G-20 Crackdown on Possible Dissent in Pittsburgh Begins: A First Person Account

[Kevin McCloskey]

My son Daniel McCloskey loves Pittsburgh. After graduating from the University of Pittsburgh last year with a degree in writing, he decided he wanted to make that city his home. He bought a fixer-upper in the Upper Lawrenceville neighborhood and with his friends built a writer's collective he calls Cyberpunk Apocalypse. They have poetry readings, a free library, and open house hours to drop in and talk about writing.

Daniel just called to tell me the Pittsburgh police raided his home last night, as a warm-up for the G-20 summit. Daniel wrote something on the blog that leads me to believe the police are flexing their muscles. If you are a writer, or artist living in Pittsburgh (or even look like one) I wish you luck in the days ahead.

I looked out my open window, to see a fleet of police vehicles that went off in both directions farther than my view would allow. "Sara, there are like a hundred cops outside." A flashlight beam hit my face and someone loudly pronounced, "There's someone in the attic."

There was rapping on the door before I picked up my shirt. I heard the police open my side gate and walk into my back yard, as I rushed to the second floor, and by the time I was halfway down the living room steps one of the writers-in-residence was talking through the back door with her boyfriend as the officers scanned our compost and ripe squash with one hand on their hips. "The owner of the house lives here," she said.

If you have a moment, you can read his full account here....

[Kevin McCloskey]

Largely true, Art, but Pittsburgh is complex. It has many fewer blue collar jobs.
Pittsburgh's largest, fastest growing employers are universities, Pitt, Carnegie Mellon, Duquesne, and research hospitals and museums. These entities surely improve the quality of life, but most are tax-exempt, especially as far as real estate tax goes. The solid housing stock vacated by the blue collar workers is cheap, my son paid 40,000 last year for two small houses on one lot in move-in condition. So at this point some brave souls are willing to work at urban reinvention. But you are absolutely right, there are no jobs with decent wages.
So many towns in the East, especially in Pennsylvania are pinning their hopes on the artists reclaiming houses and riverfront development. It isn't going to be an easy process, especially if the new homeowners feel terrorized by their local government. I saw a sign held by a protester, "US out of Pittsburgh!" God bless them , they haven't lost their sense of humor.

[Art Hazelwood]

Thanks for the post. I've heard that Pittsburgh lost half its population in recent years to de-industrialization and now is being held up as an example of Green economy. Is that the future for all of us, scatter the workers to the four winds and then claim we have a green economy?