The race for Pittsburgh City Council District Six is heating up.
Voters will head to the polls in just over a month.
Right now, two challengers are looking to unseat incumbent Daniel Lavelle.
The race for City Council District 6 is quickly heating up.
This spring, City Council President Dan Lavelle ran unopposed.
It now appears that the incumbent will have two challengers, Republican Jacob Dumont and write-in opponent Lisa Freeman
“I am running for re-election because I believe District 6 is heading in the right direction,” Lavelle said.
Lavelle will face two challengers in the general election.
Write-in Lisa Freeman and Republican challenger Jacob Dumont.
“We can’t afford another 4 years of this,” said Freeman.
“Tired of seeing the same old same old,” said Dumont.
Freeman is a lifelong Pittsburgher and Manchester resident and doesn’t believe Lavelle has done enough to prevent developers from buying up Black and brown communities.
“District 6 is not up for sale to the highest bidder, District 6 will not be displaced, our communities will not be displaced by corporate greed, back door deals, developers who see our communities as profit margins,” Freeman said.
Lavelle disagrees and told us his biggest accomplishment since being elected in 2010 is his track record on affordable housing and the creation of the Housing Opportunity Fund.
“Right now, we are currently developing what is going to be 1000 new units of affordable housing here in the Hill District through the Neighborhood Choice Program,” Lavelle said.
Dumont would like to address the city’s aging infrastructure
“We are not seeing progress in the neighborhoods; we are seeing a lot of failing infrastructure,” Dumont said.
A Republican has not been elected to the city council since the 1930s, something Dumont says should change.
Write-in challenger Freeman said her top priority would be addressing food insecurity and homelessness.
“We are going to seek equity and justice and bring working-class people and livelihood and business and salaries back to our community,” Freeman said.
Lavelle plans to continue to grow affordability while attracting new residents to the district, which includes Perry Hilltop, the Hill District, Marshall-Shadeland, Uptown, Manchester, California-Kirkbride and parts of Downtown and the North Shore
“Part of growing our population, I believe, means investing in black and brown communities and that has to become critical for us,’ Lavelle said.
The election is Nov. 4.
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