The city's fiscal oversight board could recommend refinancing debt and selling off assets to help fill the cash shortfall facing Pittsburgh later this year.

James Smith III, chairman of the five-member Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority and a bond underwriter, said yesterday that he has been studying the city's staggering debt load and has determined that some of it could be refinanced, saving some money in the short term.

Smith said the savings would be rather small compared to the city's estimated $40 million cash problem looming this fall, but should be considered anyway.

"It is small relief, but a viable opportunity exists," said Smith, who works for Merrill Lynch. "It doesn't solve the problem, it doesn't even make a dent, but it needs to be looked at."

Smith, who noted that he and his firm would be prohibited from working on a refinancing by conflict-of-interest language in the state oversight board legislation, said he would deliver a city debt report at the board's weekly meeting this afternoon.

Board member Jim Roddey is working on separate studies of assets owned by the city and its affiliated agencies, such as the Urban Redevelopment Authority.

Republicans in Harrisburg, who appointed Roddey, Allegheny County's former chief executive, to the board, have long argued that the city could erase some of its short-term budget problems by selling off assets, including loans issued by the URA; land owned by the Stadium Authority; and the city water system.

There may also be discussion at the board meeting today of a City Council resolution calling on city authorities to halt pay increases issued this year and funnel the savings into reopening city swimming pools. While Mayor Tom Murphy returned the bill without his signature, allowing it to become law, it is nonbinding and the agencies do not have to accept it.

Council's budget director, Scott Kunka, is due to issue his own cash-flow report today to the oversight board, while Murphy's budget office and the city controller's office may issue their reports next week, Smith said.

The board also wants reports on long-term deficits facing the city in coming years, Smith said.

The city's state-appointed, Act 47 economic recovery team -- Downtown law firm Eckert Seamans and Public Financial Management of Philadelphia -- has said the city faces a $40 million shortfall this year and is due to run out of cash in August or September.

Act 47 team member Jim Roberts, an Eckert Seamans lawyer, said the recovery team will soon issue its own report on the city's long-term deficits and general obligation debt load to the oversight board. It has lately been studying city-county service consolidation plans and the city's labor agreements, he said.

On a parallel track, the oversight board is under a state requirement to issue preliminary budget-saving solutions to the Legislature by April 12, which will likely include debt refinancing, asset sales, spending cuts and other short-term ideas.