Mahoning Valley population continues to fall

Staff/wire report

YOUNGSTOWN

The Mahoning Valley continues to be among the top areas in the nation in population loss, according to new estimates provided by the U.S. Census Bureau.

The region that includes Mahoning and Trumbull counties in Ohio and Mercer County in Pennsylvania – referred by the bureau as the Youngstown-Warren-Boardman Metropolitan Statistical Area – lost 2.8 percent of its population between the 2010 census and the July 2015 estimate released Thursday.

That’s among the top 15 Metropolitan Statistical Areas in the U.S. in highest percentage population declines.

MSAs are considered by the bureau to have at least one core urban area of at least 50,000 residents.

The 2010 census had the population of this region at 565,773. It dropped to 549,885 in July 2015. That’s a decline of 15,888 people with the area losing population every year.

The bureau provides annual population estimates using birth and death records and migration data. That can sometimes lead to inaccurate counts, and the bureau has updated records from previous years.

The bureau also provided population estimates for counties Thursday.

Trumbull County’s population declined from 210,312 in the 2010 census to 203,751 in the 2015 estimate. That 3.1 percent decline is among the top five highest of Ohio’s 88 counties.

Mahoning County’s 2.9 percent decline between the 2010 census and the 2015 estimate wasn’t too far behind. The county saw its population drop from 238,823 in the 2010 census to 231,900 in the 2015 estimate provided by the bureau.

The population of Columbiana County – not included in the Youngstown-Warren-Boardman MSA – declined by 2.8 percent from 107,841 in the 2010 census to 104,806 in the 2015 estimate.

The Ohio county with the largest percentage population decline between 2010 and 2015 is Crawford in the north-central portion of the state. Its population declined by 3.4 percent.

Ohio’s overall population increased by 0.7 percent from 11,536,504 in the 2010 census to 11,613,423 in the 2015 estimate.

Mercer County saw a 2.1 percent decline from 116,638 in the 2010 census to 114,234 in the 2015 estimate.

Elsewhere, The Villages, the retirement community in central Florida famous for its souped-up golf carts once again was the nation’s fastest-growing metro area, according to bureau figures.

It was the third year in a row the community of 119,000 residents had gotten the title of “fastest-growing” with a growth rate of 4.3 percent from July 2014 to July 2015.

“It’s exciting to hear we are No. 1 again,” said Sue Kelly, executive director of the Lady Lake Chamber Commerce in adjacent Lady Lake, Fla.

Most of the growth came from retirees moving to the community located northwest of Orlando, and 99 percent of the migration was from people who already live in the United States, according to the census figures.

Two other Florida metro areas were among the 10 fastest-growing cities in the U.S. in the past year. Cape Coral-Fort Myers had a growth rate of 3.3 percent, and Punta Gorda grew by 2.8 percent.