One of the traditional duties of a member of Congress is to “bring home the bacon,” which is a nice way of saying, get what you can for your district.

This rite becomes more important when people are struggling in the midst of a pandemic.

And it has wedged its way into the CD-11 race between incumbent Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Rosemary Becchi.

The challenger’s position is clear – Sherrill has failed miserably in this regard.

Becchi made the point in debates last week and in a post on her campaign Facebook page. The reference is to the CARES Act – the pandemic relief bill passed by Congress back in the spring.

And the bare facts are clear. Many New Jersey counties received millions in direct CARES Act funding,  but Morris County got nothing.

So, is Becchi’s accusation about Sherrill’s indifference correct?

It is, as far as it goes. But the problem is, it doesn’t go very far.

And politics aside, there’s no mystery here.

A lot about the federal government is about formulas and guidelines and that’s what is happening here. Only counties with populations of 500,000 or more qualified for direct aid under the CARES Act.

The latest figures put Morris County’s population about 8,000 people short.

Ouch.

That explains the lack of direct aid.

Becchi’s position would be spot-on if the story ended there, but in fairness it didn’t.

There also was millions of dollars of CARES funding aid that went direct to New Jersey. And Sherrill with help from local lawmakers – Republicans included – takes credit for securing $15 million in CARES funding for Morris County from money allocated to New Jersey.  In fact, a press release announcing about $7 million of that aid featured a quote from Republican state Sen. Anthony M.Bucco.

All this made for an interesting exchange at last week’s Insidernj.com-sponsored debate between the two.

After Becchi pointed out that Morris received no federal aid in direct funding, Sherrill read off a list of awards to Morris County including $1.7 million for the Zufall Health Center, about $4 million to the County College of Morris and nearly $7 million of HUD funding to the county, Parsippany and to local housing authorities.

Clearly, when it comes to money and politics, it all comes down to where – and how – you look.