Behind those fancy doors

In the neighborhoods where I grew up, every guy wanted to meet a girl who lived in a house with a circular drive. You know the kind -- sometimes they are called Governors' drives -- where you enter at one curb-cut, sweep up past the big house and exit at another curb-cut several city lots away.

In our primitive analysis back on our street corner in the valley, the consumption of that much real estate for just one family meant that life must be sweet within those walls. It was certainly a world away from 25-foot building lots, shoulder-to-shoulder rowhouses and daily fights for parking spaces on the narrow front streets and alleys that are common to the old mill towns.

Applying our simple equation, real estate equaled wealth. We were strangers to the notion of debt and had not the slightest hint that many of the people who lived in those huge houses were harnessed to their mortgages like draught horses to the beer wagon. It was only as adults that we became familiar with the term "house poor."

ILLUSIONS AND DEBT

Especially when the economy falters, we begin to discover that many individuals and organizations never really own the property they claim; they merely own the debt. Governments, as we are learning the hard way in our region, are no exception.

For anyone who studies the travel magazines, Pittsburgh International Airport has been a source of great regional pride. Frequently touted as one of the best airports in the nation, the "new" airport has also provided some world-class shopping in the Air Mall. After 9/11, the shopping facilities began to falter, but that was a mere prelude to the financial collapse that looms in the future.

Back when the Allegheny County commissioners were looking for a way to build an airport that would give us bragging rights, what then was known as USAir emerged to form a match made in heaven. In a pretty cozy deal, USAir signed some very expensive leases in exchange for certain dominance in our region, and the new and improved Greater Pitt was born.

We now know that those arrangements are only as good as the word and performance of those who cut the deal. Allegheny County Executive Jim Roddey recently expressed surprise that the county had been betrayed as what's now known as US Airways exited bankruptcy and canceled its valuable airport leases. The only thing that was surprising was that the county executive -- a businessman turned politician -- could still be surprised by a corporate doublecross.

SCOUNDRELS' TOOL

Unfortunately, US Airways executives have gone the way of many American corporations, donning the garb of scoundrels and using bankruptcy as just another management tool. While seeking concessions from its own employees and county government, they were making promises they knew they could not keep. It looks like Allegheny County should have resisted the US Airways bankruptcy every inch of the way, since all of this appears to be designed so that the corporation could live to fleece us another day.

Then there are the stadiums -- a new one for baseball and a new one for football. There may even be a new one for hockey in the offing. To the extent that stadium debt reduction depends on the continued growth of the Regional Asset District Tax, even that revenue is beginning to dissappoint. I know that there are leases and personal commitments that are designed to protect our public pocketbooks, but there are also loopholes and outside forces and legal filings that can put our children and grandchildren in the public debt soup for life.

And consider all the upscale property the City of Pittsburgh owns -- places that still carry names like Frick, Schenley and Mellon. Just maintaining appearances in our public parks has required that we run as fast as we can. Add government buildings and public streets to the city's budgetary responsibilities and it is clear that we have been "house poor" for some time.

CITY OVERSIGHT

When Philadelphia found itself at debt's door a few years back, the state Legislature responded with the formation of the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority. This authority was given sweeping fiscal powers to get Philadelphia back on track. And at least it was designed look like a bipartisan panel, since the body had two Democrat appointees, two Republican appointees and a fifth tie-breaking member appointed by the governor.

Then, the governor was a Republican and the Republican-controlled Legislature was happy with the political composition of this Philadelphia oversight board. When a similar device is created to save Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, it would only be "business as usual" if the governor does not get to appoint the tie-breaking member.

This time, the governor is a Democrat, and the Republican-controlled Legislature will surely try to find a way to keep that controlling vote within the Republican Party. At least in the political arena, that appears to be a pretty standard pound of flesh for getting us out of this mess. And if that is the way it happens, no one should be surprised.

They sure looked nice from the curb -- those big houses with the circular drives. But we never realized how tough things might have been behind those fancy front doors.