21. Percentage Foreign Born
City of Columbus | 1900—2010
12%
10%
8%
6%
4%
2%
0%
20
40
60
00
00
80
19
19
19
19
19
20
22. The world is coming to Columbus…
…to find opportunity
23. Opportunity Mapping
Neighborhoods Jobs + Access Health + Safety Education
Median home Transit access Medically Student
value underserved poverty
Mean rating
Poverty rate commute time School
Number of performance
Vacancy rate Job access primary care index
Foreclosure Unemployment providers
Educational
rate rate Incarceration attainment
Rate of cost- Job growth rate rate
Student
burdened attendance
households rate
29. Growth in Economic Segregation
% of Households Living in Poor Neighborhoods and % of Families Living in Affluent
Neighborhoods by Decade for the Columbus Region
35 15.6
30 13.6
25 9.7
20 7.8 5 16.5
13.9
15 12.6
10.7
8.8
10
5
0
1970 1980 1990 2000 2005/2009
% Living in Affluent Neighborhoods
% Living in Poor Neighborhoods
Editor's Notes
When Ed Koch became Mayor of New York City in 1978 he took over during a period of incredible change. Most of which was negative. There was a social crisis, a financial crisis, and an energy crisis. Shortly after taking office he was walking on the Brighton Beach boardwalk when an elderly lady approached and said, ‘ Mr. Mayor, make it like it was .’” He responded, “ Madam, it probably never was the way you remember it was, but I’ll try my best”. What is important about his response is that he suggests that no matter how bad things are—a social crisis, fiscal crisis, and energy crisis—that the city will not only survive, but can thrive in the face of major changes. And in the end, he was right. In Columbus we just came through a decade of major change—although not as dramatic as 1970s New York—we experienced a demographic shift that has culturally changed us as well as a housing crisis and a financial crisis the likes of which we haven ’t seen in generations. Part of our change is that we are a rapidly growing region and in the last decade our metro…
Grew by 359 people every week.
Or 1,864 people every month.
Or 22,370 every year. Essentially, our region adds a combined population of Grandview Heights and Powell every 12 months. Most of our growth is due to births because we are a young region. We more importantly we are the only area of Ohio where more people are moving in than leaving. So let ’s talk about that! The smallest percentage of our growth—about 24% —is due to more Americans moving into our region, than moving out.
This map shows the movement of American born people between Franklin County (shown in white in the middle of Ohio) and every other US county in the previous decade. We are a mobile nation. And while this map shows relationships, it doesn ’t show who is coming and going, or to where. But in a single year, just before the recession in 2008, we can look at the data and see...
The top location of in-migrants came from the Cleveland area, where 802 people moved to Columbus.
Second was Dayton with 752 people coming to Columbus….
Third was Youngstown where 547 people left for Columbus .
Detroit was fourth….
And Akron fifth….do you see a pattern? Nearby industrial cities doing far worse than Columbus—that ’s where we attracted people from.
Now that we know where people come from, when people leave Columbus where do they go?
Top destination for folks who left Columbus…264 went to Phoenix!
Second was Dallas…
Houston was third…
The largest city in the Tarheel state was fourth…
And the capital of the Peach state was fifth….do you see another pattern? People have been heading to warmer and sunny places.
This is the same map as earlier now depicting net move-ins in Black lines and move-outs in Red lines. A different pattern appears. The point of this image is that Columbus is attracting people from about a 250-mile radius. When people leave Columbus, they leave the state, and essentially the Midwest all together. Columbus ’ attractiveness almost stops at the state line…. … ..At least for Americans it does. But a slightly larger share of our growth about 26%--is now coming from far away.
We haven ’t been known as a city of immigrants for a really long time and starting with 1970 as a base map you can see that only 2% of our County was foreign born. It used to be said that the only foreign diversity in Columbus was either attending Ohio State University or teaching there . (CLICK) By 1980, the percentage of foreign born increased to 2.8% (CLICK) By 1990, it was still a very low 3.4%, adding 8,300 foreign born in the previous decade. (CLICK) By 2000, things began to change. During the previous ten years, over 32,000 international immigrants moved to Franklin County brining the percentage to 6%. (CLICK) Just 9 years later the percentage had jumped to over 9% and swelling to over 105,000. Additionally, these new arrivals were locating throughout the community .
Now comparing 1970 on the left and 2009 on the right you can clearly see the more than 500% increase in the number of foreign born in Franklin County. And imagine for a moment if all of the county ’s foreign born lived in the same municipality, they would create Ohio’s 6 th largest city!
When you look at the entire 7-county metro, there are now more than 132,000 foreign-born residents living here, more than anywhere in the state. And of all our foreign-born living here in 2010—86% of them have moved into the U.S. since 2000. They are very new to the United States.
Within the City of Columbus itself we are now at a century high with regard to the percentage of people who are foreign born. What will it mean if this rate of change continues? And what does it mean that more people are now moving here from say Africa and Latin America than from Dayton or Detroit?
Ohio State University ’s Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity created Opportunity Maps of Franklin County that incorporate 17 indicators from 4 broad categories: Neighborhoods Jobs & Access Health & Safety and Education to create a single image as if you we were to look at all 17 data sets simultaneously. Pretty Cool. And some clear patterns emerged.
On the left is the Franklin County Opportunity Map and the right is an inset that allows a closer look at the neighborhoods surrounding downtown. The darker the color, the greater the level of opportunity. The first thing that becomes apparent is the adjacency that some of our highest opportunity neighborhoods have with some of our lowest opportunity places. What the Kirwan Institute research suggests is that for most of us “opportunity”—whether or not we graduate from school, be a victim of crime, or develop diabetes—is often about where we were born, or more importantly, where we continue to live. And we are NOT experiencing opportunity equally.
Now we factor in race. On the map on the left you can see the Asian population and on the right, the White population. Each dot is sized according to the size of the people from that racial group who live in that census tract. What become apparent is that 70% of Asians live in the highest opportunity neighborhoods, while it is about 50% for the White population. As an example you can see the large numbers of White people living in the very low opportunity neighborhoods of Franklinton and the Hilltop—shown in yellow—on the near west side.
Now we compare the Hispanic population on the left and the African-American population on the right. What becomes clear in these two comparisons is that the Hispanic population is living in moderate opportunity areas, while the majority of African-Americans are concentrated in the lowest opportunity neighborhoods . The Latino community which has more than doubled in the past decade, has managed to locate in better opportunity neighborhoods than most African-American households . Many of the struggles of the Black Community in Columbus is due to the fact that too many are removed physicall y from where opportunity exists.
Now looking at poverty and again beginning in 1970, the poverty rate in Franklin County was just over 10% and well below the US rate of 13%. There were just over 85,000 people living in poverty and it was concentrated in neighborhoods closest to downtown . (CLICK) By 1980, the poverty rate had risen to 12.3% and almost 104,000 were living in poverty, an increase in real numbers of 18,100 . (CLICK) By 1990, the rate had risen slightly to 13%, but due to increased population growth, we added about the same number of people to the ranks of the poor. Our poverty rate then matched the US rate . (CLICK) But the 1990s was a different story. The poverty rate actually fell 1.4% during the decade and despite Franklin County adding 107,000 additional people, we essentially added no additional poor. We didn ’t realize how good it was. (CLICK) The 9 years following the 2000 Census tells a very different story as the poverty rate skyrocketed 6.6 percentage points and the numbers swelled to over 205,000. During this period the county grew by 95,000 people, but added 84,000 to the ranks of the poor. And the County ’s poverty rate in 2009 stood more than 3 percentage points HIGHER than the US rate.
When you compare the geography of poverty between 1970 and 2009 three obvious things appear. For one, the geography of poverty now consumes a much larger area of the community due to the fact that poverty has grown three times faster than population . Two, we have seen an increase in concentrated poverty—depicted in the darkest of green and blue—the areas where quality of life conditions break down for everyone . And three, the suburbanization of poverty into what where previously stable middle class areas of the city . It is worth mentioning that last year in the benchmarking study Columbus was ranked with low unemployment yet high poverty—this is due to many of our jobs not providing wages that allow working people to be above the poverty line .
The last community trend I will share—and a trend happening almost everywhere—is a growing segregation not by color or ethnicity, but by income . As you can see in this graph in 1980 only 10.7% of our community was poor and living in poor neighborhoods and 5% were affluent and living in affluent neighborhoods. By 2009, the numbers had increased to 16.5% and 15.6% respectively, meaning nearly 1/3 of all people where either poor or affluent, but NOT living near anyone different than them with regard to income . A study released just weeks ago by the Pew Charitable Trust reported that Columbus is now the 7 th most income segregated Metro in the nation—just ahead of Detroit .
So I had the Kirwan Institute plot our incomes on a map to see what would appear. Each blue dot represents 25 households with incomes above $100,000 and each yellow dot represents 25 households in poverty. Clearly there is pattern of economic segregation . As you can see there is a concentration of poverty immediately Northeast, West and East of downtown and large concentrations of wealth Northwest in the top left of the slide—Upper Arlington, Clintonville, & Dublin . On the east side in blue Bexley stands out, as does German Village immediately south of downtown .
It is clear that we are experiencing rapid change. And while we face many challenges, we are faring better than most. We are growing, becoming more diverse, and despite increases in poverty, our current unemployment rate is now the 5 th lowest among the 50 largest US Metros. As a Smart + Open city we must use what we know about community change and turn our perceived weaknesses into strengths.
Just two weeks ago the NYTimes Magazine reported on Ohio ’s strong recovery claiming that “Ohio’s economic future will be largely tied to the new economy that Columbus represents: Banking Insurance Management consulting State-of-the-art medical facilities High-tech manufacturing and Research ” Equally important it acknowledged that Columbus is city where it ’s citizenry has invested in our future through infrastructure, parkland, fiber optics, and other quality of life investments . As our Bicentennial Year quickly comes to a close it is only fitting that we take stock of where we are and acknowledge that will never be able to make it like it was…and you see, 33 years ago Mayor Koch got it right about his city, just as we have gotten it right with ours—Columbus will do more than just survive these changes, it can thrive . On behalf of all of us here at TCF, we thank you for all you do that allows our city to not just change, but continue to thrive .
