The intern who saved Cincinnati

Dan Klepal reports

The guy who made Cincinnati’s challenge to the U.S. Census Bureau population estimate possible couldn’t stick around very long after a Monday morning press conference, announcing the city has gained population over the past five years instead of losing more than 22,000 residents.

He had to go to class.

Mark Manning, a 20-year-old intern in Mayor Mark Mallory’s office and a junior at Xavier University, is the person who discovered that the U.S. Census Bureau allows challenges to their annual population estimates, and researched how often and how successful other cities have been in their challenges.

That research led to Mallory ordering up a challenge of Cincinnati’s 2005 population estimate that had the Queen City losing 6.8 percent of its population since 2000 – which, had it been correct, would have been the most of any major U.S. city. The Census Bureau’s new population estimate for Cincinnati is 331,310, or a gain of 22,582 people since the 2000 Census.

Manning started researching the Census estimates because he knew his boss – Mallory – wasn’t happy with the number and because of a little encouragement by Xavier professor Gene Beaupre.

“Dr. Beaupre sent me an e-mail saying maybe I should look into this,” Manning said. “I spent about an hour a day on it over the summer. I talked to other cities that challenged the estimates, and I found out most of the cities that challenged them ended up ahead. Since I’m an intern, I really didn’t know what would happen. But I typed up some memos saying it looks like something we should try.”

Mallory said he ordered the challenge because the numbers didn’t match what he saw happening around the city – energy, and new building, everywhere. Not to mention young people who are engaged and excited to live in the city.

“Mark is exactly what I’m talking about,” Mallory said. “The most recently educated, who want to be part of this city.”