Here’s a story from ElPasoMatters.org‘s CEO Bob Moore about El Paso County’s population growth prospects:
El Paso County will continue to see little to moderate population growth over the next 35 years, according to population estimates released Tuesday from the Texas Demographic Center.
The county’s population is projected to grow by an average of one-tenth to half a percentage point annually between 2020 and 2060, the projections show. That would be by far the slowest population growth in the county in the 20th or 21st centuries.
. . .
From 1900 to 2010, El Paso saw double-digit population growth each decade, with the exception of 1930-40, when the Great Depression disrupted most of the world.
But between 2010 and 2020, El Paso’s population grew by just over 8%.
Well, that’s just part of the equation.
From 2000 to 2012, the population of El Paso County grew from 679,222 to 772,000, or 13.6%. Over that same time period, the City of El Paso grew from 563,662 to 673,745, a 12 year growth rate of 19.5.
Slowing population growth – or even declining population – has pluses and minuses for El Paso. Lower population places less strain on finite natural resources, especially water and reduces environmental harm.
But fewer people can make the region less attractive to employers, resulting in fewer jobs and decreased wages. And El Paso’s demographic trend for the past 15 years – a combination of low population growth and urban sprawl – can increase the cost of public services and drive up property taxes, while also causing environmental degradation.
None of the local governments’ models contemplated stagnant population growth. Without population growth, the City of El Paso’s plans don’t make sense.
Forget Uptown Downtown. Forget Onward Alameda. Forget the prospect of Economic Development that the City has used to justify every boondoggle they’ve sold us. Forget everything the city planners ever told us.
Since the most recent turn of the century, the City of El Paso has been planning for the arrival of people who aren’t coming. Not the Creative Class. Not the fabled Young Professionals. Not Information Workers. The City has been preparing for a party that no one is coming to.
And while the City has been arranging the chairs and setting the table and making the hors d’oeuvres for guests that aren’t going to show, they’ve been ignoring the people that are already here.
What has the City done for you?
Paved the streets? No.
Raised your taxes? Yes.
Will the City heed the reason of professional demographic forecasters? Or will they swallow the rationales of real estate speculators who make campaign donations?
The real estate speculators are the odds on favorites.