Hunger and housing advocates from around the city gathered in Pittsburgh City Council chambers to plead with council members to restore or increase funding to their respective organizations. 

Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto unveiled his 2019 budget plan in his first address to city council since the Tree of Life shooting two weeks ago.

Peduto boasted a budget that would highlight the Steel City’s growth while planning for the future. He told the council in 2019 there’d be no tax increases, but while losing Act 47 oversight, there was still work to make Pittsburgh financially stable.

Amid excavators and hard hats on a dug up Greenfield Street, Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto struck an optimistic tone on replacing the lead pipes that have shaped the city’s water politics since 2016.

Peoples Natural Gas is finding support in high places for their gambit to partner with the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority. 

Since the company announced its wish to build a water treatment site in O’Hara Township, Pittsburgh activists, lawmakers and the authority itself have held growing concern about the prospect of the partnership. 

City Controller Michael Lamb blamed the city’s increased realty transfer tax for sluggish revenue numbers in the first half of 2018 Tuesday.

“It was an unnecessary increase that has been counterproductive to affordable housing,” Lamb said at a press conference. “We’re fighting to keep families in this city and the tax is an added hurdle in the way of enticing new people into town.”