Pittsburgh City Council voted to join a car-sharing plan today, but not before members spent more than an hour picking at Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's administration in a second day of sparring on the City-County Building floor shared by the administration and the city's nine legislators.

Council's tentative 5-3 vote, with one abstention, must be followed by a final vote Tuesday to join Flexcar, a system in which the city and other organizations would get access to cars on an as-needed basis for $8 an hour. Council's vote would allocate $10,000 to what the administration pitches as a pilot program that could lead to a reduction of the city-owned motor pool.

Council President Doug Shields grilled members of the city's Law Department and Finance Department over an opinion on the issue written last night that he called "about as clear as mud." The opinion found that the city could sign on to the Flexcar system without any competitive process, because the provision of vehicles, their maintenance, and a Web-based system for reserving cars qualifies as a no-bid "professional service."

Mr. Shields said the city is not "McDonald's" and therefore needs to follow proper, competitive procedures when buying services.

Other members, though, argued that joining Flexcar on a test basis was a good step toward eventually cutting the city's fleet.

The Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership is pushing Flexcar as a means of improving transportation in the Central Business District. "These are my constituents, and I believe that this is a program that we should try out," said Councilwoman Tonya Payne, who represents Downtown.

Voting to join Flexcar were Ms. Payne, Len Bodack, Darlene Harris, Dan Deasy and Jim Motznik. Voting no were Jeff Koch, William Peduto and Mr. Shields. Twanda Carlisle abstained.

Mr. Ravenstahl, meanwhile, wrote an e-mail to Mr. Shields this morning responding to the council president's criticism yesterday that the administration was making an end-run around the city's nine legislators in regard to contracts.

"Welcome Back, Mr. President!" the e-mail read, in an obvious reference to Mr. Shields' failed Democratic primary bid for city controller. " 'I wish to remind you' that despite the fact that maybe you haven't been here the past three months, we have. . . . In fact, your respective council members have individually, because of your seeming absence regarding legislative issues, come over to discuss things one on one with me."

"I sent the mayor a nice note back," said Mr. Shields. "I said thank you for the welcome back, but I've been here."

Council put on hold a bill to reduce the minimum holding time for unlicensed animals before they can be put up for adoption or euthanized. Ms. Harris said the administration wants to review its position on the issue.