Kevin's Closing Argument
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Wednesday, October 28, 2009
CLOSING ARGUMENT REMARKS
Kevin Acklin | October 28, 2009
Good morning. Thank you for being here today.
Over the course of this campaign, from the beginning of June when I announced my candidacy all the way to today, with less than a week until the election, I’ve run with one idea in mind: that our neighborhoods are being neglected, and that they need a voice in the Mayor’s office.
At the same time the region’s jobless rate has hit a 23-year high, Mayor Ravenstahl is running a campaign ad entitled, “Jobs,” that touts our city’s “low” and “healthy” unemployment rate. That ad is both hurtful and offensive to the thousands of Pittsburghers who are right now looking for work. And it’s a reminder that a Mayor who listens only to corporate developers and fundraisers will always be out of touch with the struggles of the hard-working people in our city.
In this campaign, we’ve proposed a slew of innovative ideas for Pittsburgh and for hard-working Pittsburghers — ideas to reign in abandoned housing and fix BBI; to put more police on the streets and make our neighborhoods safer; to solve our pension crisis and secure the retirements of our city employees; to reduce wasteful spending and produce an alternative city budget; to refocus the URA away from corporate welfare for big-money developers and back on our neighborhoods and business districts.
We've also called out corruption where we've seen it. Now LET ME BE CLEAR – what I find objectionable about the Mayor's relationship with John Verbanac is the privileged, insider access and influence it affords. The Mayor’s powerful friends — big-time developers, lobbyists, CEOs and other corporate interests — have a direct line into his administration. But the rest of us do not.
When John Verbanac wants to take a jaunt down to Nemacolin with the Mayor, he gets it set up and on the books in one afternoon. When he wants someone hired or fired, it takes one email to the Mayor, and the change is made. If he has an opinion on an important issue before the city, he gets heard and served. But the rest of us do not.
LET ME BE CLEAR – while corporate interests like John Verbanac are sitting in the Mayor's office, calling the shots and getting their way, the doors to the Mayor's office are literally being chained shut, and slammed in the faces of Pittsburghers who want to talk with the mayor about crime, about their forgotten neighborhoods, about how big corporate developments are hurting our city. While the Mayor and John Verbanac trade emails from Grant Street to Cranberry, people in Beechview and Carrick, in Garfield and Sheraden and Homewood, are left to suffer.
These relationships of Mr. Ravenstahl’s have a wide-ranging, devastating impact on the working people of our city. While City Planning and BBI have been gutted, the URA has stepped up to hand out corporate welfare to our city's biggest developers. While the Pittsburgh Initiative to Reduce Crime took over a year to find funding, the Mayor was handing out sweetheart deals to some of his biggest campaign contributors. While rich insiders become even more powerful and politically connected, the hard-working people in our neighborhoods become ever more powerless and politically forgotten. That is the priority, and the legacy, of Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.
Once more, LET ME BE CLEAR – this Mayor's priorities are hurting our city, our neighborhoods, and our working families. We need new leadership in the Mayor's office, so we can invest more in our neighborhoods, put more police on our streets, and make our communities attractive destinations for young families. These are the only ways for us to grow Pittsburgh, and to put it back where it belongs: on the side of its hard-working people.
Thank you. I’ll take any questions you have.
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