Council approves task force to study sustainable funding for Pittsburgh Land Bank

Councilman Wilson secured approval May 29 for Bill 18-54, a resolution creating a task force to develop recommendations for sustainable funding of the Pittsburgh Land Bank, with the council adopting the measure as amended.

The task force will convene a core group of city and land bank officials and return recommendations within 90 days aimed at informing the next city budget, Wilson said. "We wanna wrap this all up in 90 days so we can literally turn around and make recommendations," Wilson said during committee discussion.

The measure matters because Pittsburgh faces persistent vacant and blighted properties across neighborhoods, council members said. The task force is charged solely with examining funding options to continue land bank operations past 2026, not with rewriting the land bank's bylaws, Wilson said.

Sally Stadelman, acting director of the Pittsburgh Land Bank, told the committee the land bank cannot rely entirely on property sales to cover operating costs. "It will never be possible for the land bank to be 100% sustained by our sales," Stadelman said, explaining that many properties require subsidies or deep discounts to be rehabilitated and returned to the tax rolls. She described the land bank's role as both an affordable-housing pipeline and a mechanism to return long-vacant property to taxable use.

Council discussion addressed membership and scope. Wilson described an initial membership of nine that includes the land bank chair and treasurer, a land bank acting director, the finance and law committee chair, a mayoral designee, a designee from the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA), representatives from city planning, the budget director and an Office of Management and Budget designee. Wilson said the task force would invite additional stakeholders as needed.

Councilwoman Kale Smith expressed concerns about transparency and community engagement in property decisions. "I don't want foundations controlling our land, and I don't want certain developers just controlling our land," she said, asking that the land bank work closely with neighborhood groups and keep council members informed about properties in their districts.

Members and the land bank described current acquisition and disposition processes. Stadelman said the land bank has relied on the treasurer's-sale and sheriff's-sale pathways and on identifying nonprofit buyers, such as community development corporations, before processing properties. She said the land bank currently has about 150 properties in its pipeline and roughly 90 in its inventory, and that the organization typically charges buyer fees that cover some processing costs.

Committee members asked about typical processing and transaction costs. Stadelman said processing paperwork and related steps generally cost the land bank between about $2,500 and $5,000 per property, and she cited example fee levels of roughly $7,500 for lots and about $10,000 for purchases as current practice for some transactions; she also said the land bank aims to limit sales to experienced nonprofit partners as it scales up.

Wilson framed the task force as a short, focused effort to identify budget or other revenue options that could sustain the land bank beyond temporary pandemic-era funding. "We had a great moment in time when we had $10,000,000 in COVID relief money," Wilson said, noting that those funds were subsequently reduced. The task force will consider whether city budget allocations, new revenue sources, grants or other approaches would be appropriate.

The committee approved the bill as amended; the amended version sets the 90-day reporting requirement and lays out the initial membership. The measure now moves forward as an affirmative committee recommendation.

Council members said they expect to review the task force's recommendations and that further council and mayoral action would be required to implement any funding changes.