City Controller Rachael Heisler

We have some visitors in the building for Take Your Kids to Work day! Great to have so many kids here learning about City government and the important work their parents do every day.

The key takeaway from the 2025 ACFR is that the City is spending more than it brings in, but there are some bright spots. Earned income tax and deed transfer tax revenue is up, real estate taxes have started to even out, and our pension is very well-funded. If we control spending and focus on growth, we can put the City back on the right track and continue to deliver high-quality services to all of our residents.

Last night I spoke with residents in the South Side Slopes and Allegheny West about the state of City finances and our recently released 2025 Annual Comprehensive Financial Report. Thank you all for having me!

This weekend I went to the annual event to support Pittsburgh Action Against R**e (PAAR), an organization that does critical work to serve victims of sexual assault. We need to ensure that PAAR and other r**e crisis centers around PA get the full funding they need to do this lifesaving work.

This Spring, an incredible group of Carnegie Mellon University students from a Management Consulting class worked with our office to optimize our engineering and inspection division’s workflow, including no-cost solutions that speed up field inspections and review of invoices. This was a great example of students taking an interest in public service and using their talent and expertise to help make government work better. Thank you so much to Teo, Sabrina, Yilin and Edgardo, and to Jordan Pallitto and Dr. Chris Brussalis for helping to arrange this partnership!

There are few people who have done more for the City of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh than Mark Nordenberg. He is a legend, and I am thankful to call him a friend. Join me in wishing him a long and happy retirement.

The elephant in the room: federal ARPA funding. Without ARPA money, the City would've had a deficit in 2023 and 2024. In 2025, we no longer had ARPA money, and we had a deficit.

ARPA helped save our city. But it also masked the fact that we are spending more than we earn.

Bottom line upfront: In 2025, the General Fund collected $687.5 million, and spent $732.2 million.

That's a net deficit of $44.7 million.

We need to be disciplined about spending, and we need to maximize revenue. We need to secure lasting contributions from our largest employers and property owners.

And in the longer term, we need to grow.