Thread: Gulf Coast sees high tide of population change

MSNBC.com


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Gulf Coast sees high tide of population change
Latinos swept into region after Hurricanes Katrina, Rita forced others out
The Associated Press


Updated: 7:35 a.m. ET June 7, 2006
WASHINGTON - Hurricanes Katrina and Rita drove an estimated 450,000 people from their communities along the Gulf Coast last year, but in the storms’ wake Hispanics moved in — perhaps 100,000 or more.

New government estimates show a region decimated by population losses four months after the storms. Orleans Parish in Louisiana lost 279,000 people, and nearby St. Bernard Parish lost 61,000, or 95 percent of its residents.

Hispanics, however, swept in by the tens of thousands, according to estimates released Tuesday by the Census Bureau.

Jose Rios, a Mexican immigrant from Eagle Point, Texas, runs a food trailer near a spot in New Orleans where dozens of immigrants wait each morning to be picked up for a day’s work.

“Every time you look up on the roofs, the guys doing the hard work, they’re all Hispanic,” said Rios, 36.

Guillermo Meneses, spokesman for the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, said, “Where you see work and the opportunity for work, you will see Latinos.”

The Census Bureau released population estimates Tuesday for 117 counties and parishes along the Gulf Coast for the period before hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and for Jan. 1, about four months afterward. The counties — all in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas — had been designated for hurricane assistance by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The data showed 40 counties and parishes losing a total of 450,000 residents. The other 77 counties and parishes — most of them farther inland — added 200,000 people.

Census officials cautioned that there weren’t many people to count in some areas four months after the storm, creating larger margins of error than in most census studies. Also, the region has changed since January, with more residents returning to some areas.

Events skew population counts
Steve Murdock, a demographer at the University of Texas San Antonio, said, “It’s a mistake to think that these numbers provide of a comprehensive look at the effects of Katrina. They provide a certain snapshot, but they are clearly only a partial picture.”

Among the weaknesses in the data: Only people living in households were counted, meaning that hurricane refugees living in hotels and shelters were excluded. That skewed some population counts.

For example, the estimates showed that Harris County, Texas, home to Houston, grew by 93,000 people. The city and county have consistently placed the population influx at 150,000 people.

“We know it says 90,000, but the number of people in the housing program alone exceeded that,” said Frank Michel, spokesman for Houston Mayor Bill White.

Also, while the data clearly shows an increase in Hispanics and immigrants in the hurricane region as a whole, it is less clear where those increases happened because the changes were so small in some areas.


Texas reaps most of the gains
Jorge delPinal, an assistant division chief for the Census Bureau, said much of the increase appeared to be in coastal Texas, though there were also increases in Mississippi and Alabama.

In New Orleans, demographer Greg Rigamer estimated the city has rebounded to at least 221,000 people since January, or about half the size it was before the storms.

“The analogy I like to use is that it’s like a stock price in the middle of the day. It’s a very dynamic and fluid situation. People are continuing to return and the availability of housing and utilities has a bearing on that,” said Rigamer, head of GCR & Associates Inc., a New Orleans consulting firm

Data in transition
Still, census officials said, the data offers the best look yet at who was driven from their homes, who was left behind, and who moved to the region in the months following the storms. Across the region, the data showed large jumps in the percentage of people using food stamps. In New Orleans, it showed average incomes increasing by 16 percent, in part because many of the poorest residents were forced to leave.

The black population in the New Orleans metropolitan area, which includes several largely white suburbs, dropped from 37 percent to 22 percent, while the white population grew from 60 percent to 73 percent of the total that remained.

The Census Bureau was unable to provide race or socio-economic data limited to the city of New Orleans because officials were unable to survey enough people there to generate reliable data.

Three Gulf Coast counties in Mississippi — Hancock, Harrison and Jackson — lost an estimated 50,000 people, or about 14 percent of their populations.

The share of white residents in those counties shrunk from 80 percent to 72 percent, while the share of black people grew from 17 percent to 28 percent.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said he expects most to return.

“I don’t have any concern about any kind of flight,” Barbour said. “I think virtually everybody on the coast, or well over 90 percent of people who lived on the coast before the storm, intend to be living and will be living on the coast in the future.”

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13172174/from/RS.3/


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© 2006 MSNBC.com

Yes and from the CNN article I read MS-13 was swept into the area with them bringing guns, drugs and crime to an already embattled area along with the countless stories of American citizens displaced by Hurricane Katrina who were employed by FEMA contractors at various sites until one supervisor at a work site said "you all are dismissed, the Mexicans are here". Just too bad they aren't swept back out.

Just found this news report released today about New Orleans' demographic shift post-Katrina:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... ome-nation

Storms Also Shifted Demographics, Census Finds
By Ann M. Simmons, Times Staff Writer
June 7, 2006


NEW ORLEANS — In the four months following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the population of the New Orleans metropolitan area became substantially whiter, older and less poor, and it shrank to less than half its size, according to statistics released today by the Census Bureau.

The figures were drawn from estimates of the hurricane-affected areas along the Gulf Coast as of Jan. 1, and cover 117 counties initially designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency for individual or public assistance. Separate data from the Census Bureau's 2005 American Community Survey, or ACS, analyzed demographic, socioeconomic and housing characteristics of the population in those counties.

ADVERTISEMENTCensus officials and demographers said the new statistics provided the most comprehensive post-Katrina population and demographic figures to date.

"The data from the ACS provides the first quantitative data in support of anecdotal stories we have read and seen on television for the past nine months," said Lisa Blumerman, deputy chief of the ACS, which typically produces annual estimates of population and housing characteristics after a full year of data collection. This time, however, ACS divided the 2005 data into an eight-month period before Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and a four-month period after the storms.

Census officials acknowledged that because of the survey's shorter time period, and the smaller sample size because of difficulties in conducting interviews immediately after the storms in flood-ravaged areas such as Orleans and St. Bernard parishes, "the reliability of the estimates is reduced."

Parishes and counties were combined into metropolitan statistical areas, and the margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The biggest population loss was experienced in metropolitan New Orleans, which includes seven parishes, and in the Mississippi Gulf Coast counties of Harrison and Hancock, and part of the Gulfport-Biloxi area also in Mississippi.

The population of Orleans fell from 437,186 in July 2005 to 158,353 after the storms. Nearby St. Bernard Parish lost 95% of its residents.

The New Orleans metro area's population was 37% black between January and August 2005 and fell to 22% between September and December 2005. The percentage of white residents grew from 60% to 73%. Households earning between $10,000 and $14,999 annually dropped from 8.3% to 6.5%; while those with a yearly income of between $75,000 and $99,999 rose from 10.5% to 11.4%.

"It's become substantially whiter, less poor, and there is a greater percentage of the area's people who have high-valued homes, or who are paying higher values of rent," said William H. Frey, a demographer and visiting fellow at Washington's Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program, which analyzed the new census figures. "The changes also tend to impact the family structure and household. There is a decline in poverty."

Frey added that the disproportionate out-migration of lower-income and black residents to destinations farther away from New Orleans had likely slowed the return of such residents, because they lacked the finances, did not own their property, or if they did, the property might have been destroyed.

The percentage of households that were renters dropped from 36% to 27%, Frey said.

While population numbers have drastically decreased in Orleans and St. Bernard parishes, a dramatic rise has occurred in cities such as Houston and Baton Rouge, which absorbed large numbers of displaced people.

Harris County, where Houston is located, gained some 92,000 people in the last six months of 2005, according to the Brookings analysis of the census data. East Baton Rouge saw a population spike of about 4% in four months.

"Blacks tended to move to where they had relatives and friends or where they were first evacuated to," Frey said. People who relocated to nearby towns such as Baton Rouge tended to be middle class and own cars.

Blumerman, the census official, said other significant findings for the New Orleans area in the four months after Katrina included: The number of people who were living in a different home rose from 13% a year ago to 21% in January; the median age of residents had increased from 38 to 42; and, in Louisiana's federally designated hurricane-related assistance zones, the number of people in need of food stamps went from 12% to 31%.

Louisiana state officials said that while the data was useful, it was just "a snapshot."

"It's a partial picture of the changes," said Karen Paterson, a demographer at the Louisiana State Census Data Center.

*

(INFOBOX BELOW)

After the hurricanes

Metropolitan New Orleans has become older, whiter and more prosperous since Hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck last summer:

Jan. through Sept. through
Aug. 2005 Dec. 2005
Population: 1,190,615 723,830
Median age: 38 42
Income: $39,793 $43,447
Race
- White: 59% 73%
- African American: 37% 22%
- Other: 4% 5%


Note: Metropolitan area includes New Orleans, Metairie and Kenner.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Once the city is rebuilt, where are the Katrina victims going to come home to if the Illegals have invaded the area?

Where are the Illegals living now..... in huts and tents???

Originally Posted by ConcernedCitizen

Once the city is rebuilt, where are the Katrina victims going to come home to if the Illegals have invaded the area?

Where are the Illegals living now..... in huts and tents???

From what I understand from friends from LA, and from the charity I helped during the hurricane aftermath, most have no intention of coming back and of those who have returned, most were wealthy and their homes either weren't hit bad enough to be condemned (they were on higher ground). The ones who were relocated because they had no transportation can't come back. They are too poor to afford the move and have established roots where they were moved to (kids in school, etc).

The immigrant workers (presumed illegal) are most likely being put up in housing by the companies that hired them to do the reconstruction work.

Originally Posted by ForFutureGens

Originally Posted by ConcernedCitizen

Once the city is rebuilt, where are the Katrina victims going to come home to if the Illegals have invaded the area?

Where are the Illegals living now..... in huts and tents???

From what I understand from friends from LA, and from the charity I helped during the hurricane aftermath, most have no intention of coming back and of those who have returned, most were wealthy and their homes either weren't hit bad enough to be condemned (they were on higher ground). The ones who were relocated because they had no transportation can't come back. They are too poor to afford the move and have established roots where they were moved to (kids in school, etc).

The immigrant workers (presumed illegal) are most likely being put up in housing by the companies that hired them to do the reconstruction work.

This is incorrect information, Forfuturegens. Please validate it if at all possible.

We must be careful not to post incorrect info.

The ILLEGALS have not only taken jobs that Katrina victims could be doing but they have NOW PRACTICALLY SHUT DOWN THE HOSPITALS with their medical issues. New Orleans Hospitals have had enough on their hands and now, we the taxpayers, must foot the bill for ILLEGALS and their DISEASES while our Black citizens are still homeless.

What a SHAM.

The immigrant workers (presumed illegal) are most likely being put up in housing by the companies that hired them to do the reconstruction work.

And that makes everyting OK? With government funds, contracts welfare to boot. Lovely

Originally Posted by 2ndamendsis

Originally Posted by ForFutureGens

Originally Posted by ConcernedCitizen

Once the city is rebuilt, where are the Katrina victims going to come home to if the Illegals have invaded the area?

Where are the Illegals living now..... in huts and tents???

From what I understand from friends from LA, and from the charity I helped during the hurricane aftermath, most have no intention of coming back and of those who have returned, most were wealthy and their homes either weren't hit bad enough to be condemned (they were on higher ground). The ones who were relocated because they had no transportation can't come back. They are too poor to afford the move and have established roots where they were moved to (kids in school, etc).

The immigrant workers (presumed illegal) are most likely being put up in housing by the companies that hired them to do the reconstruction work.

This is incorrect information, Forfuturegens. Please validate it if at all possible.

We must be careful not to post incorrect info.

The ILLEGALS have not only taken jobs that Katrina victims could be doing but they have NOW PRACTICALLY SHUT DOWN THE HOSPITALS with their medical issues. New Orleans Hospitals have had enough on their hands and now, we the taxpayers, must foot the bill for ILLEGALS and their DISEASES while our Black citizens are still homeless.

What a SHAM.

I'm sorry? Which part is incorrect? I can try to validate if I am clear on what you say is incorrect.
Yes, illegals are taking jobs that some locals wanted to help rebuild their lives and homes. My favorite uncle's ex wife is now married to a man who works for a construction company in N.O. and he said the construction company is paying the costs to house the workers in local rentals (hotels, rooming houses, "Katrina cottages").

article on illegal immigrants taking rebuilding jobs and quote on who is paying for their housing:

"...They retire at night to downtown or outlying hotels paid for by contractors, sometimes four or more to a room, or in tents in city parks. They are some of the more visible occupants of a half-empty city."

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/10/23/World ... New_.shtml

Originally Posted by ForFutureGens

article on illegal immigrants taking rebuilding jobs and quote on who is paying for their housing:

"...They retire at night to downtown or outlying hotels paid for by contractors, sometimes four or more to a room, or in tents in city parks. They are some of the more visible occupants of a half-empty city."

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/10/23/World ... New_.shtml

Let's add some pertinent information concerning the above, shall we?

the CONTRACTORS are paid with FEDERAL MONEY which is actually AMERICAN TAX PAYER MONEY.

CONCLUSION: now Americans are paying to HOUSE ILLEGALS...not the Contractors.

Holy Toledo.........we've yet more burden put upon us and draining our money due to the ILLEGALS invading our USofA.

Hey folks! What do you say to this great American financial drain down New Orleans way? Illegals sucking the American Tax Payer yet again.