It's not as if 20,000 Pittsburghers will be found living under the steps. But the decision by local officials to consider doing what other cities with falling populations have done -- challenge the U.S. Census Bureau's estimates -- is worth a shot.

It's just too bad that cities like New York, St. Louis, Detroit, Cincinnati, Milwaukee and Toledo have already been successful in having their Census projections adjusted upward, while Pittsburgh leaders learned of the phenomenon only through a Post-Gazette article on Wednesday. Now the deadline for challenging the 2007 estimates, Jan. 5, is past.

Mayor Carty Finkbeiner of Toledo made news Tuesday when the Census told him it had approved his challenge and revised the city's 2007 population estimate upward by 19,045 to 316,851 -- enough to move it ahead of Pittsburgh's 311,218. Toledo officials built their case with data on recent building permits and net increases in the number of new housing units from 2000 to 2007; they also examined the number of people living in mobile homes and group homes.

A representative of Social Compact Inc., a Washington-based nonprofit that helped Toledo study its housing numbers, said the city may be eligible for an extra $15 million in federal aid because of the new population estimate. That may be an overly optimistic claim, but even a windfall of $1 million should appeal to Pittsburgh, with its heavy debt load and finances still overseen by state agencies.

While his recent predecessors apparently were just as unaware of the option, Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said Pittsburgh may challenge the next Census estimate by gathering new numbers of its own. Let's hope so. Making a case has paid off for other cities. The only regret is Pittsburgh should have done it before now.