With 31 properties Downtown worth more than $27 million, Pittsburgh's Urban Redevelopment Authority has a big stake in the area's rebirth.

But the URA also is a major reason why the hard labor leading to that rebirth continues, retailers and real estate brokers say. They complain that the agency turns away developers who might bring new life to the Downtown.

"The city's got to allow the private sector to develop Downtown," said Eitan Solomon, who owns Prime Gear, a sports apparel shop on Wood Street. "We don't live in Russia. I don't think so."

Several of the URA's high-profile buildings along Forbes Avenue -- all bought with taxpayer money for city government-directed redevelopment plans that failed -- sit empty. Cheerful posters behind dust-caked and graffiti-scrawled windows show a rising sun and the URA's name while proclaiming: "Preparing Downtown for a Brighter Tomorrow!"

Mayor Tom Murphy readily acknowledges the city has turned down "a number of developers" who want individual URA properties. The city would rather hold onto them, he said, hoping to turn them into a sweeping retail and housing redevelopment.

"We believe -- and every person we have talked to, every developer, has been clear -- that the value is in doing it holistically, comprehensively, not in a piecemeal way," Murphy said. "If we begin to sell the buildings off, then we move away from doing what I think would be attractive development."

Murphy concedes the city will have to at least consider selling off the properties individually if his third attempt to lure a master redeveloper fails.

"If we can't see a way to do that," Murphy said, "then probably we will begin to move in a new direction."

Downtown interests say there would be no shortage of takers. Developers privately complain they have been turned away when they tried to buy URA properties. They declined to speak publicly for fear of upsetting the Murphy administration.

Councilman Sala Udin, who serves on the URA board of directors, said the Downtown situation is not dire and there's no need to unload the URA's portfolio, which includes the former G.C. Murphy buildings that border the once-bustling Market Square.

"Downtown is still a successful, thriving commercial district," he said. "There are problems, but it's not a ghost town."

Meanwhile, the annual cost to taxpayers in lost revenue on the URA's property tax-exempt Downtown portfolio tops $800,000 a year, including $300,000 that would go to the cash-strapped city, according to Allegheny County's online assessment records.

Critics say that cost might be worth paying to support the mayor's strategy -- had it not already failed twice. While the URA pursues comprehensive redevelopment, more shops are going out of business.

Across Wood Street from his sports apparel retail shop, Solomon counts five empty storefronts, one of them owned by the URA. The now empty Lazarus-Macy's building sits across the corner. Another storefront is empty on his side of the street, and the store next door, The Card Center, is having a going-out-of-business sale.

The co-owner of that store, Patty Maloney, was a strong critic of Murphy's initial redevelopment plan four years ago, the ambitious Marketplace at Fifth and Forbes, a $522 million project that hinged on retailer Nordstrom opening a store that would have been heavily subsidized by taxpayers. The plan collapsed, in part because Downtown businesses and property owners fought against losing their properties to the city by eminent domain.

Now some are losing their businesses to the lack of retail density -- a concentration of stores that could attract shoppers -- as well as to a neglect of basic maintenance in the Fifth and Forbes corridor. When the sidewalk in front of a URA-owned Murphy's building started cracking, the city paved it with macadam rather than replacing the concrete.

A woman working in The Card Center said Maloney is no longer commenting on Downtown redevelopment. She could not be reached for comment.

Murphy's subsequent plan, which would have used more existing buildings instead of razing the Fifth and Forbes corridor, collapsed in January when the Philadelphia developer was bought out.

The city is waiting for another Philadelphia developer, Dranoff Properties, to propose a comprehensive retail and housing plan, Murphy said. Major developers will invest in the Downtown only if the city can offer them a large parcel, he said. While saying it "breaks my heart" to walk through the Fifth and Forbes retail corridor, Murphy said his original proposal could have prevented such decay.

Dranoff is expected to make its pitch for revitalizing Downtown early next year.

The URA's acting director, Jerome Dettore, could not be reached for comment. Midge McCauley, who is developing Dranoff's Downtown plan, declined to talk about it.

Instead of trying to direct Downtown redevelopment, the city and URA need to step aside and let market forces shape the retail area -- even if that means allowing multiple investors to reclaim the area one building at a time, said Aaron Stauber, managing director of Rugby Realty in Teterboro, N.J.

Stauber's company owns the Gulf Tower and is involved in redevelopment efforts at a number of properties on Penn and Liberty avenues, Downtown. Until last month, Rugby had been considered the likely buyer for the soon-to-be-closed Lord & Taylor department store. The building went to J.J. Gumberg Co. of Braddock Hills instead.

"You have got to let market forces work," Stauber said. The city should encourage investment in the Downtown, regardless of whether it's from upscale stores or discount outlets, he said.

Bill Burroughs, the president of Downtown real estate developer Scott & McCune Co., said there's no dealing with the URA. He gave up ambitious plans for a hotel and retail complex on a Liberty Avenue block when the URA started buying the property for a planned African-American Cultural Center. The site remains undeveloped.

"We just said, 'Why fight City Hall?' " Burroughs said. "You can't. We sold our property to them."

Udin insists that market forces are shaping Dranoff's plan, in which a master redeveloper will oversee the work of individual developers reclaiming the corridor incrementally. Lazarus-Macy's failed, he said, because it was not part of a comprehensive strategy.

"That doesn't mean you go willy-nilly," Udin said. "You need to have a plan."

But Stauber pointed to the success of the Burlington Coat Factory store, a discount outlet in the former Gimbels department store building, now Heinz 57 Center, on Smithfield Street. The Downtown outlet is one of the company's most successful stores.

"Whatever stores want to come to Downtown, I think that's the right use," Stauber said. "Until Burlington Coat Factory moved into the Gimbels building, nobody was going to take two lower levels of a building that had been boarded up for several years. But Burlington stepped up to the plate, and now it's a huge success."

The URA needs to offer its properties for sale or get moving with a plan, Stauber said.

"Will you see things change overnight? No. But you'll start seeing developers like myself come in and buy property and put in real investment."

Andrew Conte can be reached at aconte@tribweb.com or (412) 765-2312.