PITTSBURGH — A judge ruled Wednesday that the city of Pittsburgh can't issue one bill to the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center if it wants to challenge the giant medical system's tax-exempt status.

Judge R. Stanton Wettick said that the city can't legally ignore the existence of UPMC's subsidiaries. Pittsburgh's lawsuit claimed that the hospital network behaves more like a business than a nonprofit and should therefore pay city taxes on its properties and payrolls. Wettick noted his ruling does not settle whether any of its subsidiaries are charitable organizations, just that the city can't issue one bill to all of them.

Mayor William Peduto said that the ruling was “procedural” and not a decision on the merits of the lawsuit. “We are eager to continue to meet with UPMC and other nonprofit partners” to reach a long-term agreement on the tax issue, Peduto said, adding that city lawyers are reviewing the decision.

PITTSBURGH — Allegheny County is cutting off benefits to same-sex partners of its employees unless they're married.Officials say they're changing the policy now that a federal judge has allowed same-sex couples to marry in Pennsylvania. The county once limited benefits to those married to county employees, but made an exception years ago for unmarried same-sex partners when they couldn't marry.Now that both homosexual and heterosexual couples can marry, the county is limiting benefits only to spouses of employees.

DETROIT — General Motors has told dealers in the U.S. and Canada to stop selling 2013 and 2014 Chevrolet Cruzes because of a potential defect in air bags made by beleaguered supplier Takata.A stop-sale order is not a recall, but it could have an immediate impact on Cruze sales, at least in the final days of June. Introduced in 2009, the Cruze is GM's best-selling passenger car. GM has sold 119,330 Cruzes this year through May, or 18.4 percent more than it did in the first five months of 2013.The air bag issue is not related to the defective ignition switch at the heart of GM's recall of 2.6 million small cars that is tied to 13 deaths, more than 50 crashes and four investigations.“Certain vehicles may be equipped with a suspect driver's air bag inflator module that may have been assembled with an incorrect part,” GM spokesmen Jim Cain said.GM, which notified dealers of the stop-sale order on Tuesday, said it is working to identify how many cars may have driver-side air bags with a defective part.

WASHINGTON — The government wants to dramatically lower the height limits of buildings near hundreds of airports, but the proposal is drawing fire from real estate developers and members of Congress who say it will reduce property values.The Federal Aviation Administration proposal, supported by airports and airlines, is driven by encroaching development that limits safe flight paths for planes that might lose power in one engine during takeoff.The proposal would change the way the FAA assesses plans to build or modify structures near 388 airports to take into account potential takeoff hazards.