Brookline Office Opening Remarks
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Wednesday, September 16, 2009
BROOKLINE OFFICE OPENING REMARKS
Kevin Acklin
[As Prepared for Delivery 9.16.2009]
Good morning, everyone. It’s wonderful to see you all here today. Thank you for coming.
I was born in South Oakland. But when I was ten years old, I moved to South Pittsburgh.
My Mom, who was working herself to the bone to raise my brothers and me on her own, remarried, and we moved to a little house just across the way and over the hill in Banksville. I remember when we first moved, seeing all those trees and thinking it was like we’d moved to the country. And I also remember that, though I missed my old neighbors, I felt right at home here — in a wonderful collection of proud, tight-knit, working-class neighborhoods.
The people of the South Hills welcomed us — you welcomed us — and we became part of this community.
I went to the public scholars program at Banksville Elementary from fifth through eighth grade. I played Little League Baseball for Banksville. I had some great times watching my brother, Tim, play football for the Knights at Brookline Park. He was coached by Patrick Reilly’s Dad, who reminded me of that fact when I was door-knocking at his house not too long ago. When my grandfather closed his VFW Branch, he donated a lot of money to that field.
I have strong roots in these South Pittsburgh neighborhoods. My Mom and Step-Dad still live here in Banksville. My Uncle Dan, who worked in the City of Pittsburgh Fire Department, lives in Overbrook. I have cousins here in Brookline and in Overbrook. I spent my formative years here — from the time I was 10 until the time I went off to college on an academic scholarship. I love these neighborhoods.
That’s why so many of the projects I’ve done with Renew Pittsburgh, the non-profit organization I co-founded to help revitalize our city’s neglected neighborhoods, have been for South Pittsburgh. You may not know about some of these projects, because we didn’t have cameras following us around when we did them. We didn’t want that. We just wanted to do the work and help the community.
Right here in Brookline, I led the clean-up of the park and the repainting of the Boulevard Cannon. I helped the South Pittsburgh Development Corporation with pro bono legal advice, and I drafted an agreement between Beechview and Brookline community groups to hire a business development person to spur growth in both neighborhood business districts.
We helped clean up Broadway Avenue in Beechview. Just a few weeks ago, as a candidate for Mayor, I took a press conference walking tour of the Broadway Avenue Business District with Phyllis DiDiano, so we could protest, and call more attention to, a lack of support from the city and the URA.
In Carrick, I helped to clean and refurbish Leolyn Parklet behind St. Basil’s Church, participated in a neighborhood clean-up along Brownsville Road, and led a clean-up of Volunteers Field, so kids in the neighborhood would have a place to play baseball again.
I know how important South Pittsburgh is to our city, and I know how important the city's support is to South Pittsburgh. That’s why I’m here, all the time, working and sweating and doing everything I can to help these wonderful neighborhoods. These neighborhoods are the strongest communities in Pittsburgh; they have the deepest roots, the oldest families, the deepest roots, the proudest neighborhoods.
We need a Mayor who loves these neighborhoods as much as you do. We need a Mayor who understands these neighborhoods, and who wants to be a part of the their solutions, not just another part of their problems.
We need a Mayor who’ll be a true leader. A Mayor who’ll fight crime in Brookline. A Mayor who’ll reverse the terrible effects of the Bernardo Katz devastation in Beechview. A Mayor who’ll revitalize Carrick and bring new amenities to Overbrook.
We need a Mayor who will put the focus of his administration where it belongs: on delivery of city services, on development and investment in our neighborhoods, and on the promise of working-class families like the ones who make South Pittsburgh such a proud and wonderful place to live.
Over the next several weeks, my campaign will be rolling out more detailed platforms for this kind of investment and development. But I’ll tell you right now, that you have my word: as your next Mayor, every decision I make for the city of Pittsburgh will be the support of our families and the improvement of our neighborhoods. It’s time for city government to get back to the kind of grassroots, bottom-up, neighborhood-based approach to community development that made Pittsburgh what it once was, and what it could be again.
I’m running a city-wide campaign, because every part of this city is important to me. This summer, when I filed to be on the ballot, I collected signatures from every ward, every zip code, every corner of this city. My campaign team and I have been on the ground, in the neighborhoods, talking to voters for every day for the past three months. We’ve already reached out to more than 50,000 voters, and we plan to meet twice that many people between now and election day.
I have a lot of amazing stories from my hours and hours of door-knocking, but one of my favorites is when I met a woman on the South Side slopes. Her house was up on the hill, at the end of a dead-end street. She was resistant at first. And cynical. She even crumpled up and threw away the literature I gave her. But we kept talking. She asked questions, and I answered them.
You know, she said, I’ve lived here a long time, and no candidate or politician has ever come down my street and knocked on my door. You’re the first person who’s ever cared enough to come and talk to me. I told her I would do it again. And again. And again. And, most importantly of all — I told her that I’d still do it after I’m elected Mayor.
There are too many Pittsburghers who live and feel just like that woman. Too many people who think that they, or their street, or their neighborhood have been forgotten. Too many people who believe that their city’s leadership has forsaken them.
That’s why I’m running. That’s why I’m going to Put Pittsburgh First again. And that’s why I’m here today, opening a campaign office in Brookline, in this wonderful neighborhood, one of a whole collection of wonderful neighborhoods that have too often been forgotten and forsaken.
It’s a long way from the South Hills to Grant Street. There are a lot of barriers in between. You have to cross bridges and rivers, go over the mountain or through the tunnels. And that makes it easy for people on Grant Street to forget about you, to use those barriers as excuses to ignore you. To let you fend for yourselves. To pretend, sometimes, that you’re not even here.
But this is an awful lot to forget.
South of the Rivers is one-third of the city. One-third. And yet this part of the city has been ignored time and time again.
It’s incredible to think that we’ve lavished millions and millions development dollars in other parts of the city, over and over and over again, yet we continue to ignore the South Hills. How long have we been talking about the Brookline Boulevard reconstruction? How long have we been promised development in the Broadway Avenue Business District? How long will Overbrook have to go without a library, without a fire department, without a school or even a pool?
We need a Mayor who’ll work every day for this forgotten one-third.
When you elect me, South Pittsburgh, we’ll have one. When you elect me, your voices will be heard, and your needs will be met. Your neighborhoods will be remembered, and your communities will be developed.
We can win this race, but I need your help. South Pittsburgh alone has enough votes to win this election. Rise up and join me, South Pittsburgh. Give me your voice, your support, your fight. Let’s cross that mountain, those rivers, those bridges and tunnels — all the way back to Grant Street, so that all of this great city, and especially your great neighborhoods, are never forgotten again.
Thank you.
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