South Side Slams NID Tax

South Side Property Owners

NoNIDTax.com

SouthSideOwners@NoNIDTax.com

    The people of Pittsburgh's South Side have decisively defeated City Councilman Robert Charland's proposed NID Tax, leaving Susan Anderson's South Side future uncertain.  Anderson was slated to manage the planned NID Tax District.  Charland approved a $6 million boondoggle for "land use policy development" in February 2025 and voted to raise property taxes twenty percent across the City last December, but ran into a stone wall with the South Side NID Tax, furtively billed as a "Neighborhood Improvement District" or "NID".

     Proof of the defeat went live October 8 at NoNIDTax.com.

     "We're fed up with the out-of-control spending and dumb ideas in Pittsburgh City government," said South Side entrepreneur Richie Cupka, long-time owner of Cupka's Cafe 2 on East Carson Street.  "Enough is enough!  When you have teens pulling guns at high school football games, flower baskets and marketing will not solve the problem, which is precisely what the NID proposed to do," Cupka continued.

     The failed NID Tax earmarked nearly $360,000 for administrative staff, branding & image development and marketing.  Nothing in the plan addressed crime, which is the root cause of South Side's ails.  Charland's proposed Tax District encompassed 393 properties according to his "Updated Property List" released in July 2026.  There were a few oddities in the highly gerrymandered list.

     One property owner who favored the NID Tax saw their frontage, which was the basis of the tax, plunge from 124 feet to just 24, a reduction of over eighty percent, with a commensurate drop in tax.  A bar owner who supported the NID Tax found his property vanish from the "updated" list while two other outspoken NID Tax advocates did not make the list despite being surrounded by properties on the list.  Curious.

     State law requires forty percent of property owners to voice their opposition to the City Clerk in order to kill the NID tax.  Unbelievably, property owners unaware of the proposed NID tax and those who remain silent are counted to be in favor of the tax.  Charland purported to have survey results of ninety-four percent approving the NID Tax, but offered no evidence.  He also paraded no less than fifteen individuals singing NID Tax praise at public hearings earlier this year.  The only problem is the fifteen so-called supporters were not even subject to the NID tax. 

"It's akin to volunteering your neighbor's son or daughter to war while yours stay at home," according to one furious property owner choosing to remain anonymous.  "The dude [Charland] is absolutely clueless."

     The tally stood at 172 against the tax as of October 8, or nearly forty-four percent, more than enough to kill the NID tax.  A complete list of property owners opposed to the tax with signatures, tax parcel numbers and addresses is available for download at NoNIDTax.com.

     Messages for Councilman Charland can be left at 412-255-2130 or Bob.Charland@PittsburghPA.gov.

###