Pittsburgh nixes plan for youth curfew enforcement, focuses on creating youth resource centers

Pittsburgh City Council on Tuesday unanimously voted down a proposal to ramp up enforcement of the city’s curfew, as officials are focusing instead on launching resource centers catered to youth and their families.

City Council President Theresa Kail-Smith, D-West End, earlier this month introduced a measure that would order officials to ramp up enforcement of a curfew for minors that is technically in place in the city, but hasn’t been enforced because there is nowhere for police to take juveniles who violate it.

Kail-Smith — along with her council colleagues and Mayor Ed Gainey — last week discussed nixing the curfew idea and instead focusing on the second portion of her proposal, which was to open 24-hour resource centers throughout the city to give Pittsburgh’s youth safe places to go.

Gainey had said he opposed the idea of enforcing a curfew because of concerns it would harm police-community relations and be difficult to enforce because Pennsylvania does not require people to carry an ID in public.

In what appeared to be a compromise between the mayor and council president, Gainey and Kail-Smith will form a committee of five people appointed by Kail-Smith and four by Gainey who will be tasked with studying and making recommendations on city-owned facilities in areas most impacted by violence.

Councilman Bruce Kraus, D-South Side, acknowledged discussions of a potential curfew have been “controversial and difficult” but said he was pleased to see the compromise amid an increase in violence throughout the city.

“We all share that goal — that we want to see less violence in our city,” Kail-Smith said.

Kail-Smith said officials now need to focus on how to get minors — and particularly youth who may be most at risk of becoming involved in the violence — to voluntarily go to the resource centers when there is no curfew enforcement.

The council president said she wants to ensure that city officials are looking for immediate remedies to increasing violence, while also focusing on longer-term solutions. She has pushed for opening resource centers in all parts of the city by the time students go on summer break this year.

“Sometimes we need an intervention for the moment,” she said. “There are children dying.”

The goal, Kail-Smith said, is to involve the public and youth in conversations about how to solve these issues. She said she also would like to see a partnership that involves county, school district and state officials.

Councilman Ricky Burgess, D-North Point Breeze, said he would continue to advocate for systemic changes to improve the lives of Pittsburgh’s young people. He highlighted how the pandemic caused students to lose a year or more of in-class educational time, and pointed out that many students at Pittsburgh Public Schools are behind academically as a result.

He called for a coordinated effort to provide better education and opportunities for the city’s youth.

“Until we get serious about making sure every kid in this city can read and write, what do we think they’re going to do?” Burgess said.