Innamorato faces an Allegheny County Council that clashed with her predecessor

Sara Innamorato, Democratic nominee for Allegheny County Executive, takes questions from reporters following her acceptance speech for the role on election night, Tuesday, Nov. 7, 2023, at Mr. Smalls in Millvale. (Photo by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource) The new Allegheny County executive has urgent problems from homelessness to the environment. She inherits a government system with a deep internal feud. by Charlie Wolfson, PublicSource Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato, to be sworn into the region’s highest elected office today after campaigning on a “county for all,” has been thrust into leadership of a government roiled by internal lawsuits and big personalities.& She will need to confront urgent policy problems, from homelessness to the jail to the environment, working alongside a County Council that spent the last few years aligning itself in opposition to her predecessor, Rich Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald, who began his political career as a member and then president of council before ascending to the executive’s office in 2012, saw the legislative branch work in recent years to override his vetoes and elect a vocal critic as its president in Pat Catena. In the last year alone, the legislative and executive branches have been locked in three lawsuits over who has the...