the week in review
A BRIEF ROUNDUP OF THE LOCAL NEWS OF THE WEEK
No one in journalism school warned us that reporters would be required to interview so many angry, frustrated, hurting people. But every job has its downside.
Staff writers Alexis Johnson and Bob Batz Jr. were busy last week talking to owners of Allegheny County bars and restaurants caught on the roller coaster of closing, partially reopening, opening and then closing again because of a steady increase in COVID-19 cases.
Part of the owners’ grievances was that even those who followed county Health Department guidelines suffered the same “punishment” as those that didn’t.
Archie Manning, owner of Archie’s Bar on East Carson Street on the South Side, said he was fooled into thinking he was seeing “the light at the end of the tunnel.”
“People were coming back outside,” he told Alexis. “I feel like I did everything in my power to follow the rules, and I wish those businesses who didn’t would have been singled out. It feels very unfair to put the whole county under financial heartache.”
The good news is that the restaurants might be able to welcome back diners in the near future.
On Thursday, a group of six representatives of various members of the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association — small independent, corporate, multiunit, hotels — met with county Executive Rich Fitzgerald and others. The goal is to get everyone on the same page when they reopen again, because they can’t keep bouncing back and forth like this.
“We’re playing the long game, too,” Mark Gray, chief operating officer for Bottleneck Management Restaurant Group, told Bob. “Nobody wants this to be over more than folks in the restaurant business.”
No such thing as a free lunch
The restaurant may be closed, but the court is open.
And that is where The Davis Companies, landlord for the historic Union Trust Building in Downtown, is headed with its complaint about unpaid rent from the Union Standard restaurant, one of its tenants.
Staff writer Mark Belko tracked The Davis Companies’ complaint, filed last week in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court, seeking more than $72,000. The restaurant, which had been shut down for months because of the pandemic, informed the landlord that it “intended to cease operations entirely and close permanently.”
According to the lawsuit, the lease did not permit the Union Standard to shut down.
Chuck Hammel, president of Pitt Ohio said it is nearly impossible for a restaurant to make money while operating at 50% capacity because of COVID-19 restrictions. It’s already difficult at full capacity, he noted.
“How is any restaurant with an expensive lease and rent going to survive?” he asked. “It’s just a shame.”
Nursing homes work on visitation rules
Western Pennsylvania nursing home operators face a July 24 deadline for testing all staff and residents for COVID-19 if they want to reopen their doors to visitors in the coming weeks. Staff writer Kris B. Mamula also told us that there will be new visitation rules and procedures.
But none of those changes have been posted yet.
“We’re going to give it our best shot, but it’s going to be complicated,” said Presbyterian SeniorCare spokeswoman Lisa Fischetti. “What you don’t want to do is open the door a little bit, then have to shut it again.”
Pennsylvania has about 700 nursing homes where 76,652 people live. Visitors have been banned since March due to the COVID-19 outbreak, but facilities have made arrangements for “window visits” and sometimes visits outside on facility patios or in courtyards.
Vicki Loucks, chief operating officer for Greensburgbased Redstone Highlands, which operates three longterm care facilities in Westmoreland County, is still hoping to resume visits at their locations later this month.
“Window visits and Skype are helpful, but it’s not the same,” she said. “It’s been a rough couple months for everybody.”
Jeff Weinberg, of Squirrel Hill, said his otherwise healthy mother-in-law, Sarah Steckel, 97, was confused by FaceTime visits and eventually lost interest in living because of the isolation she experienced.
“You lose your sense of purpose. You have nothing to look forward to,” said Mr. Weinberg, who called social isolation the second pandemic. “No one is looking at this from a psychological perspective and what it’s doing to people. They’re suffering greatly.”
A fair chance for next year
In addition to helping with our coverage of COVID19 in Allegheny County, staff writer Hallie Lauer has been monitoring neighboring areas as well. Last week she told us how the cancellation of the 165th Big Butler Fair in Butler County has impacted vendors and the community.
The last time the annual Big Butler Fair was canceled was because of the Civil War.
“It’s a bummer,” said Ben Roenigk, vice president of the Butler Agriculture Association. “Christmas and the fair are the two things you look forward to in the year. I never thought I’d see something like this as long as I was living.”
Then on Thursday, it was announced that the Butler Farm Show, set for Aug. 10, has been canceled too.
But Jack Cohen, president of the Butler County Tourism and Convention Bureau, has kept an optimistic view on it.
“Once we know that we can, we are prepared to welcome people in,” Mr. Cohen said. “This health issue is more important; we need to protect our families.”
Follow-up letters for unused cards
Staff writer Patricia Sabatini last week told people still looking for their federal stimulus payments to keep an eye on their mailbox for a letter from the Internal Revenue Service regarding prepaid debit cards that they might have received and — thinking they were a scam — threw them away.
The prepaid cards were mailed to about 2 million taxpayers, while other taxpayers received checks or direct deposits to their bank accounts. People who were not expecting a prepaid card may have ignored it.
The prepaid cards, from Money Network Financial, and the letters coming out about them are not scams, said Lauren Saunders, associate director at the National Consumer Law Center, which issued an alert Thursday. “If you have any doubts, or have not received your card, call 800-240-8100,” she said.
A lot of room with a view
Billionaire Mark Cuban, a Mt. Lebanon High School graduate, still has a soft spot for Pittsburgh.
But he’s also got a vacant nine-story building on Fort Duquesne Boulevard along the Allegheny River that he’s looking to unload.
Mr. Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team and a star on the “Shark Tank” TV show, has owned the former PPG glass warehouse since 2006, when he paid $6.85 million for it. Built in 1917 and renovated in 1987, most of the interior has been gutted, leaving columns and a shell. The 168,000-square-foot building has been unoccupied for more than a decade.
There was a prospective developer interested, but the deal fell through, and now staff writer Mark Belko tells us Mr. Cuban has put the building on the market.
Gregg Broujos, regional principal of the Colliers
International real estate firm, said he expects a lot of interest in the property, especially from out-of-town developers.
“It’s a waterfront property, and developers love waterfront property,” he said.
No word on Mr. Cuban’s asking price.
This city is wired for tech companies
There was some good news on the development front as a San Diego-based software engineering firm announced plans to open an office in Pittsburgh’s Innovation District in Oakland.
Staff writer Lauren Rosenblatt said Mindera, which employs more than 500 people across its six offices, builds software systems for clients in industries including fintech, grocery tech, artificial intelligence, gaming and esports. The company has offices in Portugal, India and the United Kingdom.
Mindera chose Pittsburgh as its second U.S. location because of the city’s “vibrancy” and proximity to student talent from places like the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University, according to Sean Luther, executive director of InnovatePGH.
With nine current positions open, Mindera plans to start its Pittsburgh team small and grow it over time.
“Opening an office in Pittsburgh represents an exciting new era in Mindera Software’s growth,” Mary Lockwood, managing director, U.S. for the company, said in a statement. “The level of technical talent in the city, as well as its welcoming environment and emphasis on partnership, made this a very easy decision for us.”
“Mindera is the type of growth firm our region is well positioned to support,” said Mark Anthony Thomas, president of the Pittsburgh Regional Alliance, the economic development affiliate of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development. “This marks additional progress in reopening the regional economy and seeing promising businesses thrive in Pittsburgh.”
City Council moves on protest issues
City Council on Tuesday put the kibosh on the Citizen Police Review Board’s hope to hire a Texas-based consultant group to review police response to the June 1 protest in East Liberty.
Staff writer Ashley Murray said the council’s 5-4 vote leaves the matter in the hands of the review board and the Office of Municipal Investigations.
On Wednesday, the council conducted a public hearing regarding the creation of a Commission on Racial Equity, but turnout was light, and only one person, whose name was not provided, registered to speak.
Councilmen Ricky Burgess and Daniel Lavelle introduced legislation in March that would create the seven-member commission. Its mandate would include eliminating race-based disparities across city departments; engaging community members, especially African Americans and those who live in African American neighborhoods; and applying “deliberately and systematically” a racial equity lens in decision-making.
Also, a public hearing will be held Wednesday on Mr. Burgess’ bill to put a referendum to the voters in November on whether they want to expand the powers of the Citizen Police Review Board. To register to speak, call 412-255-2138.
You know darn well what’s in a name
The most common name for high school sports teams in the WPIAL is Indians. Staff writer Brad Everett reported that North Hills, Penn Hills, Peters Township and West Allegheny all use the nickname. Indiana uses the Little Indians. Aliquippa, one of the most storied programs in WPIAL football, is the Quips; prior to its football games, an Indian mascot riding a horse throws a flaming spear into the field. And there are other schools that use variations that include Native American imagery.
But as of Tuesday, Shady Side Academy’s squads are no longer on that list. The school’s board of trustees voted unanimously to discontinue the use of Indians, effective immediately.
According to a letter from chairman Jonathan Kamin, the board decided that “a significant portion of our community feels that it cannot embrace” the name or mascot. The letter added that students said the name became something “dividing us instead of uniting us.”
“We want everyone to be on the same page as far as race and racism,” said Shady Side Academy senior Nyla Rozier, a member of the school’s diversity leadership council. “It was a derogatory name being used as the mascot for the whole school. We’ve had a couple of meetings, most recently since Black Lives Matter. I feel like we’re trying to spread the word and help everyone be better.”
Brad reached out to other school districts to see it they are considering changing their mascots and found that some of those discussions have taken place and are likely to continue.
Shady Side Academy has yet to decide on what its new mascot will be.