In a year when some governmental cooperation efforts hit snags, city and suburban leaders met quietly on Friday to explore another approach: a consortium of "core" communities that could cooperate to address infrastructure, public safety and transportation issues.

Called Connect -- for Congress of Neighboring Communities -- its immediate aim is to hold a spring "congress" on collaboration between Pittsburgh and its 35 neighbors. Representatives of two dozen of the suburbs, plus city Controller Michael Lamb and Councilman Patrick Dowd, met on Halloween at the Wyndham Pittsburgh University Place hotel to start the process.

"There are unique issues that are associated with that common border and with being part of the core," said David Y. Miller, director of the Innovation Clinic at the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and a former city budget director. "The idea ... is creating this dialogue where the city of Pittsburgh is a partner with the other communities in a way they haven't been in the past."

Governmental cooperation has long been a hot issue, but more since April, when Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato pledged to push for a referendum on merging their governments. The General Assembly, though, hasn't written the law that would enable the referendum.

In June, Mr. Ravenstahl gathered suburban leaders, seeking to expand on the 2006 deal under which city workers collect trash in Wilkinsburg, by sharing other services with neighbors. So far, though, there are no takers.

For the Friday meeting, city officials took a humble approach. "When it comes to intergovernmental cooperation, these guys in the suburbs have a lot more experience than we do," said Mr. Lamb.

Suburban communities do much of their purchasing through councils of government, or COGs, through which they pool their buying power. Some police jointly. And municipalities that share watersheds are working together under the umbrella of the 3 Rivers Wet Weather Demonstration Program to address federally mandated sewer fixes.

Mr. Miller, who spurred the meeting, offers the idea that the city and its neighbors -- from tiny Ingram in the west to big Penn Hills in the east -- may have areas of interest that differ from some of their farther-flung suburbs.

"What happens to the city of Pittsburgh is a lot more important to Mt. Lebanon than what happens in Upper St. Clair," he said. Public safety and traffic problems know no borders, and the core communities have more of a stake in services like Port Authority transit than do most of the county's other municipalities.

There are also big differences within a group that includes urban Homestead and leafy Kennedy. Mr. Miller sees that as a strength. "They are an extraordinarily diverse set of communities, not unlike the neighborhoods in the city of Pittsburgh."

The first meeting "was kind of like a constitutional convention," said Richard Dunlap, executive director of the Allegheny League of Municipalities. "It was getting people together to say, 'Do you think this is a good idea? Should we go with it?'"

"I was very excited about it," said Mary Ellen Ramage, Etna Borough manager. In recent years, when she's heard "regionalism" it has seemed to mean "getting rid of places like Etna."

Connect seems different. "I think we're finally looking at regionalism the right way. It's not getting rid of people. It's joining forces."

Some suburban leaders have mixed feelings about the concept.

"I certainly have reservations because we like to think that we're pretty well managed and run," said Shaler Manager Tim Rogers. Nonetheless, he volunteered to serve on a 15-member committee that will figure out where to take the effort. "We absolutely, collectively, constantly as governments need to look at what we can do more efficiently," he said.

Where might the city and its neighbors work together? "Trash collecting, animal control, grass cutting, [road] line striping," he offered. The big caveat? "You've got to keep the private sector in the mix," he said, because contracting out some functions can keep municipal health insurance and benefits costs in check.

City leaders emphasized that they don't want neighbors to compromise their independence.

"This is an organization that would work collectively, and would not bind municipalities," said Mr. Dowd. It wouldn't erase boundaries, but rather seek to exploit opportunities in ways none of the members could do alone.

The 36 core communities hold 690,000 people -- 56 percent of the county's population -- and host 91 percent of its jobs, Mr. Miller said. If they combined their political might, the city and its neighbors might have more heft in Harrisburg than any one of them can claim alone. They are represented by 17 state House members -- versus eight for the city alone -- and five state senators, versus three for the city.

"If we're looking at federal or state money for infrastructure investment, for water or transportation, let's leverage our common weight," said Mr. Dowd.

Creating leverage is also part of the argument for city-county consolidation, which, as currently conceived, wouldn't touch suburbs.

Mr. Miller said that Connect is neither dependent on, nor at odds with, that effort. "I think everybody would agree that regardless of what happens with city-county consolidation and other initiatives, this initiative needs to move forward."

Mr. Ravenstahl didn't attend the Friday meeting -- his son, Cooper, was born that day -- but sent a staff member.

"It was a very promising first meeting," said mayoral spokeswoman Joanna Doven. "We're all family. The municipalities that surround us are all family, too."