School Districts See Changes, but Enrollment Holding Steady

by Bill O'Toole

Amid uncertainty and rising economic distress, school districts in the Pittsburgh region are reporting relatively steady enrollment numbers entering the new academic year, although demand for online-only education within districts and among cyber charter schools appears to be on the rise. The reopening of schools has been a hot topic of debate in southwestern Pennsylvania …

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Jobs Slowly Return

by Julia Fraser

The coronavirus pandemic’s attack on the Pittsburgh region’s economy slowed in August. Employers in the seven-county Metropolitan Statistical Area added 6,400 jobs to their payrolls from July 2020 to August 2020, according to recently released data from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Pittsburgh region lost about 100,500 jobs between August 2019 and August 2020—a …

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How Allegheny County Spends its $212 Million CARES Package

by Jeffery Fraser

Allegheny County unveiled a new COVID-19 testing center in McKeesport last week as health officials braced for the confluence of the coronavirus outbreak and the approaching flu season. The center, which can perform 200 tests a day, didn’t cost county taxpayers one dime. It is the highest profile example to date of how the county …

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Unemployment Jumped in July

by Julia Fraser

Unemployment soared in southwestern Pennsylvania last month as the coronavirus pandemic continued to weigh on the local economy. The unemployment rate in the seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area rose from 12.8 percent in June to 14.3 percent in July, according to data from Pennsylvania Department of Labor, Center for Workforce Information & Analysis. An estimated …

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Back to School?

by Julia Fraser

Back-to-school shoppers are scooping up tracksuits, vintage 1990s oversized tees and everything tie-dye. But this year, many local students will debut their first day of school outfit on Zoom or coordinate the look with a face mask when they step on the school bus. Since the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the school year last March, schools …

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Jobs Make up Ground, but Still in Short Supply

by Julia Fraser

Jobs trickled back into the Pittsburgh region in July as many business restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of coronavirus were lifted. The region gained 6,000 jobs in July from June, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. But the boost isn’t enough to bring the region back its pre-pandemic economy. In July, there …

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‘It’s Been Crazy’: Gun Sales Break Records

by Jeffery Fraser

Gooch Ionadi has seen spikes in gun sales before. He’s come to expect a surge of buyers at his Smoke ‘N Guns shop when a mass shooting rekindles debate over gun control laws. And presidential elections are busy years, as a rule. But nothing compares to the last four months. “I’m seeing little old women, …

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Futurists Mull What Changes Lie Ahead

by Bill O'Toole

The Futurists tried to warn us. For decades, researchers and experts in the field of Strategic Foresight, or Futurism, have warned that the United States is dangerously unprepared for a pandemic. The U.S. Government Accountability Office produced dozens of studies on the topic since the early 2000s. A 2004 forecast report from the National Intelligence …

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Voter Registration High Despite Pandemic

by Jeffery Fraser

Voter registration in southwestern Pennsylvania and across the state could surpass totals seen in the last presidential election year even as the coronavirus disrupts tried-and-true tactics for reaching and registering new voters. With three months left to register, Pennsylvania is 80,000 voters shy of surpassing the total number of registered voters who were eligible to …

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Unemployment Eases and Labor Force Shrinks

by Julia Fraser

The unemployment rate fell across southwestern Pennsylvania in June, when business closures began to ease as the region moved into the “green phase” of pandemic restrictions. But the coronavirus has taken a huge bite out of the local workforce. Pittsburgh’s seven-county metropolitan statistical area posted a seasonally adjusted unemployment rate of 12.5 percent in June. …

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Pittsburgh Renters Have Kept up Their Payments—So Far

by Julia Fraser

On a July Pittsburgh afternoon, temperatures soared into the 90s. Public pools were dry, closed by pandemic restrictions. But for mask-wearing residents trickling out of Eastside Bond, a high-end East Liberty apartment complex, their private outdoor pool offered relief. There are new rules: Masks when not swimming; stay six feet apart in and out of …

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Jobs Shrink 10%

by Julia Fraser

Employers in the Pittsburgh region started adding to their payrolls in May and June. But it was not nearly enough to offset steep job losses over the last 12 months as the coronavirus pandemic continues to weigh on the region’s economy. The seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area lost an estimated 116,900 jobs from June 2019 …

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Looking for Answers in the Past to Blunt Pandemic Job Losses

by Bill O'Toole

At the entrance of Laurel Hill State Park, a bronze statue of a strapping young worker pays homage to the men who built the verdant park with a lake in Somerset County as part of a federal Citizen Conservation Corps created to ease the pain of crippling job losses during the Great Depression. Almost 90 …

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The Pittsburgh Today Regional Education Survey

The Pittsburgh Today Regional Education Survey is the most comprehensive survey to date to ask Allegheny County residents about their experiences and perspectives regarding education and the local public schools that educate 115,000 students in grades kindergarten through 12.  The online survey was conducted by Pittsburgh Today and the University Center for Social and Urban …

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Local Unemployment Drops, but Rate Remains Staggering

by Julia Fraser

Unemployment in southwestern Pennsylvania fell sharply in May, when the region began to relax social restrictions and reopen businesses that had been closed to stop the spread of the coronavirus. Still, the jobless rate remains at levels rarely seen as the pandemic continued to take its toll on the local economy. The seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan …

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Could the Coronavirus Kill the Gasoline Tax?

by Jeffery Fraser

A crisis in how to pay for roads and bridges with a gasoline tax had been worsening for decades. With Americans traveling less, the coronavirus pandemic is accelerating it. Fifty years ago, when the miles Americans traveled in their cars were soaring, a tax on every gallon of gasoline sold worked as a way pay …

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Pandemic Heats Up Housing Market

by Julia Fraser

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted business as usual in the residential real estate industry as it swept through the Pittsburgh region in March. It shut the doors on open houses, cancelled showings and stifled home inspections. But it failed to curb demand. A Howard Hanna real estate agent helped a seller stage a home via Facetime …

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Pandemic Slams Pittsburgh Jobs

by Julia Fraser

The COVID-19 pandemic continued its attack on the Pittsburgh metropolitan job market in May with the region losing 175,800 jobs since May 2019, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. All of Pittsburgh Today’s 15 benchmark regions posted significant job losses in May. The seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area lost 14.6 percent over its jobs …

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Breathing Bad Air

by Jeffery Fraser

Air pollution from traffic and industrial stacks finds its way to most places in Allegheny County. But minority and low-income neighborhoods are more likely to endure the highest levels and the health risks that come with not being able to find respite from bad air, a University of Pittsburgh study reports. Researchers mapped black carbon …

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An Eroding Anomaly

by Bill O'Toole

The economic fallout of the pandemic threatens to weaken long-struggling fire and ambulance services in southwestern Pennsylvania that were already strapped for cash. Although the way the region’s fire and ambulance services are structured varies, they share daunting challenges including a dearth of new staff and a perennial lack of funding. And social distancing restrictions …

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COVID-19 Survey: Allegheny County Residents React to the Pandemic and Shutdown

Stay-at-home orders, business closures and other social distancing measures taken to slow the spread of the coronavirus in Pennsylvania were appropriate and necessary in the eyes of 70 percent of Allegheny County residents surveyed last week. More than two-thirds reported they’ve suffered no or only minor financial losses as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. …

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April Unemployment Nears 17 Percent

by Julia Fraser

Unemployment in the seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area reached 16.8 percent in April—just below the region’s peak unemployment rate in the early 1980s. For the first time since the collapse of the steel industry, fewer than one million people were employed in the Pittsburgh region, according to preliminary employment data from the Pennsylvania Department of …

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