Chelsa Wagner seeks another term as county controller, with new targets
At her inauguration in 2012, Chelsa Wagner said that as the county’s fiscal watchdog, she would not hesitate to disagree with fellow Democrats.
She launched her bid for a third term as Allegheny County controller Wednesday night at the Teamster Temple in Lawrenceville, with a list of targets already in mind for the next four years, including the county airport authority and health care giants Highmark and UPMC.
“We’re not just in a very critical time in our country and internationally, but as it’s always said, all politics is local,” Ms. Wagner of North Point Breeze said to a packed house. “If we’re not paying attention and holding people accountable and making sure that our government is looking after us at home, we’ve lost sight of what’s really important.”
Ms. Wagner was a state legislator prior to becoming controller.
During her seven years as controller, she has regularly challenged other public figures and went to court to try to expand her office’s duties. She waded regularly into political debates, while carrying out the standard duties of the office, releasing more than 100 audits.
Her targets for the coming term are typically expansive.
Except for the role of health insurance in county finances, the region’s two health care giants, which are ending their partnership later this year, are outside of the controller’s purview. But, Ms. Wagner said, “Tomorrow we’ll be kicking off a very big initiative to make sure the public is able to have a voice to hold UPMC and Highmark accountable, because I believe that’s an example of where we really need government to step in and be the referee.”
Ms. Wagner abandoned her push to audit the airport authority in 2015, after a judge ruled that it did not qualify as a county department under her jurisdiction, but it did not drop off her radar.
“I can look at them through other means and that’s certainly something I will continue,” Ms. Wagner said in an interview Wednesday. “I question why we are embarking on a $1 billionplus project at the airport.”
In 2018, she called for two members of the airport authority board to resign after it was revealed they had invested in OneJet, an airline the authority sued in August for failure to deliver on promised services. The board instead passed a rule
requiring them to divest.
Ms. Wagner also expects to challenge potential plans for public-private partnerships in Pittsburgh, such as a proposed “partnership arrangement” between the private company Peoples Gas and the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority and Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto’s “OnePGH” plan for collaboration between the city’s big nonprofits, corporations and government entities.
“We don’t govern by the consent of just a few powerful people at a table,” she said.
In 2015, Ms. Wagner narrowly won re-election, following a first term in which she feuded publicly with a fellow Democrat, County Executive Rich Fitzgerald. Mr. Fitzgerald backed Ms. Wagner’s predecessor, Mark Patrick Flaherty, in the primary challenge, but Ms. Wagner won.
So far this year, no challengers have declared. Signature-gathering for candidacies does not begin until Feb. 19; the primary election is May 21.
Ms. Wagner’s second term has seen less public acrimony, particularly with the county executive.
“I think it’s a relationship that I would say has matured. We’re in a position now where there is mutual respect for the role of the county executive and the role of the controller,” Ms. Wagner said.
Ms. Wagner and Mr. Fitzgerald even found themselves on the same side of some issues, including the failed Children’s Fund Initiative that was on the ballot in November. It would have raised property taxes to fund early learning, after-school programs and nutritious meals for children. Both said they supported funding programs for children but opposed the measure.
“As controller I’ve of course been proud to be protecting our tax dollars,” Ms. Wagner said. “Our fiscal state now is much better than it was in 2011.”