It's hard for a cash-strapped city to say no to $215 million, but Harrisburg City Council did just that last month, when it nixed a plan to lease public parking garages to a private firm -- an arrangement like the one Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is mulling as he seeks cash for the city's pension fund.

Harrisburg council members didn't like the idea of trading away 75 years worth of parking revenue for a one-time shot of cash. It was "a gimmick," said Councilman Daniel Miller. "It was a terrible deal."

Not so, said Jackie Goodwin, a communications company owner who co-chaired a group called Debt Free Harrisburg that supported the lease plan. It was "absolutely too good of a deal for Harrisburg to turn its back on."

Last week, Mr. Ravenstahl cited Harrisburg's aborted parking lease effort, and Chicago's consummated leases, as he launched Pittsburgh's foray into garage privatization. His push faces its first test today with a vote of the Parking Authority board on whether to seek a consultant to explore leasing its 11 Downtown garages with 8,200 spaces, and maybe the 9,000 spaces in neighborhood lots and along streets, to a private firm.

In Harrisburg and Chicago, the complex deals have had ardent proponents and determined foes, in part because there's no consensus about whether leasing public property to profit-making enterprises is a good idea.

The leases are essentially very-long-term loans in which cities take cash now and pay it off by granting control of an asset for the better part of a century, said Woods Bowman, professor of public service management at DePaul University in Chicago, who has studied that city's deals.

Tread carefully, he advised. "You're going to have to live with your mistakes for a very long time."

Mr. Ravenstahl said last week that if a private firm would pay hundreds of millions of dollars for control of Pittsburgh's public garages, he'd pay off the Parking Authority's $108 million debt, and then put the balance into the city's pension fund, which was $638 million short of ideal levels at the end of November.

What's there to lose? Two things: Control over the cheapest parking in town, and the $1.3 million a year paid by the Parking Authority to the city's coffers.

Mr. Ravenstahl's administration has been talking with Dana Levenson, formerly Chicago's chief financial officer, and now a managing director at the Royal Bank of Scotland in charge of investing in infrastructure. Mr. Levenson and his firm declined comment yesterday.

Chicago pioneered the leasing of city assets with a 2005 deal that put its Skyway toll road into the hands of a private consortium in return for $1.83 billion. The city then leased out four parking garages for $563 million, Midway Airport for $2.5 billion, and its 36,000 metered parking spaces for $1.16 billion. All are 99-year leases, except for the 75-year lease on metered spaces.

"We do believe it has been good for Chicago," said Lise Valentine, vice president of the Civic Federation, a nonprofit government research organization. "The act of the privatization itself, we feel the city has done responsibly. What we take issue with is the city's use of some of the proceeds" for covering its budget deficits.

Ms. Valentine said Mr. Ravenstahl's plan to invest the proceeds in the pension fund sounded more responsible, as long as it's coupled with an effort to reduce future pension payouts.

Chicago Alderman Scott Waguespack was one of five votes, out of 50 aldermen, against the meter lease. "Our meter [rates] will be pretty high," he said. "We might be driving people away from businesses." Under Chicago's lease with Morgan Stanley -- which also leased the four garages -- meter rates in the Downtown Loop can go from $3 an hour now to $6.50 in 2013. In the neighborhoods, they can leap from 25 to 75 cents an hour now to $2 in 2013.

All-day garage rates in the four Chicago garages have risen by $4 to $6 since that 2006 lease. Those rates range from $13 in one garage to $24 in another.

The Harrisburg deal was pitched as a way to wipe out much of that city's debt, waive most 2008 property taxes, and add police and public works employees.

Negotiated between Mayor Stephen Reed, London-based RBC Capital Markets and New York developer Jacob Frydman, it took a hit when the union representing parking employees wouldn't waive a contract clause giving it veto power over privatization.

The union representing the Pittsburgh Parking Authority's 60-some lot workers doesn't have a similar veto, but has been promised "a seat at the table," said Marc Dreves, recording secretary and business agent for Teamsters Local 926.

After the union's rejection, Harrisburg's plan "became ensnared in the ongoing political battles between certain members of Harrisburg City Council and its mayor, and never really stood a chance for a fair or reasonable hearing," said Randy King, a senior associate at Triad Strategies, a public relations firm hired by Mr. Frydman.

Harrisburg council members questioned the logic of leasing away, for 75 years, an asset that generated $4 million a year -- and could bring in more. Council, according to Mr. Miller, wanted an answer to a simple question: "What is some outside entity going to do to make more money that we can't do ourselves?"

There are two answers to that question, said Mr. Bowman. A private firm can raise rates without worrying about voter ire. And it can write off a portion of the value of a garage or other asset on its tax bills. The rate increase, and the tax write-off, are what the companies that bid on such leases are paying for, he said.

Mr. Ravenstahl said last week that he recognizes that a garage lease might mean rate increases, but added that he would "make sure that the public interest is still protected in this."

Other cities are weighing the same issues. Reading has been exploring a garage lease for months. No decision has been made.

"Are [private operators] going to increase fees?" asked Larry Lee, executive director of the Reading Parking Authority. "I think they would. Would they raise rates so much that nobody could afford to park there? I don't think so, because that'd be shooting themselves in the foot."