Laurel: To rebuilding. Rick and Beth Napoleon lost their home with the August 2023 explosion in Plum’s Rustic Ridge neighborhood. The blaze consumed three houses across the street from the Napoleons, but they were not the only ones with damage.

Many houses required extensive repair. The Napoleon home was beyond fixing. It had to be reconstructed. Not even the foundation could be saved. Only the driveway and one brick column holding the mailbox and the house’s address numbers will remain.

Builder Barry O’Block has a timeline to finish in early August, right before the anniversary of the tragedy that claimed the lives of six people.

Every nail, every board and every wire will be a testament to more than just the Napoleons’ decision to live in Plum. It will be a monument to a community getting back on its feet.

Lance: To reversing course. Two weeks ago, Pittsburgh City Council declined to pay a $1,200 credit card charge. The bill in question was for Mario Ashkar, a former city employee with the Department of Parks and Recreation. Since leaving his job with the city, he has done about $23,000 worth of contract work.

The problem with this is how it was done. The city’s purchasing cards are not meant to cover contract work. The questionable nature of that is being investigated by the city and separately by Pittsburgh Controller Rachael Heisler.

But the nature of banking boxed the council in and forced approval of the payment. Bank of America did not consider the charge fraudulent because it was made with the cardholder’s authorization, and the amount was accurate. The funds already had been released to his PayPal account before the controversy came up.

The bank’s policies notwithstanding, the issue points to the problem of oversight. If council is to approve how city money is spent, employees cannot take actions that cannot be reversed by council withholding that approval. This shows why cards like this aren’t used for this type of expense.

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