and last updated 2021-04-26 18:31:56-04
Apportionment is the process of distributing 435 seats in the House of Representatives among the 50 states based on population counts.
It's a process that impacts your voice in Congress, and one that has New York State on quite the losing streak.
Since 1950 New York State had lost two or more congressional seats each time census data was released, or every ten years. According to information from the United Stats Census Bureau New York has moved from 43 seats in 1950 all the way down to 27 seats in 2010.
"It does take away our voice in Congress", says Shawn Donahue, who is a Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University at Buffalo. "If we are losing seats it means those seats are going somewhere else. A lot of seats have been going to California, Texas, Florida and Arizona."