On today’s episode of The Confluence: Carol Kuniholm, chair of Fair Districts PA, explains why her organization and five others want to change procedural rules in the state legislature around how bills move through committees and get floor votes; and we speak to a University of Pittsburgh administrator about enrollment in higher education more than two years since pandemic-related closures.
‘Fix Harrisburg’ campaign aims to change procedural rules in state capitol
(0:00 - 11:13)
Majority leaders and committee chairs in the state General Assembly can block bills from getting a vote or even a hearing, despite the fact that some of those bills have bipartisan support. Good government groups want to change these procedural rules, which they consider a problem in Harrisburg.
“Over four thousand bills are introduced in every session. Eight out of 10 get no attention at all in committee,” says Carol Kuniholm, chair of Fair Districts PA. “There are many, many bipartisan solutions that are introduced session after session, sometimes for decades, and get no attention at all.”
Kuniholm and a coalition recently launched the Fix Harrisburg campaign to improve the legislative process. As it currently stands, majority leaders in each chamber and committee chairs have complete control over which bills are considered and voted on.
“Committee chairs are really kind of petty dictators in our Pennsylvania legislature,” says Kuniholm. “These are people who are elected by less than 0.5 percent of the people of Pennsylvania. So, somebody in a district elected by 0.5 percent of people of Pennsylvania can say, ‘I'm not interested in the solution that would benefit every community across the entire Commonwealth’.”
Kuniholm says the key to getting more bills considered and passed is to reform the procedural rules voted on at the beginning of every legislative session.
“We want procedural rules that guarantee bills with bipartisan support get a vote in committee,” says Kuniholm. “And that bills that come from one chamber to the other with bipartisan support are guaranteed a vote in the other chamber.”
As fewer PA students apply for financial aid, University of Pittsburgh sees record number of applicants
(11:18 - 22:30)
This year, 31,000 fewer students in Pennsylvania completed the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) compared to 2021.
The drop in FAFSA applicants is concerning to University of Pittsburgh’s vice provost for enrollment Marc Harding, “particularly because it seems like where it's impacting the most is families with first generation [college students], families [with] low socioeconomic status.”
But as FAFSA application numbers go down, Pitt student applications to attend have gone up. Pitt saw a 57% increase in the number of student applicants this year compared to 2021.
“We have almost 52,000 first-year applications. That's double the number of first-year applications we received in the Pittsburgh campus in just a decade,” says Harding.
Harding attributes the increase to improved outreach during the pandemic, such as greater one-on-one communication with applicants. Pitt also employs regional recruiters outside of and throughout the state, including a newly established recruiter based in Stroudsburg.
“Fifteen to 20 percent of our students are from what the legislature defines as rural Pennsylvania,” he says. “We have someone based in a rural area trying to help us figure out how to increase and enhance our relationship with rural Pennsylvania.”
Concerning the future of student enrollment and recruitment, Harding says he wants to emphasize using social media to reach out to families and potential students.
“I think financial aid, how we get that message across to students and families is absolutely tied to the work that we do in helping students and families figuring out how to afford college,” he says. “At the end of the day, it's all about how we connect the dots … as to how students can achieve their goals.”
The Confluence, where the news comes together, is 90.5 WESA’s daily news program. Tune in Monday to Thursday at 9 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. to hear newsmakers and innovators take an in-depth look at stories important to the Pittsburgh region. Find more episodes of The Confluence here or wherever you get your podcasts.
