Mayor O’Connor Appoints Fire Chief, OMB Director & I&P Director

Each of the newly appointed leaders have been serving in the acting capacity and bring years of experience, commitment, knowledge and expertise to their roles.  

Mayor O’Connor has appointed Mat Davis to be the Fire Chief. Davis started his long firefighting career at the Dormont Fire Department in 2004, where he later went on to become Chief. He has also served part-time with the Swissvale and North Strabane Fire Departments. In 2023, Davis joined the City of Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire as the Assistant Chief of Community Risk Reduction and has served as the Acting Chief since earlier this year. In addition to serving as a mentor and fire instructor for new recruits and various agencies, he holds a Bachelor's and MBA from Point Park University and is a graduate of the National Fire Academy’s Executive Fire Officer Program.

O’Connor has appointed Deputy Director of OMB Rea Price to fill the role of Director and CFO. With over 14 years of combined experience in OMB as Senior Budget Analyst, Operating Budget Manager, Assistant Director of Operating & Special Revenues and Deputy Director of the City Council Budget Office. Throughout her time with OMB since 2006, she has implemented programs, platforms, software and practices for the budget, financial reporting and management. Price returned to the City in January 2026 to join the O’Connor Administration and has led efforts to identify, plan for and manage the budget crisis announced by Mayor O’Connor earlier this week.  

Sylvia Harris has been appointed by Mayor O’Connor to Director of I&P and CIO. Harris started at the City of Pittsburgh in 2008 in the department that oversees information technology infrastructure and services as well as data governance, digital services and the implementation of innovation and performance improvement across all City departments. Throughout her 18 years with the City, she has served as an Information Security Analyst, Deputy Director of Operations and Chief Information Security Officer and Assistant Director of Security and has implemented a full Disaster Recovery Solution, established ITIL training, created the Incident Response and Training Team and established and maintained the City’s Cybersecurity Program. Harris has over 30 years of IT and leadership experience and was awarded the 2023 Local IT Leader of the Year award.