May 2025 Primary - Endorsements
The housing shortage is a critical issue currently facing the citizens of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, and Pennsylvania. We believe the solution to this crisis involves providing abundant and affordable housing for all. We fight for more housing because we want to reduce poverty, end homelessness, eliminate racial segregation, create jobs, and stop climate change, and we believe elected officials at every level play an important role in solving this crisis.
We have endorsed candidates after evaluating their history in office, their responses to our Questionnaire, and their responses from our Candidate Forum.
All responses are published here, and informed our official endorsements. Additionally, some of the candidates attended our Candidate Forum, and you can view the entire video here.
All Pro-Housing Pittsburgh Endorsements
Corey O’Connor, Mayor of Pittsburgh
Pro-Housing Pittsburgh endorses Corey O’Connor for Mayor of Pittsburgh. O’Connor has shown that he is in favor of the type of housing policies that we need to make and keep Pittsburgh an affordable place to live. Among those, he has expressed his commitment to updating our outdated zoning code and welcoming new homes and new neighbors. Additionally, he has discussed the importance of speeding up and streamlining permitting to ensure new projects get built quickly - this is a problem that can impact both affordable and market rate homes.
O’Connor has expressed his support for common sense zoning reforms such as reducing Minimum Lot Sizes, reforming Parking Minimums, allowing ADUs, and creating Transit-Oriented Development. Additionally, O’Connor has expressed skepticism for home-killing policies like Inclusionary Zoning citywide, which has been shown to harm housing production and raise prices.
Pittsburgh needs a leader like O’Connor to help create broad-based housing affordability for Pittsburghers.
Kim Salinetro - City Council, District 2
As the only person currently running for City Council who is not already a member of City Council, we based our decision on three factors, including Kim's responses to our questionnaire, her discussion at our Candidate Forum, and a private meeting we held with the candidate.
From these discussions, we believe that Kim will support common sense pro-housing reforms. Among those, Kim has expressed her support for the elimination of parking minimums, noting that parking should be built for market needs. Additionally, she expressed her support for Ordinance 1579, which would reduce minimum lot sizes throughout the city.
Additionally Kim expressed her concern with mandatory inclusionary zoning citywide, noting that the policy likely will not work in certain neighborhoods.
Kim finished her time at our candidate forum by talking about something that we greatly agree with - that we "must create housing at every level" - ultimately, the housing shortage won't be solved by making it harder to build one type of housing or another, but rather by making it easier to build ALL housing.
Anthony Coghill, City Council - District 4
Pro-Housing Pittsburgh endorses Anthony Coghill for City Council, District 4. Throughout our time getting to know Councilman Coghill, he has shown himself to be eager to find solutions to many of the problems plaguing Pittsburgh. Councilman Coghill voted in favor of Ordinance 59, which legalized attached homes citywide. He is an opponent of citywide Mandatory Inclusionary Zoning, which is a policy that has been shown to increase costs and decrease affordability.
Councilman Coghill was one of the co-sponsors of the Tiny Homes legislation, which was an idea to help provide more housing options for unhoused Pittsburghers.
Additionally, he recently voted in favor of Ordinance 1579, which reduces Minimum Lot Sizes across our city.
Ultimately, Councilman Coghill recognizes that housing in Pittsburgh requires an “all of the above” approach, and has been a reliable advocate for housing in our city.
Erika Strassburger - City Council, District 8
Pro-Housing Pittsburgh endorses Councilperson Erika Strassburger for City Council, District 8. Councilperson Strassburger is a respected leader on City Council, and has been a leading voice for housing affordability and abundance in her time as a City Councilor.
Along with voting for housing reform such as Ordinance 59 (attached homes) and Ordinance 1579 (reducing Minimum Lot Size requirements), Councilperson Strassburger’s office was also the drafter of legislation to reduce Parking Requirements across the city. She is the definition of a pro-housing legislator, and is a leader on council on many of these issues.
Councilperson Strassburger has also expressed the need for careful thought and nuance on challenging issues such as Inclusionary Zoning, fully understanding that a program that’s implemented without careful thought could lead to a decrease in housing production, and increased costs for residents.
Councilperson Strassburger is a trusted leader on council and will help lead Pittsburgh to a future of more affordable housing.