Pittburgh/ Allegheny county merger (Pittsburgh, Lebanon: how much, tax, assessment)

[supersoulty]

Wow... I didn't realize this thread was that old. Sorry

[Drover]

Originally Posted by supersoulty

Wow... I didn't realize this thread was that old. Sorry

The thread may be old but the topic is still relevant and not really being discussed in any other thread. So, might as well revive it.

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by morefromcali

wow! One of the things that attracted us to the Pittsburgh area was the responsiveness of local government! Comming from Los Angeles, where the bureaucracy is so huge that that it works for very very few of us, the thought of creating another one makes me sick to my stomach! I know that the issues are different in Los Angeles, but I just don't believe that you can retain the responsiveness that is currently present at least in the suburbs. I look forward to learning more about the issues when we move, but creating another Los Angeles should not be a goal!

Let's not confuse problems here. I am sure the problem in L.A. has less to do witht he size of government as it has to do with the entrenchment of said government (though I can't know for sure).

In terms of the government here... Allegheny County has the most governing structures of any County in the nation. That's alot of levels one has to go through in order to get something major accomplished. While that might give some people a warm, fuzzy feeling about government right next door, it leads to severe fracturalism in governance and ultimately leads to bad things for the region, economically, socially, etc.

A consolidated government would not mean a huge bureaucratic mess, either, as it would give a chance for the county to rework government and reimagine it in a way that is more responsive. What we have now, with any project needing to go throught sometimes hundreds of channels for approval is a huge mess.

[Katiana]

So you are proposing a complete merger, a sort of City and County of Pittsburgh (like in Denver)? Would that not require a vote of all the affected people? My guess is the city people would go for it, but not the suburbanites. It's hard to give up your identity.

[suzeeq521]

Very true, Pittnurse. And this area doesn't have a good history with this.

We just passed the 100th anniversary of Allegheny City being annexed to Pittsburgh.

And people are still angry about it.

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by pittnurse70

So you are proposing a complete merger, a sort of City and County of Pittsburgh (like in Denver)? Would that not require a vote of all the affected people? My guess is the city people would go for it, but not the suburbanites. It's hard to give up your identity.

I think that would be the ideal situation, yes.

And yes, it would require a vote of all people affected.

As for the identity, I had a professor once who said that he found it so aggravating that , when he ask people from anywhere in Southwestern, PA where they were from, he would always get "Pittsburgh" as a response... didn't matter if they lived in Ft. Pitt, or if they were from Fayette County.

There is a lot of truth to this, and we probably don't realize how odd it is for people to identify so strongly with a central city that people from 30 miles away are eager to claim that they are Pittsburghers. In the minds of most people in Allegheny County, when it comes to "identifying" they wouldn't think twice about saying they are from the Burgh and expressing their Pittsburgh Pride.

Odd how that pride never seems to transfer over to their wallets or the ballot box, though.

[Katiana]

When I lived in the area and even elsewhere in PA and people asked me where I was from, I always said "Beaver Falls". Out here, where no one has heard of BF (sorry, Joe Namath), I say "Pittsburgh". If they know the Pgh area, then we narrow it down.

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by suzeeq521

Very true, Pittnurse. And this area doesn't have a good history with this.

We just passed the 100th anniversary of Allegheny City being annexed to Pittsburgh.

And people are still angry about it.

Yeah, I read that too. Honestly, I have a hard time understanding why people get angry about things that are 100 years past. Oddly, I actually knew about Allegheny City when I was young, because I saw it on a map once of the U.S. in 1860. That's when I had it explained to me that Pittsburgh owed its existence to annexation.

There is nothing wrong with that. Think of all the things that never would have happened here if Pittsburgh hadn't annexed all the communities around it. It's a good thing, not a bad thing.

Hell, where I come from, people are still pissed off that a neighboring city took the town's school district away. It was 40 years ago, and the town couldn't support it, but never mind those little details. And that's my point, stupid little grievences like that the reason some regions advance, and some fail. Putting those behind us will help us succeed.

[supersoulty]

Originally Posted by pittnurse70

When I lived in the area and even elsewhere in PA and people asked me where I was from, I always said "Beaver Falls". Out here, where no one has heard of BF (sorry, Joe Namath), I say "Pittsburgh". If they know the Pgh area, then we narrow it down.

I went to school in Erie, so it wasn't like we were a continent away. And even then, alot of people don't do that. Hell, you ask a New Yorker where they are from (and you could be in Paris, because I have seen it) and they will tell you "Brooklyn"... oddly, the only people who ever claim to be from "New York" generally live on Manhattan, but that's besides the point. A lot of other people will start with the small place, and then work up until you have a general idea. Western PAers generally start with "Pittsburgh" and then work down. It is something I have observed several times, and I know I am far from the first person to comment on it.

[Katiana]

I guess "Brooklyn" is a little more known than "Beaver Falls, PA". My friend in DC says she always says "Beaver Falls" when people there ask her. OTOH, I know a guy from out here from Sharon and he says he's from Pittsburgh!