From the City’s Planning and Growth Department, here are a couple of pictures that show the migration of Peoria’s population from the older neighborhoods to the south into the newer neighborhoods to the north. Areas in red and orange saw a decline in population, whereas areas in yellow and green saw an increase. As you look at these, take particular note of how large the area is that is losing population versus the area that is gaining population. Here’s a map that shows the change just over the past ten years:
And here’s what the change looks like over the past forty years:
Here are some other revealing statistics:
| Year | Population | Area |
|---|---|---|
| 1970 | 126,963 | 40 mi.2 |
| 2010 | 115,007 | 49.84 mi.2 |
That means that, over the past 40 years, there has been a 9.42% drop in population, and a 24.6% increase in land area that has been annexed into the City. In other words, our city has gotten physically bigger, but the burden of providing city services to all that land is falling on fewer taxpayers.
Now, to be fair, we had large population losses from 1970 to 2000, but have seen a slight population gain between 2000 and 2010. So let’s compare just the changes in the past ten years. Population increased from 112,936 to 115,007, or 1.83%, yet land area grew from 44 to 49.84 square miles, or 13.27%. If it takes over 13% growth in land to net a little under 2% growth in population, I would submit that we cannot sustain such a policy.
These charts illustrate that we have to find ways to get people moving back into our heritage neighborhoods. Northern growth alone is demonstrably insufficient to pull the city out of its fiscal crisis.
Cj,
the financial demographics should be out there, but the city does not have them published. I strongly suspect that the population growth has come from those leaving Chicago and would suspect that our low income population is mainly what increased. I also don’t know if there are data on this or not, but wondered who left. Our increase seems to be in minority populations, but without the economic data, which one would think would be the most important data, budgetary and other planning is difficult.
I can’t think of any reason that anyone would leave Chicago for Peoria. Jobs? no Schools? no Property value? no Entertainment? no.
The only advantage here is there is less police, less effective police and less sophisticated city leaders. (easier to buy off for less)It is easy to become the big fish in this small pond.
http://www.city-data.com/poverty/poverty-Peoria-Illinois.html
from 2009
At least some of this change must relate to people having smaller families, along with the increasing norm size of the american home per person – when people buy homes they don’t plan to fit as many into the space as was the case 30 years ago.
Looking at the data supplied by Paul, it is surprising that anyone would want to come to Peoria.
Income breakdown demographics can be obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau branch office in Chicago. That is how I obtained the information on median income for the East Bluff for the EVGC TIF area. Google it up and send them an email. My response took less that 24 hours.
“we have to find ways to get people moving back into our heritage neighborhoods”
1. More magnet and charter schools.
2. Developer incentive for tear down and rebuild of decaying area close to BU and other older, yet desirable areas of the city.
Peoria cannot continue to hand out the same crap and expect a different result. Your maps indicates clearly what people want (based on the migration pattern) — they want safe neighborhoods, NEWER housing stock, strong schools, good grocery stores and other shopping, etc. . . Really, no mystery here!
The core of the city is dead. The city is living off it’s branches. .
“NEWER housing stock” I don’t want ‘newer’ housing stock. Have you really looked at the homes that are being built today? Been in one? My 1912 home is a heck of lot safer than most homes built today. The quality of the construction? No contest.
I would contend two things.
1) People are buying these ‘newer’ homes because of the other factors. It becomes one of those compromises one makes.
2) Like used automobiles, people want to avoid homes that have impending maintenance costs. Understandable. There is a shortage of genuine craftsmen in this town who have the skills to work on a finely crafted home. This makes it difficult maintain any older home (Pre 1960), even if you have the means to do so. Why is there a shortage… hard to say but I can’t help buy feel that the general inferiority of work done today in building new homes has contributed. Most of the really skilled guys are are old… near retirement old. The young men are not learning the skills. They don’t need to. Any clown can hang vinyl siding. They pay is low and the profits high. Try and find a young carpenter who is skilled with a shaper/router, a planer? or even knows what a shaper is. Any plumbers or HVAC people wise in the ways of radiators? There are few of them left.
Just wait… over the next 20 years the most deteriorating homes and neighborhoods in Peoria won’t be those Pre-war ones. Look for those built in the 1970s and 80s.
Agreed Mahkno.
I have often said how cool it would be if a developer would build a subdivision made up of Upland-style homes. And for a higher end subdivision, use the homes on Moss. I have a feeling there would be quite a demand for this. Check out Simple Homes. They have some neat offerings.
Landlords coming from Chicago to buy up property???
The “decayed” area near Bradley consists of people who are dedicated to making things better in the area, Frustrated. You better hope we don’t decide to go away or the whole city will go down the tubes.
I agree with Mahkno and Mazr. We had a beautiful 1 1/2 story 3000 sq. ft. brick house in the west bluff. We replaced all 40 windows with new period correct Pella windows. 2 new furnaces and central air conditioners. Totally remodeled kitchen and finished basement with 9 ft. ceilings. When we purchased the house in 1986 the neighborhood was safe and occupied by young families such as ours and older families that had long occupied their homes. This was a house we planned to have for the rest of our lives. As years went bye, 2 houses in close proximity to our neighborhood were turned into section 8 and the whole surrounding area was starting to decay. After much debate, we decided it best that we move for the safety of our family. We sold this beautiful house, with mahogany wood work, 2 cherry wood fireplaces, plaster walls and slate roof, in 2008 for $44 a sq. ft. $130,000. We were fortune to get that as we had it on the market for 1 1/2 years. In 2006, we purchased a new 2900 sq. ft. home out North for $140 sq. ft.. Our real estate taxes went from $2700 to now paying $9200. Granted our yard is much bigger and the neigborhood is much safer.
But, the house is not of the craftmanship of the old house.
The location is not as convenient as the old neigborhood. And once again, I have a mortgage payment. Everytime I watch HGTV and see people wanting to buy houses in close proximity to downtown in other cities and pay a premium, I wonder where Peoria went wrong. How do we get people to want to move back into the inner city?
You get people to move back into the older neighborhoods by offering incentives. The city could guarantee loans for owner occupied homes, to purchase and rehab, but the owner must live in the home. Too many older homes are chopped up into apartments and rented out. If someone owns their home, they will take care of it and the neighborhood.
Frustrated, most of all they want safe schools. Let’s try just having a charter school take over Trewyn–as is, no changes in the student body–period. Then perhaps you will see that it isn’t the charter school that makes the difference–it’s the “unselected” student body that will keep the charter school from succeeding. Charter schools and magnet schools help parents escape, but they don’t solve problems for the district–the left behind “problem” children still have to be taught–and whichever school is forced to deal with the problems will not be quite so successful.
Mahkno – I am with you. I love older homes . . .but I believe we are the exception rather than the rule. And. . . older homes in many of the more stable areas of Peoria are still very expensive even though many need total remodeling. So, if I am a young professional family, I can buy a house is a corn field in Dunlap or Washington that is newer and the majority of my costs are contained in a single mortgage payment (at least for 10 years or so, right) vs. taking on an almost equal mortgage payment to live in a nicer neighborhood in Peoria and still have to set aside $$ for the new roof, bath remodel, failing garage door, etc.
Conrad, there are some lovely areas around BU but there are some blighted areas as well. Living in proximity to BU, Moss, the park, and a few restaurants and coffee shops offers a fertile development opportunity that the City should not squander. Throw a developer some dollars for this project and help her acquire the land instead of throwing dollars at a Marriott that a business developer should be able to finance based on the merits of the project (or not).
Sharon, you right — but the question C.J. asked related to how do we attract people back to the inner city, NOT how do we educate the economically disadvantaged. Again, you are not giving the “customer” what he wants. Whether Quest is successful or not (my bet is it will be) clearly that is what many people WANT. According to comments on Emerge’s blog, families filed appeals to be reconsidered for Washington in order to gain admittance. . . I mean really could it be any clearer???
Frustrated, ss long as you agree that charter schools can’t do any better than the existing inner schools–if the charter school were forced to work with the same student body at Trewyn, for example, then I understand your point. I understand your desire to give the customer (parents) a school away from the problem children–however, their parents are, also, District 150 customers (and I hate applying that term to education, but I will follow your lead)–and the charter school isn’t offering to help meet their needs.
But Sharon – some of the “customers” and their children ARE the problem. See remarks from some other bloggers above. Additionally, this is not a competition. It is not about proving one educational entity can beat the other. It is about educating children, getting more people to live in Peoria, and maintaining and increasing a tax revenue stream.
Offering more choice schools will attract and retain families that will purchase homes and pay taxes. We don’t need more families paying taxes on homes valued at $25,000, we need more families paying taxes on homes valued at $250,000. If we had more people wanting to get into Peoria rather than out, it would cause property values to rise, as well, and again this translates into more revenue for schools and city services. And then . . . maybe the District could devote more resources to schools like Trewyn in the way of longer school days, smaller class sizes, whatever to help these children succeed. The way it stand now . . . the District has little or no money to educate anyone.
Frustrated,
you are only looking at one side of the economic gander. Much like the city council does. They look at expanding revenues, hence the sprawl so we have devoted a significant amount of resources to expansion with no in fill planning. The result has been fewer families paying taxes on $25,000 houses, instead, landlords are. The taxes are still paid, but the expense of the types of people renting those house has caused the need for more police, code enforcment, etc. District 150 is inundated with an increasing number of families who do not participate in their children’s educational process. 78.8% of renters in the city are at or below poverty level. While education is the KEY to getting out of poverty, the community values of part of that population is not geared toward education. Note the other statistic 52.2% of those in poverty in Peoria DO NOT WORK. These are not the single parent homes where one parent is working 3 jobs trying to make ends meet and therefore not able to invest time in raising the children. These are households where no one works therefore one would think the parent has plenty of time to invest in the raising of the children. What do you see in the schools, increasing student violence, disrespect, lower test scores, etc. Some want to argue that the test scores are lower because of bad teachers or poor programming, I would argue that the test scores are low because of little to know parental involvement. When a teacher has to spend class time with unruly students, the rest of the class’ educational experience is stolen from them. Everyone suffers. Homework is not sent home. Why, parents don’t check and review it, books aren’t returned. Parents are contacting teachers to find out why the children aren’t doing well. Children are roaming the streets of at least my neighborhood well after they should be in bed. Kids need rest, nutricion, and most of guidance to be successful in school. There are huge problems with the families of the students in District 150 that NO ONE wants to bring up and discuss. Worst of all, the expectation is that the government fix the children at school and send them home to a hot mess. The community as a whole needs to take a stand regarding parents who won’t care for their children.
Frustrated, I don’t know the answer, but more charter and magnet schools will not solve the city’s problems. I am not convinced they will even solve the problems of those parents who could but don’t want to spend money on private education. Isn’t District 150 about 70% poverty–and, unfortunately, that does account for the problems Wilkinson just listed. How many more ways of escaping the problems of District 150 can be offered to the 30% for whom you advocate charter schools, etc? Yes, there are some gifted children in the poverty areas, but I think if you took an honest look at the academic performace of the majority, you would find that those who can escape already have.
How many areas in the city have older homes that anyone in the $250,000 bracket would want to buy? Outside of the Uplands and Bradley area (where no one wants to live now because of Bradley’s expansion causing noise, traffic, and parking problems) where are these homes? Most of the homes in other poverty areas were modest to begin with–and restoration now is unthinkable.
My solution as always is for District 150 to stop allowing the trouble makers the privilege of an education in the three traditional high schools (and middle schools,too) by creating an alternative school. Then concentrate on restoring order in the schools. Stop handing out grades like candy at schools like Manual where there are almost 400 on the honor role (making all A’s and B’s) and most of the rest getting C’s with few D’s and F’s. Once students are free to learn without all the distractions of the troublemakers, the city could start rebuilding a school system of which we can be proud (and we won’t need any outside companies like Edison, Johns Hopkins, and the one that will undoubtedly soon be taking over PHS)to do it. The struggling but well-behaved students (of which they are many) will have a better chance of getting the help and motivation they need without the unmotivated students holding them back.
I meant District 150, not the city, could start rebuilding the school system.