The running gag that is the Christina Cassotis Compensation Parade at the Allegheny County Airport Authority marches on.
The authority board last week awarded Cassotis, its chief executive officer, the latest in a series of whopping bonuses. For 2023, she was given a bonus of $254,718, a quarter of a million dollars and some change.
Additionally, she was given a contract-mandated 6 percent raise. That will raise her base pay to just over $600,000 for 2024. She continues to be paid more than many of the CEOs at far larger airports in the country.
As per usual, board chairman David Minnotte praised her performance.
Apparently, that includes the absolute debacle in which the Airport Authority arbitrarily and capriciously (and unceremoniously) expelled the former operator of the Airmall at Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT).
After the authority had its hat handed to it by a court, it ended up paying out $10.5 million to the long-time Airmall operator to make it go away.
That cluster cluck of mismanagement should not be lost on the airlines that pay much of PIT’s operational fare. That it was lost on the Airport Authority board only affirms the need for a thorough housecleaning — but one that likely never will come.
Now, let’s go around the horn for some brief other troubling notes on the state of things:
The Post-Gazette reports that Pittsburgh officials failed to heed repeated warnings about the decay that led to the 2022 collapse of the Fern Hollow Bridge.
“Inspectors described a cascade of problems that compounded over more than a decade,” the P-G says.
How many iterations of lousy government must Pittsburgh continue to suffer? Being asleep at the proverbial switch isn’t “governance,” it’s dereliction of duty.
Some downtown Pittsburgh developers involved in converting high-rise office space into residential living are lamenting that, as the P-G reports, “Strings attached to [a] $35 billion White House program to fund office conversions make it ‘unworkable.’”
The hoops to jump through are too myriad and too high, critics wail. And the time it takes to jump through them takes too long, they add.
Now, we are tempted to say, “Pardon us, but beggars can’t be choosers.”
But that implies a tacit approval of raiding the taxpayer kitty to subsidize the cost of such conversions – conversions whose costs should be born exclusively by developers risking their own money in pursuit of profit.
The Tribune-Review reports that “the union representing 5,000 state university faculty across Pennsylvania has reached [a contract] ‘agreement in principle’ with leaders of the State System of Higher Education.”
A prior contract expired on June 30.
The Trib further reports that the “four-year deal, if ratified by rank-and-file APSCUF members and by the State System board of governors, would mean a prolonged period of labor peace at a pivotal time for the 10 state-owned universities with about 85,000 students, among them those attending PennWest University, Slippery Rock University and Indiana University of Pennsylvania in Western Pennsylvania.”
But, added both parties in a joint statement:
“Details will not be released to the public until the process of ratification and approval is complete.”
Sorry, but that’s not acceptable. The public that will be paying for this “prolonged period of labor peace” has every right to review, and comment upon, the new contract’s detail before it is signed, sealed and delivered.
And, do remember, buying “labor peace” is akin to taxpayers bending over to be spanked and expected to say, “Thank you, organized labor, may I have another?!”
Colin McNickle is communications and marketing director at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy (cmcnickle@alleghenyinstitute.org).
