McCormick rails on Democrats' economic record, criticizes Innamorato's proposed Allegheny County tax increase
Steve Bohnel / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Dave McCormick, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate facing longtime Democratic incumbent Bob Casey, criticized Mr. Casey’s and other Democrats’ economic policies, including County Executive Sara Innamorato’s recently proposed budgets and property tax increase, saying they were hurting working families and seniors on fixed incomes.
Mr. McCormick was in Shaler Friday afternoon at the home of Jo-Ann Zajackowski, 86, a retired banker and 60-year resident of Shaler. He was joined by Joe Rockey, the GOP’s candidate for county executive last year, and Charles Carey, Marshall’s tax collector.
During his remarks, Mr. McCormick said that Mr. Casey, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ economic policies were terrible for Pennsylvanians, including those operating on fixed incomes and working families living paycheck to paycheck.
He specifically took aim at Ms.Innamorato’s proposed budgets and property tax increase. The increase of 2.2 mills would raise the county millage rate from 4.73 to 6.93 mills and — on a house assessed at $110,400 — would amount to $182 more per year in taxes, accounting for the homestead exemption. It equates to roughly a 46.5% increase.
Mr. McCormick said now, during a period of high inflation, was not the time to be raising property taxes this high. When asked where he would cut from the county budget, he said that he didn’t have any specific areas. He added that there are areas in the federal government —- subsidies for electric buses, electric vehicle charging stations, and solar panels — where there has been too much spending. Also, he criticized student loan forgiveness, saying that policy in the Biden administration “is truly unfair and un-American, where all of us, everybody here, is paying taxes to offset the student loans.”
“As a business leader, as someone who's been a leader of organizations, you don't start with the answer being: let's raise taxes,” Mr. McCormick said. “That's not the starting point. The starting point is: let's sit back and look at all the services we offer, look at what's driven up expenses.”
Ms. Innamorato’s office declined to comment. Mr. Casey’s campaign could not immediately be reached for comment Friday.
Joe Rockey, who ran against Ms. Innamorato in the November 2023 election, said after the press conference that Ms. Innamorato and her predecessor, Democrat Rich Fitzgerald, could have done more to prepare for the structural deficit to prevent such a large tax increase proposal.
This issue of a potential tax increase is nothing new, Mr. Rockey said — it’s something he heard on the campaign trail, alongside a potential countywide property reassessment, which also would impact the county budget and homeowners across Allegheny County.
“We had a transition team that was going to go in, and understanding the dilemma we had in front of us — knowing that there was a structural deficit inherently coming — we had plans to go in and do the work,” Mr. Rockey said.
County Controller Corey O’Connor had stated in recent weeks that the county was facing a structural deficit of nearly $60 million, and is projected to grow to $80 million by the end of 2024. County budget officials estimate that number could grow to nearly $150 million in their proposed 2025 budgets.
Mr. Rockey said some of Ms. Innamorato’s decisions in office, like giving nonunion employees pay raises in her first days as county executive, are questionable.
“My point is, how do you not have a better plan?” Mr. Rockey said. “And by the way, the plan shouldn't start with, the very first thing I'm going to do my first day in office is raise everybody's salary.”
Mr. McCormick said that in the bigger picture, Pennsylvanians usually have a better sense of how to spend their money versus the government.
“The thing I learned in 25 years of business is the best thing you can do is have government have a small footprint and out of the way, let businesses prosper, [and[ let people spend their money,” he said. “The people are much more capable of spending their money than the government is.”
Ms. Zajackowski, the retired banker who hosted Friday’s news conference, agreed. As a retired banker, she questioned how Democrats plan their budgets.
“As someone who has worked her whole life in the banking industry and doing taxes, I can see how the seniors are trying desperately to live off of a simple fixed income, either their pensions or their Social Security,” she said. “We may get an increase in Social Security, but you can bet your bottom dollar that Medicare is going up. And it's not just me, it's everybody throughout the country. Seniors are having a hard time.”