Big decisions
Innamorato era will shape county government for years to come
Former state representative Sara Innamorato’s Jan. 2 inauguration as Allegheny County Executive, and subsequent Jan. 3 press conference, opened a new era in Western Pennsylvania politics. While a great deal of attention will be paid to hotbutton issues like the county jail, the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center and property reassessments — all topics this Board has weighed in on, or will soon — the most enduring decisions of Ms. Innamorato’s term will likely regard the structure of county government itself.
Ms. Innamorato inherits a contentious relationship between the executive’s office and an emboldened CountyCouncil. While commentators often described the last few years as defined by personal tension between certain councilors and former executive Rich Fitzgerald, this was only partially true. It would be more accurate to say that council, under the official leadership of president Pat Catena, D-Carnegie, and the unofficial leadership of at-large councilor Bethany Hallam, D-North Side, has sought to assert its authority against that of the county executive’s office, and thus toreshape county government.
That means that Ms. Innamorato will have hard decisions about when to fight Council, and when to acquiesce to pressure — generally from her own left wing of the Democratic Party. For the sake of the stability and efficiency of county government, she shouldstand firm.
Getting frisky
While nearly all authority over the county’s bureaucracy rests explicitly with the executive, the charter gives council the responsibility to adopt and to amend “an Administrative Code that shall provide a complete plan of organization, departmental structure and operation for the Countygovernment.”
For the first two decades, county leaders generally assumed these words meant what the document’s framers likely intended: County Council, through the Administrative Code, can lay out a blueprint for the county’s bureaucracy. This is how the “administrative code” works in other governments, and the charter explicitly gives the executive, often through his or her appointed county manager, authority to supervise the minutiae of thegovernment described in the code.
But what if the administrative code can do more than that? A “plan of … operation” for the government could include much more than a blueprint. The charter also says that the administrative code should include a “personnel system.” Does this mean councilcan amend the administrative code to set management policies for the executivebranch?
If so, the home rule charter might describe a very different government — one run jointly by the executive and the legislature — than the one the county has had for the last 24 years. And that’s exactly what County Council set out to test by raising the minimum wage for county workers — while Mr. Fitzgerald defended the assumed meaning of the charter by taking the legislature to court.
Multi-front battle
That question has been settled for now. The county Court of Common Pleas ruled that the executive alone can set wages, and County Council has declined to appeal. In a letter to council, Mr. Catena stated that Ms. Innamorato’s Jan. 3 executive action to raise the minimum wage rendered thecase moot.
It’s more likely that an appeal wouldhave been time-consuming and futile. Meanwhile, Ms. Innamorato’s move to raise wages on her own authority was not, as some have speculated, an attempt to cozy up to council. Rather, it was an assertion that Mr. Fitzgerald and the court were correct: She, and she alone, can fiddle with the countybureaucracy.
And so for now, that issue has gone dormant. But council has also pressed on other fronts, including challenging the executive’s authority to contract with a private agency to manage the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center, and attempting to amend the county codeto give itself the power to confirm the executive’s directors for major departments. The former question is in litigation, while Mr. Fitzgerald vetoed the latter, which council declined to override.
Both of these controversies, however, could pierce the executive’s prerogative in the county charter. Ms. Innamorato will have to decide how strenuously to contest the contracting power in court — a delicate issue, because her progressive base opposes the Shuman contract. And she will have to decide whether to veto any further attempts to increase council’s authorityover her personnel.
A young government
While the people of Allegheny County have settled comfortably into the executive-council form of government, the county’s home rule charter isstill a young document.
Ratified in 1999, the charter replaced the inefficient and ineffective triumvirateof commissioners who had run the county for generations. The document, the county-level version of the U.S. Constitution, clearly envisions a weak legislature with several enumerated powers, and a strong executive in whom rests all remaining authority to managethe government.
But every governing document has its ambiguities, and even basic structural questions can take decades to iron out. For instance, Marbury v. Madison, which established the nowbedrock principle of judicial review, was not decided until 1803, sixteen years after the Constitution came into effect. And major questions about government authority, such as the construction of the Commerce Clause,remain contested to this day.
Ms. Innamorato is set to supervise the growing pains of the still-young Allegheny County Charter. While her predecessors enjoyed relatively stable interpretations of the charter, and an expansive definition of their powers, she will have to decide how much political capital to spend to defend both herself and the office she holds — while councilors will have to decide howhard they want to push.
While it might come with shortterm political costs — and comparisons to her predecessor — Ms. Innamorato shouldn’t hesitate to defend her authority. Anything else would threaten to throw county government intochaos.