.Things are looking slightly better for Pittsburgh, pensions-wise.
"My delegation is prepared to support the mayor's effort to exempt the city for the next two years," said Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, as he and the mayor emerged from the hour-plus meeting in the City-County Building, Downtown. "What we saw was very credible information, and everybody's speaking from the same place." (P-G, Lord and Barnes)
Nice to see our champions in Harrisburg getting real exercise.
Now let's make sure everybody scrutinizes Pittsburgh's data really well, until it's well understood. It's common to make uneducated assumptions. From there, this city can hold a discreet conversation about demanding this two-year exemption from joining the statewide pensions solution while pursuing the administration's current plan -- or other options. For example, as Ravenstahl himself put it last week, "How about a revenue stream?"
*-UPDATE: Gov. Rendell warns of a possible "avalanche" of amendments (P-G, Lord and Barnes). We should be judicious, conservative and timely with what amendments we do get behind, going forward. There is "Frankel's" delegation and then there is the whole entire Greater Pittsburgh delegation, as well as other dimensions of delegations.
*-ALSO: These guys think the bill is "greased" for quick passage in Philadelphia (Trib, The Triple B's).
I have not been following this pension thing nearly as closely as I should have, but Dan Frankel finally agreeing with the Mayor that this pension bill will essentially destroy the new Act 47 plan and force either the State to hand the City bags of money or the City into federal bankruptcy (nice way for Rendell to leave office, putting Pittsburgh into bankruptcy to give Philly what it wants) is not that compelling. As I understand it, Frankel is the embodiment of an urban liberal. He should be the natural ally of all things Pittsburgh (or at least all things Squirrel Hill). But Frankel has expressed annoyance with much of what Ravenstahl says. Still, apparently even Frankel realized the pension thing was demolishing Pittsburgh while it made Philadelphia happy. Given the way the rest of the state legislature has behaved in the past, I expect Frankel to be one of the few criticizing this bill.
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