Mayor Ed Gainey Gives Tim Stevens, Esther Bush, Sala Udin And Chris Moore Keys to Pittsburgh

Esther Bush. Chris Moore. Sala Udin. Tim Stevens.

Talk about icons in the City of Pittsburgh.

The political arena. The financial/non-profit sector. The spoken word. Collec­tively, the four aforemen­tioned African Americans have more than 150 years of service and impact in the Pittsburgh region. Collectively, they have not only spoken out against injustices involving Afri­can Americans, but they have created change for the better in the region for Black people.

Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey, one could say, stands on the shoulders of these iconic figures. The city’s first Black may­or paid homage to Bush, Moore, Udin and Stevens by presenting them each with “Keys to the City” during the WAMO Ra­dio (107.3 FM) annual “WAMO Day” celebration at Highland Park, June 28.

It’s the highest honor a mayor can present to an individual.

“You deserve it!” screamed a few in the crowd to Bush as she was honored on stage on a mostly sunny Saturday afternoon. The rain held off until after the presen­tations occurred.

“I am honored and privileged to be named with the other honor­ees today,” Bush said. “Each and every one of them have contributed mightily to my personal success and that of the Urban League.”

Bush is serving as in­terim President and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Pitts­burgh while the orga­nization searches for its next leader. But the entire region—and some nationally—know Bush as the tireless leader of the Urban League for 27 years, from 1994 to 2021. She significantly raised the profile of the Urban League of Great­er Pittsburgh during her tenure, even start­ing a charter school run by the Urban League in 1998.

The mission of the Ur­ban League is to empow­er African Americans and other underserved communities to achieve social and economic equality, and to secure their civil rights.

“My message to you is this—we are at a pe­riod of time in our city, our state and our coun­try, where you cannot lay down and see what somebody else is going to do,” Bush told the crowd. “You have to get involved. You have no choice. Don’t come up to me and talk about the president and talk about what somebody else did Downtown. What are you doing? And if you’ve never been an advocate before, let me tell you that it feels darn good.”

Stevens has been an advocate for forever and a day, it seems. The current Chairman and CEO of the Black Polit­ical Empowerment Proj­ect Proj­ect, he leads the charge in Pittsburgh for Afri­can Americans to “vote in each and every elec­tion.”

“What would happen if every Black person in America voted in each and every election?” he asked the crowd. Ste­vens also included the LGBTQ and other mi­nority communities. “We could put anybody in, and we could take anybody out of office.”

In addition to voting, Stevens is a fierce advo­cate for African Amer­icans being respected by local police. He has spoken out against in­justices done to Black people by police officers in the region, but also tries to find common ground in showing Af­rican Americans that officers should be shown the proper respect as well, and that it’s al­ways best to try to dif­fuse any situations that might occur during, say, a traffic stop.

As for Moore, the long­time host on KDKA Ra­dio (1020 AM, 100.1 FM) and former WQED-TV host, Mayor Gainey had nothing but admirable words for him.

“To be on KDKA and speak truth to power, even when he knew that he might get in trou­ble…,” Mayor Gainey exclaimed. “When you have that type of cour­age, someone who served in our military, someone that continues to be a pillar in our neigh­borhood…and someone who also celebrated 50 years of marriage with his wife (Joyce Megger­son-Moore)…I told him he should write a book about radio personali­ties in this city.”

Moore, who can light up a room with his verbal quips, gave the crowd another one: “This key to the city might not be any good after Janu­ary (2026), but that’s al­right with me.”

Mayor Gainey got a kick out of that, as did the rest of the crowd. Mayor Gainey is serving out the remainder of his term as mayor of Pitts­burgh, but there will be a new mayor of Pitts­burgh in January 2026 after Mayor Gainey lost the Democratic Primary Election to Corey O’Con­nor on May 20.

Udin is currently a board director for Pitts­burgh Public Schools. But that’s barely half of his story. Udin has been a part of Pittsburgh’s political and civil rights scene since the ’60s. In 1965, Udin co-founded the Centre Avenue Po­ets’ Theatre Workshop in the Hill District with August Wilson and Rob Penny. He helped es­tablish a Black studies program at the Univer­sity of Pittsburgh a few years later. Eventual­ly, he made his way to Pittsburgh City Council, where biting his tongue was never an option. He spent 10 years on City Council beginning in 1995.

“Nobody in politics is successful alone,” Udin said on the WAMO stage. “It takes teamwork to make the dream work, and everybody who’s re­ceiving this key, who’s been up here to speak, they’re all members of a team. I hope if you walk away with anything to­day, you walk away with the idea that you cannot do anything meaningful without teamwork. We have to love each other and work as a team to get anything done.”

Think of today’s Black political figures in Pitts­burgh and the region. Think of Congresswom­an Summer Lee from North Braddock, Lt. Governor Austin Da­vis from McKeesport, Pittsburgh City Coun­cilmen R. Daniel Lavelle and Khari Mosley, state Reps. La’Tasha D. Mayes and Aerion Abney, and of course, Mayor Gainey —they’ve all benefited and had their path made easier thanks to the tireless work of people like Esther Bush, Tim Stevens, Chris Moore and Sala Udin.

Still, on a day when it was time to honor them, the four icons took time to honor someone other than them—Ed Gainey.

“Let me just say,” Udin continued, “Ed was the first Black mayor of the city, but because of the work that he did, he won’t be the last Black mayor of the city. He has raised the standards that other competitors for that office are going to have to live up to.”