The Jewish communities of Northeastern Pennsylvania had come, like so many others to the Coal Region, in waves. They arrived from the German states in the middle of the 19th century, from Poland in its closing decades, and from Russia and Ukraine in the early years of the 20th.

They came for economic opportunity, certainly – the anthracite coal fields were hungry for labor, and the towns rising around the collieries needed merchants, businessmen, and tradespeople. But most often, they were also fleeing something: discrimination, threats, and pogroms carried out by their neighbors and frequently with the blessing of their own governments in Europe.

Pennsylvania’s political map is changing, but not in a way anyone anticipated. Defying political convention, Pennsylvanians are leaving the state’s two largest economic anchors.

The latest county-level migration data shows that Philadelphia lost nearly 17,800 residents to net outmigration in a single year, while Allegheny County, home to Pittsburgh, lost nearly 6,800. These are not marginal shifts. Together, those two counties accounted for nearly 80% of the state’s net adjusted gross income loss from migration, roughly $1.7 billion walking out the door.

Rep. Rob Bresnahan, Jr. headed back from Washington to lend his support at the scene of a recent fire that led to the evacuation of 77 patients from Lehigh Valley Hospital in Dickson City.

Other hospitals in the Scranton area were available to take those patients because of more than a year of work by Bresnahan and his team, which led to a deal for Tenor Health to assume control of the Regional Hospital of Scranton, Moses Taylor Hospital, and Wilkes-Barre General Hospital, saving those facilities that were on the brink of closure.