Pittsburgh officials are again contemplating changes to the 2026 budget.
City Council last year made sweeping revisions to the spending plan first pitched by then-Mayor Ed Gainey. They added a tax hike, increased funding for new vehicles and tried to plug what they saw as holes in the former mayor’s budget.
But Mayor Corey O’Connor, who took office in January, earlier this month said he would propose reopening the budget to address serious concerns his administration raised. He has asked council to consider additional changes, which would increase the overall spending this year by about $28 million, taking the overall operating budget from about $693 million to $721 million.
The mayor also is looking to add millions more in expected expenses in the coming years, which are outlined in a five-year forecast attached to the budget.
City Council on Tuesday held a special meeting to discuss the proposed budget changes.
Council members plan to take preliminary votes on each proposed change — and any new amendments they may present — next week.
They plan to host a public hearing to gather feedback from residents on April 14 ahead of a final vote the following week.
Acting Director of the Office of Management and Budget Rea Price outlined several of the changes the O’Connor administration has pitched.
The amendments, Price said, aim to ensure there’s enough money to cover basic costs like employee health care, fuel and vehicle maintenance. The existing spending plan, she said, seems to fall short in various areas.
For example, one of the amendments would restore some funding to a trust fund that pays for employee health care. When the O’Connor administration took office in January, Chief of Staff Dan Gilman said, the fund was “insolvent.”
“We could not pay another medical claim,” he said. “There was nothing.”
The amendments also propose to include more money for fuel — though Price said even with an additional $550,000 set to go to that line item, it “honestly may not be enough” with rising fuel costs.
Other changes would cover over $2 million in overtime and contractor costs associated with a massive January snowfall, add funding for staffers at the newly reopened Oliver Bath House and include more money for vehicle maintenance, which Price said would only be funded through July under the existing budget.
Gilman said the administration is focused on fixing urgent problems first. They will work with council to address larger, longer-term budget issues, including jobs funded by grants that will eventually run out and the city’s use of parks tax revenue for operating expenses instead of broader park projects.
Gilman said the O’Connor administration wants to get “back to the basics” and focus budget priorities on creating safe neighborhoods, ensuring everyone has access to housing, supporting main streets and improving parks.
The administration is to update revenue projections to add about $8 million in payroll preparation taxes that were not accounted for last year and will be instead be counted in this year’s budget.
O’Connor is proposing to trim vacant job positions, spend the roughly $15 million surplus council had anticipated for this year and pull about $6.5 million from the city’s rainy day fund to make ends meet.
Another proposed change would remove about $2 million in the EMS operating budget that is meant for vehicles. In light of $12 million worth of donations from UPMC and the PNC Foundation to buy new ambulances and snowplows, Price said she felt they could do without that $2 million allocation this year and next.
She’s proposing moving that money to the capital budget for future years.
Councilwoman Barb Warwick, D-Greenfield, has advocated strongly for more investments for the city’s aging, breakdown-prone vehicle fleet. She was not impressed with a proposal to move any money that was earmarked for vehicle purchases.
“That feels like a non-starter for me,” she said.