Cities and communities in Yuma and La Paz counties in Arizona saw minimal growth from 2021 to 2022, according to U.S. Census Bureau statistics released Thursday.
Welton has seen the fastest growth of any community in southwest Arizona, from 2,465 in 2021 to 2,519 in 2022. However, this is only a 2.19 percent increase.
Yuma went from 97,154 Yuman to 98,527, a change of 1.41 percent.
Summerton’s Summertonian number went from 14,412 to 14,514, a change of 0.71%.
Parker in La Paz county went from 3,344 to 3,361, a change of 0.51 percent.
Nearby quartzsite rose 0.47 percent from 2,355 to 2,366.
San Luis, Arizona, was the only city in our region to see a decline, where the number of residents decreased by 0.96% from 36,118 to 35,770.
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by Howard Fisher
capitol media services
Phoenix — The two cities on the edge of the city of Phoenix have grown faster than any other community in Arizona.
In fact, Queen Creek and Maricopa are among the top 15 cities in the nation for population growth one year from July 1, 2021, according to new statistics released by the U.S. Census Bureau on Thursday.
However, this doesn’t tell the whole story.
When producing the rankings, federal agencies only rank cities that are considered “large cities,” i.e. cities with a population of 50,000 or more.
But a closer look reveals that Coolidge has been boosted by new factories and economic development, with a one-year population change rate of 11.9%, outpacing both of these cities.
The new report also reveals that about one in four Arizona communities have actually lost their population. And the biggest loser was the city of Douglas, which lost 4.6% of its population, according to Census Bureau statistics, bringing the city’s population below 16,000, effectively returning it to its early-century state.
Much of the content of the new national report is not surprising. The fastest growing communities tend to be on the edge of existing cities.
And most of them are in the South or West, on the edge of metropolitan areas, like Queen Creek and Maricopa.
Consider Georgetown, Texas, which the Census Bureau considers to have grown the fastest in percentage terms over the past year, at 14.4%. It’s about an hour away from Austin.
Kyle and Leander’s Texas also ranks third and fourth with 10.9% year-over-year growth, placing them outside of Austin.
And Santa Cruz, California, in second place with 12.5%, benefits from its location south of San Jose and Silicon Valley.
The same is true in Arizona.
A few decades ago, it was communities like Glendale and Mesa that grew by leaps and bounds. These communities quickly filled up.
At the same time, additional highways were built, expanded and extended. And this has reduced commute times to acceptable levels for those who need to travel to major cities for work, encouraging them to live further afield.
Queen Creek is a prime example of that.
Not only did the state complete the 202 loop into the southeastern gorge, most of it from county tax dollars, but it also built and extended State Route 24, which was now a mile all the way from 202. are doing. to Pinal County.
And that’s just the beginning. A new budget signed by Gov. Katie Hobbs earlier this month gives the city of Queen Creek $87.5 million for further expansion of SR 24, including the Ironwood Road transit interchange.
Queen Creek was able to add an additional 4,416 residents in the year ending July 1, 2022, even though the highway is not yet completed. This represents an increase of nearly 6.7%.
Maricopa was not far behind, with 3,844 new residents, an increase of nearly 6.2%.
Other communities in and around the periphery of the Phoenix area also saw significant year-over-year population growth, including 4.6% growth at Casa Grande, 3.8% growth at Goodyear, and a nearly identical growth in the adjacent Buckeye.
Wickenberg and Surprise also achieved growth of over 3%.
Coolidge can also be said to be located on the periphery of Phoenix. But that growth has been underpinned by a number of new economic developments.
There is still more to come.
Last November, for example, Procter & Gamble announced a $500 million investment in a manufacturing facility. And this community has land that can be used for both industry and housing.
The growth pattern at the urban edge is repeated around Tucson, albeit to a much lesser extent.
According to the Census Bureau, Marana added an additional 1,290 residents in one year, bringing its population to 55,962. But it was enough to record a growth rate of less than 2.4%.
And Sahuarita’s record was less than 1.2%. By comparison, Tucson itself came close to the 1% level, but fell short of it.
After Douglas, the other community that recorded the greatest population decline was Florence. However, this has been greatly affected by the declining number of prisoners in state-run prisons in recent years.
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Twitter: @azcapmedia
