Allegheny County Council President Pat Catena has installed his Democratic allies to lead all 10 of the body’s legislative committees — a move that he said is meant to send a message to Democratic County Executive Rich Fitzgerald.
“I don't believe we're a rubber stamp [for Fitzgerald] anymore,” Catena said Tuesday, a day after the new committee assignments were unveiled.
While the 15-member council will “cooperate with the [executive’s] administration,” Catena said “we're very independent of the administration. … We want to move the county forward.”
Catena was re-elected earlier this month to a second term as president of council. And he said that a primary factor in selecting committee heads was their support for a stronger role for council in county government.
As a result, Catena snatched back committee leadership positions from four councilors who shifted their backing to Democrat Bob Macey in the vote for president. Catena awarded some posts to newly sworn-in Democrats Jack Betkowski and Michelle Naccarati-Chapkis.
Committee chairs have the power to open up discussion and hold votes on bills pending before their respective panels. Or, they can kill legislation by ignoring it, thus stopping it from returning to the full council for a vote.
Catena said that at times Fitzgerald has exercised too much sway over committee deliberations by privately urging members to alter legislation before taking a vote.
Catena did not provide specifics, but last year the executive’s office persuaded members of the public safety committee to scale back a proposal to create a civilian police review board. Council approved the less sweeping measure in April.
Catena said Tuesday, “I don't want to have to acquiesce when called upon [by Fitzgerald].”
A spokesperson for the county executive’s office declined to comment Tuesday. But Democratic councilor Tom Duerr noted that councilors need Fitzgerald’s support to enact most legislation. The executive can block any bill that does not win a veto-proof majority of 10 votes. Fitzgerald took exactly that step last fall when he delayed the passage of a paid sick leave mandate until after the county’s board of health had approved it.
“So this notion of council independence is, I think, a talking point,” Duerr said. “The notion that council is going to somehow become this really intense legislative body over the next two years – we'll see, I don't know.”
Duerr did not support Catena’s bid for council president, so it did not surprise him that he was not named a committee chair.
Council’s two lone Republicans, Sam DeMarco and Cindy Kirk, were also denied committee chair posts even though they had each held one in council’s last two-year session. Although they voted in 2020 for Catena to be president, they backed Macey this time around.
“To the winner goes the spoils,” DeMarco said.
He did not fault Catena for naming only Democrats as committee heads.
“The people of Allegheny County are going to receive the government that they voted for,” said DeMarco, who chairs the Republican Committee of Allegheny County.
“Obviously, we don't have the numbers that we had in the past,” he said of his party’s voter rolls. “So … councilman Catena made the selections that he did. And … he will own the results. So any crazy legislation, any circus that this turns into or whatever happens, it falls on him, not us.”
In an email Tuesday, Kirk said, “Based on some of [Catena’s] committee assignments, the Council does appear to be moving in a more progressive direction.”
Democrat Bethany Hallam, easily council’s most vocal progressive, welcomed the change.
“I think that these committee assignments are going to show that we're going to really get to work these next two years and be able to get things done instead of introducing legislation that never sees the light of day,” she said.
Hallam will replace Democrat Nick Futules as chair of the government reform committee. Futules opposed Catena in this month’s vote for president.
“I will be holding committee hearings on any bills that come before my committee because that's my job,” Hallam said.
She noted that Futules rarely held committee meetings. His inaction, she said, thwarted a bill she put forth last summer to establish a minimum wage of $15 an hour for non-salaried county workers, including incarcerated people with jobs in the county jail.
She said she will reintroduce the bill in the coming weeks, although she plans to propose a higher hourly wage floor between $18 and $20. She said she would also propose legislation to send every voter a mail-in ballot application before each election, a measure that would likely come before her committee.
Hallam already has a chance to use the committee post to advance her agenda. At Tuesday's Council meeting, she and a handful of other Democrats sponsored a non-binding resolution “strongly encouraging” Visit Pittsburgh to withdraw its bid to host the 2024 Republic National Convention. The motion was referred to the government reform committee.
Progressive Democrats Liv Bennett and Anita Prizio will also lead committees this legislative session. Bennett retained her assignment as chair of the public safety panel while Prizio will head the committee on sustainability and green initiatives.
Betkowski was assigned to chair the economic development and housing committee as well as the public works committee. Naccarati-Chapkis, meanwhile, will lead the appointment review panel.
Macey, who lost his campaign earlier this month to replace Catena as president, lost his position as head of the public works committee.
The committee chairs for the 2022-2023 legislative session include:
- Appointment Review: Michelle Naccarati-Chapkis
- Budget and Finance: Bob Palmosina
- Economic Development and Housing: Jack Betkowski
- Executive: John Palmiere
- Government Reform: Bethany Hallam
- Health and Human Services: Paul Klein
- Parks: John Palmiere
- Public Safety: Liv Bennett
- Public Works: Jack Betkowski
- Sustainability and Green Initiatives: Anita Prizio
Julia Zenkevich contributed to this report.
This story was updated at 7:27 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2022, to include information about a motion to oppose hosting the Republican National Convention.
