About RenewPA
What is the Campaign to Renew Pennsylvania?
We are a statewide campaign built on the common interest of Pennsylvania’s citizens to improve our economic competitiveness and restore our community quality of life.
Our goal is to advance solutions to the infrastructure, fiscal and governance issues that affect our economics and our communities.
RenewPA is hosted by 10,000 Friends of Pennsylvania and dedicated to building partnerships and coalitions to achieve our goals statewide.
Why Are We Needed?
Because despite its many assets – natural beauty, world-class farmland, a wealth of older cities and towns with major industry clusters, top-notch health and educational institutions – Pennsylvania faces great challenges.
The report concluded:
- Pennsylvania ranks low on demographic and economic performance and high on sprawl and abandonment.
- These patterns undermine the state’s competitiveness and are fiscally wasteful.
- These patterns are not inevitable; state and local policies facilitate sprawl and promote abandonment. Pennsylvania can build a competitive future.
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12.3 million people but....
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Pennsylvania is the 6th largest state, but remains one of the slowest growing states.
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The state continued to lose residents, experiencing a net out-migration of 12,000 people between 2000 and 2004.
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The average income of those leaving was higher than that of those coming in -- and the gap is widening.
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Our cities, towns and older suburbs are declining as the economy stagnates and lags behind the nation and most neighboring states. Though population is barely growing, our older communities are hollowing out and sprawling as people and businesses move to the outer suburbs.
This unbalanced pattern of development hurts the economy by weakening older communities where critical institutional and business assets that could drive economic growth tend to cluster. At the same time, it burdens taxpayers by compelling them to provide costly infrastructure and services to far-flung communities, and creates fiscal distress in cities and towns by depressing property values and tax revenues.
These trends are not inevitable. In large part, they stem from a highly fragmented fiscal and governance system at both the state and local levels that increases the cost of government and hinders the coordinated planning and action that is needed to promote economic growth.
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Since 2000, the Commonwealth …
- Continues to exhibit troubling trends for the future workforce:
■ It is a net exporter of residents
■ It has the third highest share of elderly residents.
■ It ranks 45th in the nation of the number of young professionals (25-34 yr. old) in the country
- Continues to see a hollowing out of older municipalities; though older places are experiencing a recent spark of new development activity
- Has a rebounding economy, like that of the nation, but new jobs are likely to be lower-wage or lower-quality
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The Campaign to Renew Pennsylvania was formed to respond to the need and the opportunity.
A Message from the Director of Strategy
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Todd Vonderheid |
“So often, elected leaders get consumed by the difficulties we all face trying to deliver the services we are required to provide. We rarely have the chance to think of broader solutions.
“Pennsylvania’s elected leaders have the rare opportunity now to change our future – to focus on the opportunities while dealing with the challenges. We can make our regions economically competitive for decades to come.”
For the full message from Todd Vonderheid, director of strategy for the Campaign to Renew Pennsylvania, click here. |
Stop back often!
Visit our Policy page for details and updates about the progress we’re making on our “Common Sense Agenda.”
Visit our Research page for access to a growing library of research and reports from around the state.
Visit our Regional Initiatives page for a continually updated catalog of multi-municipal initiatives from around the state.
Visit our Partners and Resources page, where you can join the growing list of partners, or search for related organizations.
A Campaign to Renew Pennsylvania • 200 North Third Street • 4th Floor • Harrisburg, PA 17101
P: (717) 238-5030 • F: (717) 234-6075 © www.renewpa.org
