[Vision2020] Some comments for Jeff Harkins
Jeff Harkins
jeffh at moscow.com
Sat Mar 4 13:56:49 PST 2006
Here you go Mark - straight from the CC web page:
>Population Growth
>
> City County
>1980 16,513 28,749
>1990 18,422 31,314
>1995 20,555 33,050
>1998 21,500 32,051
>2000 21,291 34,935
>2005 21,700 35,218
>
>The average annual growth rate for Moscow is .7%
>The average annual growth rate for Latah is .6%
Check the city numbers for 1998 and 2000
At 11:46 AM 3/4/2006, you wrote:
>Jeff,
>
>A point of clarification is needed here re
>population numbers. Somehow, a conflation of
>City of Moscow and Latah County numbers seems to
>have occurred. I'm going to admit I'm too busy
>at the moment to dig out the census numbers but
>to my knowledge there has never been a negative
>growth period in Moscow. There has been a 15
>year trend in shrinking rural Latah County
>populations (including populations within the
>county's small cities only now reversing in a
>few) that has been precipitated by changes
>within the rural natural resource based economy
>due to a combination of market forces, federal
>land use policies, corporate decision-making
>(sometimes seen as a subset of market forces)
>and automation of previously labor-intensive job-producing industries.
>
>So yes, there may have been a county-wide
>negative growth at some point, but Moscow has
>only seen a steady increase which to my
>knowledge is very close to the 1% reported by Mr. Holmquist.
>
>Mark Solomon
>
>>Also in response to BJ, you wrote:
>>>To maintain the status quo in
>>>growth (.6% to .7%), we must find a way to house
>>>about 150 - 200 families each year in Latah
>>>County - that is a mathematical fact. The
>>>challenge in all of this is that those families
>>>must have a way to feed and house themselves -
>>>they must have economic opportunity.
>>
>>The mathematical fact is a conditional one: IF
>>growth continues at a rate of .6% to .7% per
>>year, then 150 - 200 families will need
>>housing. The mathematical fact is not the claim
>>that â*we must find a way to house about 150 -
>>200 families each year in Latah County.â* It
>>takes more than just the conditional,
>>mathematical fact to support that value claim.
>>First, it takes the truth of the antecedent of
>>the conditional: that Moscow will continue to
>>grow at the same rate. Second, it takes other
>>value claims, like â*grow or die,â* with
>>which folks like BJ and I would disagree.
>
>I think I have responded to this point a couple
>of times, so I will keep my response brief. My
>point on the growth issue was to refute the
>"highly emotional but devoid of fact" comment by
>Mr. Antone Holmquist. If you need Holmquist's
>quote, let me know. Agreed, the mathematical
>argument is conditional - conditional on the
>growth rate. Before we digress too far, please
>note that the rate that I used was the average
>growth rate for the last 25 years or so. If we
>look at more recent history, we have years which reported negative growth.
>
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