They had their bite at the apple. Now, it’s time for Pittsburgh and Allegheny County to release their bid for Amazon’s second headquarters. Continued secrecy is an affront to taxpayers and detracts from the buzz that should be building here because of Pittsburgh’s strong chances of landing Amazon’s HQ2.
Last fall, 238 cities, counties and metropolitan areas submitted bids for HQ2, a multibillion-dollar investment that will involve the creation of a huge campus and the creation of as many as 50,000 jobs over a period of years. On Jan. 18, Pittsburgh learned that it’s one of 20 finalists for the investment, a remarkable milestone for a city that only 35 years ago seemed mired in post-steel doldrums.
Mayor Bill Peduto and county Executive Rich Fitzgerald should be building support for Amazon’s possible investment here — the project would bring housing pressure and traffic congestion among other problems — but instead they’re doing their best to shut the public out. They’ve refused repeated requests to turn over the bid, arguing that revealing details of their pitch would give other bidders an edge, and that they are under nondisclosure agreements with private property owners and developers. That’s not a compelling argument, and now even the state Office of Open Records has said so.
After the city and county declined to turn over the bid, various news organizations appealed to the Office of Open Records. On Wednesday, the office ruled the document a public record. In ordering it released, the office rejected the tortured arguments that the city and county law departments contrived to support their bosses’ desire for secrecy.
At that point, Mr. Fitzgerald and Mr. Peduto should have acknowledged their loss and turned the document over. Instead, they’re having their law departments review the order with the eye of appealing it to Common Pleas Court.
The city and county have 30 days to decide on an appeal, and odds are they’ll use every last one of them. That’s a common tactic that municipal governments use to drag out open-records requests and pervert a state law that is supposed to enhance public access to records.
PGHQ2, the arm of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development that’s coordinating the Pittsburgh bid process, issued a statement supporting continued secrecy for now. But it insisted that “no action will be taken on any proposed public investment in this opportunity without a full, open, public and transparent process.”
Wow, that’s big of them. The pledge falls flat, however, given the city and county to this point have showed zero interest in transparency. But if the statement is true, the city and county must be prepared to walk back any incentives the public may oppose. That should make for some interesting conversations with Amazon.
In its statement, PGHQ2 said Amazon isn’t getting special treatment. But the city and county are going to unusual and inappropriate lengths to keep their bid secret. If they go to court to continue keeping it under wraps, they’ll be throwing additional taxpayer resources down the drain.
First Published: January 28, 2018, 5:00 a.m.
