The 2020 census: Looking at what’s at stake

• Ed Mahon
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  Ed Mahon comes to Spotlight PA from PA Post, where he covered state politics and policy, produced radio stories that were broadcast on public media stations throughout the state and on NPR’s national newscasts, and co-wrote a weekday newsletter. Prior to joining PA Post, Ed worked for six years as an investigative and political reporter for the York Daily Record, part of the USA Today Network. His reporting on failures in Pennsylvania’s system for protecting domestic abuse victims was a finalist in the national 2018 Livingston Awards for Young Journalists in the local reporting category. He was also part of a team whose coverage of the criminal justice system, including the aggressive use of civil asset forfeiture by York County prosecutors, received the 2018 G. Richard Dew Award for Journalistic Service from the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association. Before joining the York Daily Record, Ed covered K-12 education at the Centre Daily Times in State College and worked as a stringer for suburban sections of The Philadelphia Inquirer. He grew up in Delaware County, Pennsylvania.

 Michelle R. Smith / AP Photo

FILE PHOTO: This March 23, 2018 file photo shows an envelope containing a 2018 census letter mailed to a U.S. resident as part of the nation's only test run of the 2020 Census.

William Penn Fdn. commits $1M to support Pa. count

Michelle R. Smith / AP Photo

FILE – This March 23, 2018 file photo shows an envelope containing a 2018 census letter mailed to a U.S. resident as part of the nation’s only test run of the 2020 Census.

• WITF’s Rachel McDevitt explains why the 2020 census is so important — and why officials in Pennsylvania are calling attention to it now, months before the counting starts.

• For one, billions of dollars are at stake, as the amount of federal funding communities receive for certain programs is often tied to population totals.

• The Inquirer’s Michaelle Bond provided a detailed look at specific programs that rely on an accurate census count. The list includes money for medical care, food assistance, housing, transportation, education and community development.

• The census also determines how many seats in the U.S. House of Representatives each state has. Pennsylvania, which currently has 18 House members, is expected to lose at least one congressional seat because of faster population growth in western and southern states, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. Norman Bristol Colon, leader of Pennsylvania’s Complete Count Commission, told WITF’s Scott LaMar that Pa. should only lose one seat “if we do an accurate and complete census count in Pennsylvania.”

• Losing a seat makes Pennsylvania slightly less valuable to presidential candidates. The Keystone State is currently worth 20 Electoral Votes. Losing a seat will drop the state’s vote to 19 (a candidate needs 270 to win). As recently as 1980, Pennsylvania had 27 Electoral Votes. In 1928, Pa. had 38 votes in the Electoral College.

• Earlier this year, Pa. legislators rejected a request from the Complete Count Commission for more than $12 million, or $1 per resident, for outreach and education. On Tuesday, The Inquirer‘s Bond tweeted that the William Penn Foundation is donating $1 millionto a coalition that is working to ensure a fair and accurate count. The foundation said the $1 million grant is the largest census-related award yet in Pennsylvania.

Best of the rest

Andres Leighton / AP Photo

Texas state police cars block the access to the Walmart store in the aftermath of a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, Saturday, Aug. 3, 2019.

• Walmart said Tuesday it will stop selling handgun ammunition, explaining that the ammunition used in some handguns can also be used in some high-capacity semi-automatic weapons. The NRA responded by calling the move “shameful.”

• Lots of people know that Northampton County in the Lehigh Valleyis a political bellwether. But I was surprised that rural Elk County voters sided with the winner in presidential contests (from 1932 onward) just as often. Both counties picked the winner 19 out of 22 times. The Morning Call’s Ford Turner explains.

• Jury duty pays $9 per day in Pennsylvania.The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Lucia Geng looked into why that’s the rate. Turns out, lawmakers last raised jury duty pay in 1980 — and back then, a proposal to raise the rate to $25 per day “suffered a resounding defeat,” Geng writes.

• WESA’s An-Li Herring spent time in the classroom with students who are also inmates at Allegheny County Jail. “In this part of the building, you are a student,” Principal Jay Moser told them. “You’ll be treated like a student. You’ll be expected to act like a student. And you will be a student.”