Housing advocates urged Allegheny County Council to sustain and expand rental-assistance funding during public comment, while one speaker used the opportunity to criticize the overall budget process and county governance.

Abby Ray Lacombe, executive director of Rent Help Pittsburgh, told council that the $900,000 amendment introduced by the council had strong support and that the money will help keep households housed. "That $900,000 amendment ... has received really great support from all of you," she said, adding that the program has kept hundreds of households in place and that more than half of people in those households are children.

Maddie McGrady, co‑chair of the Housing Justice Table and a Highland Park resident, thanked council for increasing rental-assistance allocations and offered district-level totals she said reflected millions in payments between 2021 and 2024 to keep families housed (examples cited by the speaker included District 1 payments totaling $5,879,000 and District 4 payments of more than $10,500,000).

Opposing view: Benjamin Chazar used his public-comment time to oppose the proposed budget and to call for structural changes including property re-assessment, millage-rate cuts and consolidation of some authorities; those claims were not substantively addressed during the meeting.

What comes next: Council adopted the operating budget and related amendments during the meeting; advocates said those actions will fund rental-assistance efforts that have prevented evictions but reiterated the need for transparency and continued investment.