An audit by the Allegheny County Controller made public Thursday found the agency responsible for Pittsburgh’s tourism promotion failed to follow correct financial management practices, and needs to increase transparency.
Visit Pittsburgh, which is responsible for tourism promotion in the region, receives more than 90% of its funding from tax dollars, according to County Controller Corey O’Connor.
“They're getting taxpayer dollars,” O’Connor told WESA. “This is a noteworthy expenditure of taxpayer money that needs to be accounted for.”
According to the controller’s report, Visit Pittsburgh deposited private and public funds into the same bank account and did not appropriately track the use of public money, including funds received from the Allegheny County hotel tax.
Visit Pittsburgh said it disagrees with the findings, and claimed the report includes “factual errors, misleading information and the selective omission of relevant information.”
The agency’s president and CEO Jerad Bachar said Visit Pittsburgh’s accounting process is “in full compliance with GAAP [Generally Accepted Accounting Principles] and FASB [Financial Accounting Standards Board] guidelines.”
The audit also recommends Visit Pittsburgh reduce its reserves, which currently sit just below $5.3 million.
That’s higher than reserves in comparable cities like Baltimore, the controller’s office said. Baltimore’s reserves hover around $840,000.
But Bachar said the reserves serve multiple purposes, and helped the organization make it through the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We're fully confident that our practices are very much within guidelines, very much within acceptable standards,” he said.
Bachar also insinuated the audit was prompted by political calculations, which O’Connor denied.
“We are looking at straight facts. We are not going to make this stuff up,” O’Connor said. “We are peer reviewed.”
State Sen. Wayne Fontana requested the audit in September 2022 because he had “grave concerns” about how Visit Pittsburgh was handling “millions of dollars in public county hotel room rental tax revenues.”
Fontana is the chairman of the board for the Sports and Exhibition Authority of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, which owns Acrisure Stadium, PPG Paints Arena, PNC Park, and the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.
He also opposed an additional fee on Allegheny County hotel rentals that would have boosted Visit Pittsburgh revenues.
Bachar said Visit Pittsburgh will consider some of the controller’s other recommendations.
Read the full audit and Visit Pittsburgh’s response here.
