One of our polarized country’s most pronounced challenges is the growing divide between rural and urban America. It is a gap that includes significant variations in economic opportunities and what can be debilitating disparities in critical modern infrastructure, such as access to high-speed internet. It is a gap that also includes sometimes stark social and political differences. Understanding and effectively addressing this divide is essential for the wellbeing of our democracy.

Jen Giovannitti is the President of the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation, a place-based funder dedicated to rural communities. It generally invests two-thirds of its grant dollars in West Virginia and one-third in Southwestern Pennsylvania.

Prior to joining the Benedum Foundation, Ms. Giovannitti led community-based initiatives for the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, working both regionally and nationally on issues facing low-income communities and advancing strategies for community investment. Earlier in her career, she lived in West Virginia for 11 years and led a succession of important economic development initiatives.

Pennsylvania’s historic election-reform law, which took effect on October 31, 2019, authorized no-excuse, mail-in voting and passed both houses of the legislature with strong bipartisan support.  After the presidential election in 2020, then-President Trump and his allies, including some elected officials from Pennsylvania, unsuccessfully sought to overturn the results of our election in every available forum, including the courts and the Congressional session that was interrupted for several hours by the January 6 riot in the Capitol.  David Thornburgh is the President and CEO of The Committee of Seventy, a non-partisan organization that was founded in Philadelphia in 1904 and is one of the country’s oldest good government groups. Its mission emphasizes strengthening democracy and protecting and improving the voting process in Pennsylvania.  Mr. Thornburgh is considered by many to be Pennsylvania’s leading expert on elections. He will discuss the issues surrounding an election that has been relentlessly attacked as fraudulent by some but that most have concluded was free and fair.

Among the most troubling images of COVID-19’s impact are those capturing long lines of people, sometimes in cars and sometimes on foot, waiting for the food they need, for themselves and their families, to be provided by their local food bank. As a result of the pandemic, more than 50 million Americans, including one in every four children, are battling hunger. Food banks across the country have faced daunting challenges as demand has grown, food supplies have diminished, and social distancing has reduced volunteers. Lisa Scales, President and CEO of the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank, which serves eleven counties and is one of the largest in the country, discusses how the Food Bank and its community partners have adapted to meet the needs of the Pittsburgh region though expanded service, innovative programming, and more holistic services. She also offers perspectives on the evolving mission of food banks and policy changes that will be required if current and anticipated challenges to our country’s food safety net are to be effectively met.