city’s oldest public housing neighborhood, on Aug. 3, in the Hill District. (Photo by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource) County-level interests sought to bring to the boroughs some of the models that have taken root in the city. And after nearly a decade of inactivity, the Pittsburgh Land Bank slowly began the process of reclaiming abandoned city property, sidestepping legal obstacles that held up progress.
While fears of gentrification have been most pronounced in Pittsburgh, housing market forces don’t stop at the city line. That’s why Sara Innamorato was quizzed about the issue during her successful run for county executive, which has everybody asking …
Will a fresh approach on Grant Street really change things?
In what will be the last Allegheny County election season to feature direct six-figure contributions to candidates, Democrat Innamorato barely overcame Republican Joe Rockey’s large fundraising edge. (Conversely, District Attorney Stephen Zappala ran as a Republican, and bested billionaire-backed Democrat Matt Dugan.)
“I don’t think it is fair for a few stakeholder groups and individuals to tip the scales for the most influential elected position in this region.”
TOM DUERR, OUTGOING ALLEGHENY COUNTY COUNCIL MEMBER
Innamorato’s pledge to focus on the “struggle of everyday people ” has a different feel from outgoing County Executive Rich Fitzgerald ’s recent emphases, which have tended toward consensus building with business, labor and multiple levels of government, plus stable property taxes.
Innamorato has said she’d like to address increasingly skewed assessments , but also wants to reduce a reassessment’s impact on those least able to afford tax hikes.
“By us not taking action and coming up with some sort of regular, consistent [reassessment] system, we’re exacerbating inequality.”
SARA INNAMORATO, ALLEGHENY COUNTY EXECUTIVE-ELECT, WHILE A CANDIDATE
Sara Innamorato, Allegheny County executive-elect, takes questions from reporters following her acceptance speech for the role on election night, Nov. 7, at Mr. Smalls in Millvale. (Photo by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource)
Innamorato also heard “alarm bells” in the county’s selection of nonprofit contractor Adelphoi to take over the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center. But she will become executive amid heightened attention to violent crime, which the county has sought to address with a $50 million effort to beef up prevention efforts.
That’s a lot on the plate of the likely most prominent member of what we’ll call …
Southwestern Pennsylvania’s pandemic-forged leadership class Innamorato follows political ally Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey to Grant Street, but also joins dozens of new leaders who replaced longtime executives in both the public and private realms.
