G20 Budget Approved

Pittsburgh City Council unanimously approved an $18 million budget for the G20 Summit, with the majority of money going toward public safety costs.

The $18 million amount is a compromise between the $25 million suggested by County Executive Dan Onorato and the $16 million Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl previously proposed....about $10 million from the federal government and $4.4 from the state.
About $10 million will be going towards public safety costs, including work and overtime, as well as supplies and equipment for crowd control. Ravenstahl says he's comfortable with the $18 million plan, although he says it would certainly be easy to spend more.

Councilman Patrick Dowd says a lot of the trouble came from the lack of clarity in the budget, but now that's changed.

"As a council, as a city, we have a much better understanding of where the money will be spent," he says. "We have a clearer understanding of what the joint costs are for the city and the county. We have a very clear understanding of what the city's expenses are for the G20 event."

Before Council approved the measure, Pittsburgh Public Safety Director Michael Huss urged them to act quickly because he said 2 cities, which he wouldn't name, refused to send police officers because a budget was not in place to pay them, and any delay would hurt the city's ability to bring in 3,100 out-of-town officers.
Ravenstahl says even though the county has yet to agree to the budget, under the legislation, the city would get $2.65 million in state money and the county would get $1.75 million. The county and city would split a $2.5 million grant from Homeland Security.