My weekly column was published in this week’s Wednesday edition of the Prattville Progress and News Record:

According to the latest US Census statistics, Alabama may be facing losing one of its seven seats in the U.S. House of Representatives during the next reapportionment in 2010. It wouldn’t be anything new. Alabama’s delegation has dropped from nine representatives after the 1930 census, to eight in 1960 and the current seven in 1970. There is no doubt that Alabama is gradually becoming marginalized as a portion of the nation at large.

The same report from the census bureau indicates big growth in the south, with Georgia, North Carolina, Florida, Tennessee and South Carolina all projected to be in the top twenty growth states over the next 20 years. Meanwhile the report indicates that Alabama’s population will grow at a mere 9.6%.

The projections are based on mathematical models that assume fertility, mortality, and internal as well as international migration continue at the current rate. My concern with these projections is not as much about losing the congressional seat as it is being left behind by our neighboring states and the nation at large. Their continued growth will allow those states to prosper while Alabama stagnates.

Some say that more people doesn’t automatically equal prosperity and they would certainly be right, but if you fall behind the growth rate of other states in the region it is an indicator for a number of other issues. It could indicate that immigrants, from out-of-state and out of the country, are choosing those neighboring states over yours either because they offer better job opportunities, education opportunities, or other reasons. It could also indicate that your state has a higher mortality rate than others in the region, certainly not a positive attribute for the state. It could also indicate that families are not as large in your state because of their inability to sustain them. Any or all of these properties would be unfortunate circumstances for Alabama and would be harbingers for other negative developments in the future.

I don’t want to make too much out of one report, but there is no doubt the underlying issues that contribute to growth must be addressed. They are the same issues that have been recognized but left unaddressed for decades; inadequate healthcare and education systems, a repressive tax structure, poor economic infrastructure and lack of political leadership.

We want Alabama to compete. We want Alabama citizens to be the best they can be. None of these public structures can make an individual take action, but they do provide the mechanisms and systems that offer people the opportunity to succeed. Until we recognize that those systems are not working to their full potential in our state and do something about it we will continue to be marginalized in the nation as a whole and will find it difficult to attract anyone to live in this great state, nor to stay here. Other states will offer more and better opportunities and Alabama will continue to be left behind. The process is beginning to happen already and the only way to reverse the trend is to recognize reports like these as opportunities for change and take action.

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