Free Republic

Authorities in Pittsburgh closed McKees Rocks Bridge as a precaution after several barges broke loose on the Ohio River late Friday. There is a risk that the barges could come into contact with the “substructure” of the bridge, the McKees Rocks Police Department said in a statement early Saturday confirming the closure. The department said it closed the bridge because it was “not willing to take the risk.” The bridge opened in 1931 and stretches more than 1 mile across the Ohio River. As part of the Blue Belt, the innermost of several roads that loop around Pittsburgh, the bridge...

PITTSBURGH — An employee at a Sunoco gas station is facing charges after an altercation inside the store Monday night. Pittsburgh police were called to the 100 block of North Craig Street for reports of a fight. The fight started when a man threw a banana at employees and they threw it back. Court documents say several bananas were thrown back and forth between the man and the employees. The man punched one of the employees in the face. One of the employees, Yubaraj Budhathoki, allegedly chased the man into the parking lot and hit him in the head repeatedly...

The Meltdown of Commercial Real EstateIn case you’ve still got money in a bank, Bloomberg is warning that defaults in commercial real estate loans could “topple” hundreds of US banks.Leaving taxpayers on the hook for trillions in losses.The note, by Senior Editor James Crombie, walks us through the festering hellscape that is commercial real estate.To set the mood, a new study predicts that nearly half of downtown Pittsburgh office space could be vacant in 4 years. Major cities like San Francisco are already sporting zombie-apocalypse downtowns, with abandoned office buildings baking in the sun.So what happened? The Fed’s yo-yo interest...

JOHNSTOWN — Joe Burkhart is busy working at his job as a maintenance manager at a processor here in Cambria County. Like many people who have spent their career working with their hands, he knows that unexpected layoffs and companies who have been around for decades suddenly shuttering their doors is part of today’s technological revolution.Like many people around here born in the 1960’s, Burkhart says he was born and raised a Democrat. “Everyone in my family was a Democrat, its just what you did,” he said, adding when he first started looking for work as an adult being a...

The NAACP is calling on the Department of Justice to investigate the death of Jim Rogers, a 54-year-old Black man who died in an October 2021 incident with a Pittsburgh police officer. Rogers died the day after police officer Keith Edmonds repeatedly shocked him with a taser. “Jim Rogers deserved better, and Black America deserves better,” Janette McCarthy Wallace, general counsel of the NAACP, said in a statement. “But the sad reality is, our communities continue to endure pain and suffering at the hands of those tasked with serving and protecting us. We have seen the photographs, watched the videos,...

The CRE implosion is picking up steam. Check out the grim stats on Pittsburgh.Unions are also a problem in Pittsburgh as they are in Illinois and California.Downtown Pittsburgh ImplosionThe Post Gazette reports nearly half of Downtown Pittsburgh office space could be empty in 4 years.Confidential real estate information obtained by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette estimates that 17 buildings are in “significant distress” and another nine are in “pending distress,” meaning they are either approaching foreclosure or at risk of foreclosure. Those properties represent 63% of the Downtown office stock and account for $30.5 million in real estate taxes, according to the...

Pittsburgh’s Bureau of Police is responding to staffing shortages by foregoing any officer presence in dispatch offices 3 a.m. to 7 a.m. daily. The Daily Mail reported that the cut was announced last month by Pittsburgh police chief Larry Scirotto, who noted, “Data said that from 3 a.m. to 7 a.m that we had 8% of our call volume, yet we had 33% of our personnel working during those periods of time.” Scirotto’s decision comes as the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police has dwindled to just 740 officers. In late February, Breitbart News pointed out Scirotto also made clear officers would...

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Andy Russell, the standout linebacker who was an integral part of the Pittsburgh Steelers' evolution from perennial losers to champions, has died. He was 82. The team confirmed Russell's death on Saturday. There was no immediate word on the cause or place of death

PITTSBURGH — Starting Monday, the city of Pittsburgh says it will no longer respond to 911 calls that are not related to "in progress emergencies."According to a press release titled "Pittsburgh Bureau of Police Makes Operational Changes to Better Serve Pittsburgh," the city will create a "Telephone Reporting Unit" (TRU) to dispatch calls that do not require an in-person response by officers."TRU will NOT be assigned to any 'In Progress' call where a suspect may be on scene, any crime where a person may need medical aid, any domestic dispute, calls with evidence, or where the Mobile Crime Unit will...

Beginning Monday, Pittsburgh police won’t respond to any calls that aren’t in progress emergencies. Chief Larry Scirotto wants to cut their call volume from approximately 200,000 calls per year down to about 50,000. That essentially means that calls for criminal mischief, theft, harassment and burglary alarms, just to name a few, will all be handled by the telephone reporting unit or online reporting.

Congressional candidate Bhavini Patel’s campaign said a planned Feb. 7 appearance at the University of Pittsburgh was called off the night before because of concerns about “disruption." Patel, who is a Pitt alumna, had been slated to speak Wednesday evening as part of an alumni speaker series hosted by Pitt's Frederick Honors College. But she said in social media postings that Pitt had “canceled my speaking engagement citing concerns of disruption and my safety." The university has asked Patel to reschedule the event for later in the year. But she said Wednesday night that, "It saddens me that I couldn’t...

A Pittsburgh Public Schools student is facing criminal charges after police say he assaulted at least four teachers or staff members at his school. Qvawn Rembert-Leonard, 18, was charged Tuesday with four felony counts of aggravated assault after allegedly going on a violent rampage against the staff inside his school, Oliver Citywide Academy Satellite at Greenway in Crafton Heights. According to the criminal complaint, Rembert-Leonard was talking on the phone in school about cocaine and fentanyl on Jan. 30. When a female staff member asked him to stop, the complaint states, “He turned in rage, grabbed and threw [her] across...

Pittsburgh Allegheny County dispatchers say police and medics were called to the Worship and Community Service Center on Broadhead Fording Road at 6:15 p.m. on Saturday. Pittsburgh police say the call to dispatchers reported 6 to 7 gunshots inside the building where the baby shower was taking place. Authorities say the shooting happened in the men’s restroom of the building. One man was found dead inside and another was taken to a hospital in critical condition.

Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala has filed criminal charges against the owner of the abandoned Century III Mall. Century III Mall PA, LLC is facing one felony count of causing or risking a catastrophe and one misdemeanor for making a public nuisance. The company’s Las Vegas-based owner, Moonbeam Capital Investments, bought the property in 2013, but never fulfilled assurances that it would redevelop the site. “They clearly have no intention of doing anything with the property as it exists. They've abandoned [it], for all intents and purposes,” Zappala said at a press conference announcing the charges Tuesday. “This is...

PITTSBURGH — Despite concerns raised by the city of Pittsburgh solicitor and the city council president after a series of 11 Investigates reports into the Jim Rogers tasing incident, the city controller has made the first payment to the family of Jim Rogers to settle the wrongful death lawsuit. Just several weeks ago, both the city solicitor and the council president vowed to delay the payment after 11 Investigates raised more questions about the settlement. Chief Investigator Rick Earle obtained a copy of the $4 million check the city sent to Rogers’ family. --snip-- Just last month Earle exclusively reported...

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — An Amazon delivery driver who allegedly had a gun pointed at her and was called racial slurs by an angry neighbor is speaking out after the terrifying ordeal. The driver, Linquita Schley, was delivering packages in Brentwood on Dec. 21 on Brownsville Road when the alleged incident happened. KDKA-TV obtained video of when Brian Dengler confronted Schley. "What was going through my mind? I got flashbacks of my stepson," she said. "I was getting flashbacks of my girlfriend, flashbacks of my mom. I was getting flashbacks of my life and how grateful I need to start being...

Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) vowed Monday to work to block the $14.9 billion sale of U.S. Steel Corp. to Japanese steelmaker Nippon Steel, which he described as an “outrageous” move. The deal was announced Monday, prompting the stock prices of U.S. Steel to jump up 25 percent. Fetterman criticized the sale, saying in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that the move was “wrong for workers and wrong for Pennsylvania.”

WASHINGTON — Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., is breaking with progressives on hot-button issues with his fiery support for Israel and calls for Democrats to engage on tougher immigration laws, disappointing some on the left as he shows an independent streak. He’s also continually scolding Democrats for not pushing Sen. Bob Menendez out of office after he was indicted on federal charges of taking bribes and acting as a foreign agent for Egypt, which the New Jersey Democrat denies. In the 2022 campaign, Fetterman's ties to Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., prompted GOP opponent Mehmet Oz to tell voters he’d be a...

Shocking surveillance video captures the moment a woman used a hammer to bash the front window of a Pittsburgh business that displayed a sign reading, “We stand with Israel.” The hateful vandal approached Marvista Design + Build on Beechwood Boulevard in the heavily Jewish-populated Squirrel Hill neighborhood about 3:50 a.m. Friday and repeatedly struck the window where the sign hung, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported. Unable to shatter the glass, the woman left but returned a few minutes later and continued to strike it before grabbing the sign and then smashing the windows of a company truck.

The Manhattan D.A. recently issued a criminal seizure warrant for ‘Girl With Black Hair’ in the possession of Oberlin College’s Allen Museum. Court records in a civil case reveal that the college has been fighting at least since 2006 against return of the drawing. This is in contrast to the college’s repatriation of an item of Native American craft returned to the Nez Perce tribe in 2002. Are items stolen from Jews during the Holocaust less worthy of return than items obtained from Native American tribes? ... Oberlin College was in the news recently after a drawing, Girl With Black...