Pittsburgh City Council should be involved in the plan to lease city parking garages, Councilman Patrick Dowd said, in the first official critique of the process Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is using to try to raise money for the city's troubled pension fund.

Mr. Dowd, a potential mayoral challenger, said the Parking Authority board, which voted Thursday to start the process, should include a council member. The city's charter requires a member on each authority board.

"This is hundreds of millions of dollars at question here," Mr. Dowd said Friday, after sending a critical letter to Mr. Ravenstahl. "You can't make that decision without collaboration, consensus, and without a duly constituted board with clear membership."

A Parking Authority board seat "was offered to Patrick Dowd some time ago, and he turned it down," said Parking Authority Executive Director David Onorato. "I don't think there's merit" to Mr. Dowd's concern that decisions of the current board could be challenged in court.

Mr. Ravenstahl nominated Mr. Dowd to the board April 3, to replace Dan Deasy, formerly a council member and now a state representative. At the time, though, Mr. Dowd was part of a legal challenge to a Lamar Advertising billboard on the Grant Street Transportation Center, which is owned by the authority. Mr. Dowd asked that the mayor hold the seat open "until such time as the appeal is resolved."

He and Lamar reached an agreement on April 17 requiring a public process for the billboard.

But the board nomination was never resubmitted. Instead, Mr. Dowd was placed on the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority board, and no council member was put on the parking panel, leaving it a member short.

"We need to have properly constituted boards for [authorities], and council has to be represented on them," Mr. Dowd said.

The board voted Thursday to seek a consultant to evaluate the garages and guide it toward a leasing process, with proceeds to go to the pension fund.

Mr. Dowd said the mayor's plan to lease the lots for an upfront payment in the hundreds of millions of dollars, can't be evaluated until two key questions are answered: "How much money does it generate, and at what expense to the people who park in the city of Pittsburgh?" he asked. He would oppose "a short-term infusion that forces businesses out of the city."