Letter to Mr. Dominic J. Mancini, Deputy Administrator - Sens. Ossoff and Warnock, Colleagues Call on Office of Management and Budget to Reject Change That Could Reduce Local Funding

Letter

Dear Deputy Administrator Mancini:
We write to express our concern regarding the Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Area
Standards Review Committee's proposed changes to the 2010 standards for determining
metropolitan and micropolitan statistical areas and urge you to reconsider the Committee's
recommendation.
The designations of Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Areas have important
ramifications for the counties, cities and towns that receive these designations. While the Office
of Management and Budget (OMB) has stated that these designations are established solely for
statistical purposes and are not intended to be used in program funding formulas, several federal
programs and agencies rely on these designations for the allocation of funding and provision of
services. For example, the statutory authorization for the Community Development Block Grant
explicitly defines a "metropolitan area" as a standard metropolitan statistical area as established
by OMB.1
The Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Area Standards Review Committee has recently
recommended that the minimum urban area population to qualify as a Metropolitan Statistical
Area be increased from 50,000 to 100,000. Because of the reliance on this designation by various
federal agencies and programs, this change could result in the loss of federal programming for
many small- and mid-sized counties, cities and towns across the country. Furthermore, these
recommendations have been proposed without the ability to comprehensively understand the
potential ramifications of such changes or an explanation as to what will trigger future threshold
increases--potentially allowing future changes to be made in an arbitrary manner.
2
Additionally, the coronavirus pandemic has also led thousands of people to temporarily migrate
to new areas of the country outside of their permanent homes. According to data from the United States Postal Service, nearly 16 million people changed addresses during the pandemic--an
increase of almost four percent from the year before.3 This significant increase in people moving
as a result of the pandemic demonstrates that population data based on the calendar years of 2020
or 2021 is likely to be misleading and inaccurate in predicting long-term trends about where
Americans will choose to live.
Given the anticipated negative impact of this proposed change and the inability to accurately
track where Americans will choose to permanently settle following the coronavirus pandemic,
we respectfully request that you reconsider the Committee's recommendation to increase the
minimum urban area population to qualify as a metropolitan statistical area, and instead establish
a comprehensive process to engage with relevant stakeholders to fully evaluate the impact of
such a change on the distribution of federal resources and services to arrive at any future
proposed change.
Thank you for your time and attention to this important matter.
Sincerely,