STATE REP. LA’TASHA D. MAYES DENOUNCES THE MAILER THAT’S BEEN SENT TO SOME CITY OF PITTSBURGH RESIDENTS THAT SHE SAYS MISREPRESENTS MAYOR ED GAINEY IN HIS BID FOR RE-ELECTION. (PHOTOS BY MARLON MARTIN)
Election is a month away, but mailer ‘crossed the line,’ community says
What is Ed Gainey’s legacy?
A mailer was sent to thousands of Pittsburghers in the past week by the group, Common Sense Change Action, a political action committee. On its mailer/flyer, it showed a photo of a dilapidated building in Uptown from around 2018, and under it, the group wrote: “The Ed Gainey Legacy. Wasting millions. Rewarding cronies. Hurting neighborhoods.”
The problem is, today, that building on Tustin Avenue in Uptown is no longer run down. It’s renovated with tenants living inside.
The flyer went on to insinuate that the run-down buildings, the disinvestment in certain areas of the city over the decades is Ed Gainey’s fault, when Gainey, the city’s first Black mayor, has only been in office since 2022.
The misrepresentation of the mailer was quickly called out by Pittsburgh’s African American community and others. In fact, it’s the most outrage Pittsburgh’s Black community has shown during the Gainey administration for something that, according to many Black elected officials, is a racist attack against the mayor.
BRANDI FISHER, WITH THE ALLIANCE FOR POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY
“This mailer leans into deeply racist troupes,” said Brandi Fisher, CEO of the Alliance for Police Accountability, at a news conference, April 21, in front of the City-County Building, Downtown. “Calling the administration of a Black mayor filled with cronies, implying he has misappropriated funds, saying he is enriching his friends and alleging financial mismanagement is highly inappropriate.”
Fisher also said the mailer was harmful to Black women “by implying that contracts they earned through the required RFP process were not deserved nor transparent.”
On May 20, voters in Pittsburgh will choose between Gainey and his challenger, Corey O’Connor, as to whom will represent the Democratic Party in the November mayoral election. While the May 20 Primary Election also has two Republicans vying for their party’s nomination, historically, there’s almost no chance either Republican, Tony Moreno or Thomas West, will defeat the Democrat, Gainey or O’Connor, in November.
STATE REP. AERION ABNEY called on Corey O’Connor to denounce the mailer that was sent to Pittsburghers that he said insinuated that Mayor Ed Gainey was responsible for decades of neglect and disinvestment in parts of Pittsburgh. (Photo by Marlon Martin)
Thus, the battle is fierce between Gainey and O’Connor. Attack ads have been hitting the local television screens. Mayor Gainey has called out O’Connor for accepting campaign contributions from those who are suspected of being part of President Donald Trump’s MAGA (Make America Great Again) movement. O’Connor has said that Mayor Gainey hasn’t done enough when it comes to keeping the city safe.
The O’Connor campaign did not print the mailer that has much of Black Pittsburgh in an uproar, but the PAC Common Sense Change Action is clearly in support of O’Connor. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that the group has raised more than $260,000, “primarily from donations from local labor organizations and from politicians who have endorsed Mr. O’Connor.”
Using the word “legacy” to describe anyone is a touchy subject. The word “legacy” is usually reserved for what people will think of a person for the entire body of work that they’ve performed over the course of a lifetime. Showing a dilapidated building and calling that Ed Gainey’s “legacy” isn’t illegal to say, but it’s clearly wrong, according to Fisher and Black state representatives like Aerion Abney and La’Tasha D. Mayes, who were also at the news conference on April 21.
“This is not just an attack on the mayor,” voiced Rep. Mayes, “this is an attack on me, Rep. Abney and all other Black elected officials and Black communities in the City of Pittsburgh. And to call generations of blight, to call generations of economic oppression and marginalization and redlining…part of the legacy of Mayor Ed Gainey is a lie, it’s disingenuous and it dishonors all of us who live and support and reside in the City of Pittsburgh.”
Fisher and Reps. Abney and Mayes called on O’Connor, the current Allegheny County Controller, to publicly denounce the mailer and its written words and insinuations. Instead, O’Connor’s campaign released a statement on April 21, which read: “Hateful rhetoric in any form is unacceptable. It has no place in this race and will have no place in Corey O’Connor’s administration, if elected. The O’Connor campaign is committed to tackling the very real issues facing Pittsburgh—looming bankruptcy, overwhelmed public safety departments, and a lack of affordable housing. This is the discussion that Pittsburghers deserve.”
Representative Abney, of the state House’s 19th Legislative District, was very angry with the mailer and what he said it tried to insinuate. “The folks who are behind these ads and attacks, they are not doing it because they think that you are going to vote for Corey, they are doing it because they want you to sit this one out. They want you to not vote at all, be discouraged because a ‘no’ vote is a ‘no’ vote for Ed.”
Representative Abney acknowledged that there are some African Americans in the city who are supporting O’Connor over Mayor Gainey, though the vast majority of Blacks in the city are in support of Mayor Gainey. He then said: “My message is, it’s OK to have multiple truths. You can both support Corey and you can call this out for what it is. If they will do these attack ads against the first Black mayor and this is what they feel about the Black mayor, imagine what they think and feel about your Black self.”
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