Above: Bill Peduto, winner of the mayoral primary, spoke to Northsiders last month at an event at the Aviary. (photo by Jena Ruszkiewicz).

by Kelsey Shea

On Tuesday, city councilman Bill Peduto won the democratic primary for mayor of Pittsburgh, beating out former state auditor general Jack Wagner, state representative Jake Wheatley and bus monitor and activist A.J. Richardson.

With Pittsburgh’s 70-year history of democratic mayors, Peduto is likely to top his republican opponent Josh Wander in the November election and replace Luke Ravenstahl as Pittsburgh’s mayor.

Turnout for the primary was low across the city, with only 44,000 voters casting ballots. On the Northside roughly 5,000 residents across the 14 neighborhoods voted, with some of the highest turnout percentages in Brighton Heights, Observatory Hill and Manchester.

Across the city Peduto won 52 percent of the votes. But Wagner won a narrow majority of Northside votes with about 100 votes more than Peduto.

The race’s wild card candidate, Richardson, received 32 votes from Northsiders.

Lower Northside neighborhoods, including Allegheny West, the North Shore, Historic Deutschtown and Spring Garden favored Peduto, while upper neighborhoods like Brighton Heights, Observatory Hill, Spring Hill, Troy Hill and Summer Hill along with East Deutschtown favored Wagner.

Brightwood was split between the two top candidates, Wagner and Peduto, and Manchester and the Charles Street Valley favored State Representative Jake Wheatley.

District 6 City Councilman Daniel Lavelle won his race against Franco “Dok” Harris and the Hill District’s Tonya Payne, and will return to City Council for another term.

Retired teacher and Brighton Heights resident Carolyn Klug beat Dave Schuilenburg and Lorraine Burton Eberhardt, both of Summer Hill, for the District 9 school board seat.

City Council President Darlene Harris, of District 1, is registered as an independent candidate.