Our Fragmented County... (Pittsburgh, Denver: sales, how much, house)

[SewickleyPA]

First off let me say that while I may not directly benefit from a city-county merger, there are so many people that would that it can't be ignored anymore. I realize I live in one of the better off suburban municipalities, but I don't have to travel far to see the struggling, run down poverty of so many nearby small municipalities. The fact is that these places are just too small to remain viable anymore and are incapable of collecting a decent tax base to provide any useful services.

Just to give you an example of how rediculous it is, the entire nearby boroughs of haysvile and glenfield have less people than the block I live on. Thats a travesty. The county is turning into swiss cheese with pockets of poverty and decay in between very nice areas, which obviously isn't helped at all by the hilly topography. (there is a street on the border of edgeworth and leetsdale where a $700,000 house in edgeworth sits across from a $40,000 house in leetsdale) If we want to ever encourage investment into the surrounding areas and improve our image to the rest of the world/country, we are going to have to make some major changes and drop all the outdated, selfish, secular attitudes.

The municiple goverments have no interest in the health of the region as a whole and instead enjoy playing petty politics and feeling powerful because they have "mayor" or "councilman" by their name. Even if we did a partial merger along the lines of Louisville, all of the little mucipalities could keep playing their little mock government games untill their hearts are content, except now we would now have a unified governent looking out for whats best for the entire region. No more rehabilitation and transportation projects getting shot down because muni B is competing with muni A and refuses to cooperate. There is simply no way that anyone could not see the huge long term benefits of this scenario.

Not to mention how much this benefits the city that almost all of us work/play in by making it one of the largest in the country by more than quadrupling its tax base. If you live in one of the numerous affluent suburbs and don't care if everyone is moving out of the city and bringing all of its tax revenue with them, you are a fool. Without the city, their are no affluent suburbs, their are just farms and trees and irrelevant small towns that nobody cares about.

Sorry about that long rant, I really had to get that off of my chest.

[lifepgh2op]

I agree.

I think we need FULL consolidation, though. Not just government which is what they're trying to do currently.

And I think Allegheny County should be merged into the city of Pittsburgh instead of the city of Pittsburgh being merged into Allegheny County.

[SewickleyPA]

I'm not quite familiar with all the specifics of full consolidation, what exactly does that entail?

I would take a merger of the city into the county as the first step, since I doubt that anything would happen at all if the other way around was the only option. Baby steps. You know what I mean? There are many socially conservative types in all of the suburban areas, and the only way that change is going to happen is if it happens slowly.

You have to basically "trick" them by bringing on small changes, and getting them comfortable with those new changes before you can ever move on to city annexation talk. If the suburbs get used to the merged goverment after a while and the city starts thriving again, then the suburbs will be much more comfortable relinquishing power the city.

[Copanut]

Retirement for the county is funded at 94%. For the City, 44%. I could just see all the City Democrats licking their chops to get a hold of the County money. Sorry, I don't mind sending a couple hundred bucks for a semi-consolidation, but unless all the Democrats die, I'll never vote for a FULL consolidation.

[SewickleyPA]

Originally Posted by COPANUT

Retirement for the county is funded at 94%. For the City, 44%. I could just see all the City Democrats licking their chops to get a hold of the County money. Sorry, I don't mind sending a couple hundred bucks for a semi-consolidation, but unless all the Democrats die, I'll never vote for a FULL consolidation.

I see, well I agree that partial consolidation must happen sooner rather than later. Some things, such as the retirement you mentioned, could remain seperate. Its basically a matter of voting on consolidating a few things at a time so that both sides can agree and benefit from a merger. Anything that one side or the other can not agree with should be immediately dropped from the discussions and more effort can be put forth moving forward on the things that both sides do agree to consolidate.

[Katarina Witt]

I think there are a number of models of consolidation in other areas that could be looked at. There is no need to re-invent the wheel. Denver has a city/county government, but I really think Allegheny County is too large geographically for that to work (~700 sq miles, compared to Denver's 150, 1/3 rd of which is the airport). There are lots of taxing districts here that take in all or parts of the metro counties, e.g., the Scientific and Cultural Facilities Tax, which collects a sales tax to support the big arts centers in Denver and also community arts groups in the suburbs. Minneapolis also has some inter-governmnental cooperative programs.

[Geeo]

Minneapolis uses an intersting concept that has worked well for a couple decades. It's a shared-taxing system whereby small and less affluent communities receive benefits from huge regional developents. For example, some of the taxes paid by the Mall of America in Bloomington are shared county-wide with all municipalities for infrastructure upkeep (maybe school districts), so that the benefits are spread out.