Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey has announced an initiative he says would protect longtime homeowners in the city from property tax hikes, the Tribune-Review reports.
“The goal, the mayor said, is to ensure that people who own homes in neighborhoods where property values are skyrocketing don’t find themselves struggling to pay their taxes if their property is reassessed.”
Added Councilman R. Daniel Lavelle, a Hill District Democrat, during a Friday news conference:
“Families who have spent decades building their communities deserve to stay and benefit from the value they’ve created,” he said.
Added Jake Pawlak, director of the city’s Office of Management and Budget:
“Citywide, property values have increased nearly 20 percent from January 2021 to 2025. These rapid value increases are placing serious cost pressures on existing homeowners.”
The Trib says Gainey’s tax-relief proposal would cap property tax payments for “working-class homeowners” who have owned and lived in the same property for at least 10 years, a requirement dropped to five years if they received housing assistance.
The Trib adds that qualifying homeowners also have to be up-to-date or on a payment plan for existing tax bills and make no more than 120 percent of the area median income.
It also would require that an occupying homeowners’ property taxes jump by more than 125 percent in one year or 50 percent over five years to be eligible.
“Pawlak said he does not believe anyone is qualified for the tax break this year but said it’s important to have in place for future reassessments,” the Trib reported.
But Jake Haulk, president-emeritus at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy, finds the proposal problematic on its many faces.
“If it is only affecting city taxes and not county or schools, the tax savings will not amount to much,” the Ph.D. economist reminds.
“And it will be a record-keeping, bureaucratic fiasco,” Haulk adds. “People not getting a break will soon be at the castle gate demanding relief.
And “there is already a [property tax] break for the elderly and low-income homeowners,” he notes.
Additionally, Haulk questions how the Gainey administration can accurately calculate its claimed 20 percent increase in valuations, considering there has not been a property reassessment in more than a decade.
“Homes in city areas that are selling may not be representative,” he says, reminding that office buildings in town are seeing values decline.
“The failure to reassess regularly raises its ugly head,” he says.
And “How about cutting [city government] spending and reduce the need for tax revenues?” Haulk concludes. In a word, the Gainey proposal is “bad.”
Colin McNickle is communications and marketing director at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy (cmcnickle@alleghenyinstitute.org)
