Opportunities not Challenges Focus of Fall Community Breakfast

CLARION – A diverse mix of community and university leaders packed the American Legion banquet hall yesterday for the Fall Community Breakfast to find out if changing demographics will mean challenges or opportunities for Clarion County.  The verdict?  It will be a little of both.

Barry Denk, director of the Center for Rural Pennsylvania, was the featured speaker and he presented a county scan with quantitative information on how age, income, education and diversity issues are changing the face of Clarion.  Although the challenges were evident in the data, Denk emphasized the opportunities these changes will present..

“It’s important to look beyond Clarion County and find common ground with your neighbors,” he said. “Take a regional approach rooted in local ownership.”

Here are some Clarion County statistics:

• Clarion County’s population is declining but not rapidly.
• It peaked in 1980 at 43,300.
• In 2010, it was just under 40,000.
• The projected population for 2030 is 37,895.
• There were 401 births and 411 deaths in 2010. This partially accounts for population decrease.
• Young people and baby boomers are significant age cohorts in Clarion County. Baby boomers, collectively, are the largest population group. The 20-24 age group is second largest, which includes Clarion University students. The 15-19 age group is the third largest cohort.

“Clarion University students impact the demographics, economy and infrastructure of Clarion County,” Denk said. “They need to be engaged.”

• In 2009, 9.4 percent of the total income in Clarion County came from Social Security payments.

“Older people are good for the local economy,” he added. “There money stays here.”

Denk posed the question: “Is Clarion County providing goods and services that meet the needs of the population?”

• Between 2008-09, 350 people moved into Clarion County from out of state.
• From 1960 to 2010, the non-white population in Clarion County increased from 1 percent to 3 percent

Denk said we need to ask ourselves how welcoming we are to folks who don’t look, talk, act or believe like we do. “Non-white people are part of the community,” Denk said..”Does the county welcome them?”

He also noted that household composition is shifting.

• Married couples with children decreased from 28 percent to 17 percent between 1990 and 2010.
• Single-person households rose from 24 percent to 28 percent.
• Single-parent households and married couples with no children were nearly unchanged.
• Households classified as “other types” incrased from 10 percent to 15 percent.

“What are we doing as a community to make sure housing is available to these other types?” Denk asked.

• Unemployment in the county peaked at 16.1 percent in 1983
• Current unemployment rate is 9.9 percent

“We survived the recession of the 80s and we will survive [the current economic challenges], but a lot depends on what we do at a local level,” he said.

• Half of employers in the county employ five or fewer people.
• Three-quarters of employers employ 10 or fewer people.
• Average wage and salary in the county in 2009 was $30,341.

His challenge to the group:  “Understand the Clarion community as a whole and identify what you can do collectively and individually to make change.”