WARREN Falling population threatens funding

The city will receive $1.8 million in federal funding for 2003.
By DENISE DICK
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- The city's plummeting population is jeopardizing the amount of federal funding it receives.
The 2000 census placed the city's population at 46,832, down from 1990 figures of more than 50,000.
"We'll know when the official census comes out," said David J. Robison, director of the city's community development department.
He said census figures are expected to be finalized in mid-to-late 2003. If a population figure below 50,000 is finalized, the city could lose its status as an entitlement community.
"We could get grandfathered," Robison said, which would make the city immune from the population requirement and lengthen the time it keeps entitlement status.
Steubenville maintained its status through grandfathering, but such action requires U.S. Congressional approval.
CDBG operations
Recipients of Community Development Block Grant entitlement funds include local governments with 50,000 or more residents, other local governments designated as central cities of metropolitan areas, and urban counties with populations of at least 200,000, according to the federal Housing and Urban Development Web site.
If Warren loses entitlement status, its CDBG would come out of those funds allocated to and distributed by the county. That's the way other cities and townships in the county receive CDBGs.
The city's 2003 CDBG allocation totals more than $1.78 million. City council this week approved distribution of the money to 33 projects including street resurfacing and reconstruction and social service organizations.
Projects using CDBG money are to primarily benefit low to moderate income people and the program has been used as a "catalyst for economic development activities that expand job and business opportunities for lower income persons and neighborhoods," according to the HUD Web site.
Reaction
Councilman Daniel E. Polivka, D-at large, who chairs council's community development committee, said he's been hearing for years of the possibility of losing entitlement status.
"I'm hoping and praying that it doesn't happen because it certainly would hurt our city," he said.
If it does, Polivka said he'd lobby U.S. Congressman-elect Tim Ryan to get Congress to lower the requirement to 45,000.
"There are some cities, like us, that really need the money," he said.
dick@vindy.com