Laurels & lances: Renew, revisit, rethink
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Laurel: To everything old being new again. When the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation gave a $160,000 rehabilitation loan to Dave Rankin to breathe new life into the old G.C. Murphy building in Tarentum, the hope was that it would preserve old architecture and benefit the area.
The response to the ongoing work is a first floor that is rented to capacity, with more work being done on the second floor, basement and Fourth Avenue facade.
These are the best kind of economic development projects — ones that build on existing assets and local needs rather than bulldozing the old to drop in generic stores in generic buildings that could be found anywhere.
Lance: To changing rules. It was hypocritical for Norwin School Board Director Alex Detschelt to tell someone in the audience who had spoken out at the Nov. 14 meeting to “zip it” as he moved his hand across his closed lips.
Rude, sure, but why was it hypocrisy? Because as a school board candidate in 2021, Detschelt did not “zip it” at a school board meeting when he screamed at the board over the school district following the state requirements for masking mandates inside the building.
He didn’t stop until Norwin school police officer Jeff Pritts confronted him about his behavior. He wasn’t alone. The collective actions of people not wearing masks resulted in the board abruptly canceling the meeting. No one did what Director Bob Wayman did Nov. 14 and tell them that the venue was not a bar and the person speaking out would be thrown out if it were.
Detschelt was a concerned, involved citizen raising questions and opinions in a public forum, as was his right. Now that he’s in a position of authority, he needs to accept that others will do the same to him. That means someone needed to zip it and listen: him.
Lance: To promises hard to keep. Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey has set a goal for snow removal. He wants to see all of the city’s roads cleared within 24 hours of snow falling.
So why is this a lance? Don’t we want roads cleared quickly and completely? Of course we do.
But if you’re going to lay that out as the promise, the city better be able to keep it. Challenging might be the most charitable word for the goal.
There’s the region’s weather, which can sometimes mean days of snowfall in a row. There are the roads themselves, which can be difficult to plow because of steep hills, odd angles and narrow width. Then there’s the fact that some roads have to be priorities because of access to main arteries and hospitals.
Promising clear roads in the winter in Pittsburgh seems like promising no potholes or no traffic on the parkway — good in theory but hard to deliver.