Pitt and city officials refuse comment on Board of Trustees member’s e-mails to mayor

Pitt and city officials refuse to comment on a situation involving a Pitt Board of Trustees… Pitt and city officials refuse to comment on a situation involving a Pitt Board of Trustees member and the mayor.

A series of e-mails released by an independent mayoral candidate last week detail communications between University Board of Trustees member and local businessman John Verbanac and Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.

In the e-mails, Verbanac makes suggestions on hiring and firing practices in the city and writes drafts of Ravenstahl’s initial announcement of his mayoral candidacy and a speech given a year into his administration.

In one e-mail, dated Feb. 25, 2008, Verbanac suggests that the Ravenstahl administration not fire an employee of the Urban Redevelopment Authority, despite poor job performance, because of family connections.

Pitt spokesman John Fedele said that the University would not comment on the situation.

Joanna Doven, spokeswoman for the mayor’s office, referred all calls regarding the e-mails to Ravenstahl’s campaign office, saying it was “a campaign issue.”

Ravenstahl’s campaign office has not yet responded with a statement, or to either confirm or deny the validity of the e-mails.

Verbanac initially would not comment, and he said he would provide on Friday a statement he prepared. The statement has not yet been provided, and Verbanac has not responded to further calls.

The Pennsylvania Senate appointed Verbanac a Commonwealth member of Pitt’s Board of Trustees on June 30, 2007, according to an article in the Pitt Chronicle.

Verbanac is a Pitt alumnus who graduated from the College of General Studies in 1990, the article said.

Mayoral independent candidate Kevin Acklin said that “a former high-ranking city administrator” approached his campaign with the e-mails after Acklin mentioned Verbanac in the mayoral debate Oct. 16. He would not elaborate on who the “former high-ranking city administrator” was.