Posted on 11/15/2005 11:31:36 AM PST by beaureguard
Mary James, an empty-nester from Snellville, craves the in-town bustle. Michelle Forren is tired of planning life around rush hour in Duluth. And Louise Stewart is fed up with the Spanish-language business signs, backyard chickens and overcrowded homes in her Norcross-area neighborhood.
Though their reasons vary, all three women plan to join an emerging demographic: whites leaving Gwinnett County.
In what might surprise metro Atlantans who remember the nearly lily-white county of old, Gwinnett's non-Hispanic white population declined for the first time last year, according to the latest estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. The drop of about 1,500 whites came even as Gwinnett, the state's perennial growth leader, added more than 27,000 residents.
One year doesn't make a trend. And some observers question the census estimates. But the figures offer more evidence that the number of whites is at the very least leveling off in Gwinnett, adding a new dimension to a lightning-fast demographic shift that has transformed a once-uniform suburb into what one Washington think tank called a "mini-Ellis Island."
One other indicator: White student enrollment in Gwinnett schools has declined in each of the past five years.
In some ways, Gwinnett is behaving like Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb and Fulton counties, whose non-Hispanic white populations have been dropping. But those counties aren't growing nearly as fast as Gwinnett.
Because thousands of whites still move to Gwinnett each year, the stagnating total suggests that many must be leaving, too, said Douglas C. Bachtel, a demographer at the University of Georgia. That matters because most of Gwinnett's longtime residents happen to be white. And communities can struggle when their most deeply rooted residents leave, Bachtel said. "These are the foot soldiers for your community associations — the chambers, the PTAs for the various self-help groups," he said.
James is one of those leaving, now that her three sons have graduated from high school. She and her husband want to leave Snellville for a place where they can stroll to shops, restaurants and museums. They put an offer on a house in the Oakhurst section of Decatur last week. "I'm ready for a new stage," James said. "I'm ready to break out and experience life without kids."
But residents such as Stewart say they're departing not because they've changed but because the community around them has. "I used to be able to have pleasant chats with neighbors, and now few speak English," said Stewart, who lives with her four dogs in the Rockborough North subdivision off Beaver Ruin Road. "It's a lonely feeling."
Stewart, who teaches English for speakers of other languages at Gwinnett Technical College, waved to a former student as she walked down the street she's called home for 25 years. "Are you still taking English classes?" Stewart shouted. The woman smiled and shook her head no. Stewart continued walking past yards sprouting satellite dishes and cactus plants. "Oh well," she said.
The number of Hispanics in Gwinnett is now more than 12 times what it was in 1990, according to the latest census estimates. The Asian population has increased more than sixfold. And the black population has grown sevenfold. Until recently, the white population was growing, too, just not as fast. The county is now 57 percent white, down from 90 percent in 1990.
Louise Radloff, a member of the Gwinnett County school board for more than 30 years, said the additions have enriched her district between Norcross and Lilburn. It's the subtractions that hurt. Many schools in the area are now less than 10 percent white.
"It's called white flight," Radloff said. "There is a perception that with the diversity, there is low-income and there is crime. We need to learn to cope with these issues and decide that all men are created equal."
Bart Lewis, chief of the research division at the Atlanta Regional Commission, said any "white flight" from Gwinnett is limited. It's a far cry, he said, from what happened a generation ago in parts of Atlanta and DeKalb County, where neighborhoods changed practically overnight as white families moved to outlying areas such as Gwinnett.
In fact, Lewis finds it hard to believe that the number of whites isn't still rising in Gwinnett. Accurate racial breakdowns are difficult to estimate, particularly at the county level, he said.
Lewis sees the shift in Gwinnett as driven more by economics than race, anyway. Lower-income families scouring metro Atlanta for an affordable house or apartment are landing in the aging neighborhoods of western Gwinnett. Most of them happen to be minorities, Lewis said.
"What I think you're really seeing is an evacuation of more-affluent households of one race replaced by less-affluent people of another race," he said.
Kay Kim, a real-estate agent whose 450 home sales were mostly in western Gwinnett last year, said many white sellers have complained to her about culture clash. Roughly 80 percent of her sellers last year were white, and 50 percent of the buyers were Latino, she said. Many of the departing families settled farther out in Gwinnett or in Hall, Forsyth and Jackson counties, Kim said.
The turnover has been largely concentrated in more-affordable neighborhoods around Duluth, Lilburn, Lawrenceville and Norcross, she said. Subdivisions where homes are priced above $200,000 tend to be more stable, Kim said.
William Frey, a demographer at the University of Michigan's Population Studies Center, said people leaving Gwinnett is nothing new. With no natural boundaries, metro Atlanta makes it easy for people to pull up the stakes and move farther out.
That tends to accelerate as an area gets more crowded, no matter the race of the newcomers, he said.
Gwinnett also is likely drawing a smaller share of the newcomers who traditionally settle on the edge of a given city. Those whites are driving the rapid growth in the exurbs of Forsyth, Henry and Cherokee counties, Frey said.
Folks such as Forren, the Duluth resident, prefer to live near wide-open spaces. Gridlock in Smyrna led Forren to Gwinnett 20 years ago. Now she and her husband are getting that cramped feeling again. They encounter so much traffic Friday evenings that it's hard to make it to a movie theater on time.
They've already staked out their second escape — to a patch of land in Cherokee County. Forren, 43, said she'll miss shopping at the new Korean market near her house and dining at her favorite Thai and Vietnamese restaurants. "I really like the different cultures," she said. "For me, it's just traffic."
The demographic shift is changing more than just the restaurants in the corner strip mall. Little-used softball diamonds at Lucky Shoals Park in Norcross were recently converted into soccer fields.
When pop star Marc Anthony performed at the Gwinnett Arena in September, he sang in Spanish, not English, the language he used onstage in Atlanta.
And officials who once expected to close schools around the aging neighborhoods of western Gwinnett are instead adding classrooms and English language teachers to accommodate the children of immigrants.
The changes have been slower to reach the county's elected offices, however. The County Commission and school board remain all white, for example. But that will change, too, predicts Bachtel, the University of Georgia demographer.
Gwinnett's business-friendly reputation should continue to attract immigrants and minorities, Bachtel said. "It doesn't matter who you are as long as you've come to work in Gwinnett," he said.
He pointed to Gwinnett schools as a bellwether. The number of white students has dropped by 6,366 since 2000, even as overall enrollment has swelled by 34,552 students, according to figures provided by Sloan Roach, Gwinnett schools spokeswoman. The schools became "majority minority" in January 2004.
It's a threshold that Gwinnett — and eventually the nation — is expected to cross as well. Some white families will embrace those changes. Others won't, Bachtel said. "That big number of white folks leaving," he said, "I think that's a harbinger of things to come."
Bachtel reiterated the point Monday during a video presentation to the county commissioners, telling them to prepare for the trend to accelerate.
County Commissioner Lorraine Green pointed out that some of the drop in white student enrollment could be because of the growth of private schools in the county. But she does think Gwinnett officials should make it easier for longtime residents — most of whom happen to be white — to stay.
Providing more housing for empty-nesters, seniors and young singles would add stability, Green said. And she sees those options coming to western Gwinnett, the very spot that has experienced an exodus of longtime residents. Green wants to allow high-rise condos that could anchor walkable mixed-use projects in designated areas.
"That way, people do not have to leave Gwinnett County when they reach that next stage in life," Green said. "I don't think people have left because they say 'Oh my God, I don't love Gwinnett County anymore.' "
"I don't have much faith in "FBI crime statistics" when the subject is illegal immigration."
The subject isn't illegal immigration; it's violent crime. That stuff gets tracked six ways to Sunday. It's down.
"We'll just have to agree to disagree, the American way."
Translation: you're being willfully stupid, which is a common trait among women, which is why I think the 19th Amendment was a really stupid idea.
"The change in demographics has been pretty startling out here, but it dosen't even hold a candle to Gwinnett."
Certainly the demographics are changing in Gwinett but the problem isn't skin color. I grew up in Buckhead and there were always non-white families and it didn't make any difference because we had everything else in common. In fact it was my best friend, who was black who suffered the most when bussing started - he was attacked more than anyone by the kids who were bussed in.
Cheaper rent, cheaper home prices. I wouldn't live there even if someone GAVE me a house. Hot weather there. You should see the crowds on the freeways from people coming from Berdoo into L.A. and O.C.!
L.A. and O.C. median home prices now are in the high $400,000 range, and some of them are fixer-uppers. It's crazy!
I can't handle 405, let alone I-10 coming from the desert. I'll take a condo in Studio City or Burbank over some cardboard tract home in the metropolises of Corona and Fontana.
Translation: you're a male chauvinist pig who can't stand women who have opinions. Did your Mama hit you when you were little?
Just remember all of you sprawl defenders: Your future is Houston and Los Angeles.
I'm a "sprawl defender," proudly and aggressively so.
What, Clemmie, would you propose as the alternative? Government mandates (federal, state, local, whatever) forbidding -- or discouraging, via tax and regulations -- me from moving to greener pastures?
Atlanta ping
Forgive me if I don't want auto lots, rental properties, and ugly fast food joints all over the place. I would oppose federal or state regulation to the death, but believe that local governments should be proactive in preventing sprawl.
Would you propose some sort of multi-county regional government? Or statewide zoning ordinances? I think the cure would be far worse than the disease.
Individual suburbs can, and do, pass their own zoning ordinances, and that's fine. But minimum residential lot sizes, and prohibitions of commercial and industrial properties in individual burbs simply forces development farther out. Hence, "sprawl." Which, as I've opined, isn't a bad thing.
I hope the possible collapse of overpriced zoned housing doesn't get you, Clemenza. It is not likely to be much of a problem down here in Houston. As a good Freeper, you are welcome to move down into one of our houses. You could probably live in a mansion by your standards. Talk about value!
I lived up in the NYC area and experienced zoning insanity first hand. My experience was the exact opposite of what you say. Zoning boards kept commercial competition out, forcing us to pay higher prices or drive long distances to malls, restaurants, theaters, etc.
I've lived in Houston and Atlanta and prefer either to the NYC area. To each his own, I guess. In Houston, stores, restaurants, shops, theaters, parking, etc., are much more convenient. Deed restrictions keep apartments, car lots, etc., out of the subdivisions. The only areas that suffer invasions of unwanted car lots, etc., are old areas whose deed restrictions have expired through resident neglect.
Houston is surrounded by developable land and an expanding, though crowded, freeway system. It is that and low cost non-union labor that have kept the price of housing quite affordable here. Many of the houses and roads are being built by Hispanic laborers -- one of the only benefits to mass illegal immigration.
"Translation: you're a male chauvinist pig who can't stand women who have opinions."
I don't mind them having opinions; I do object to those opinions having any sort of political weight. The rise of the socialist aspects of government track with the rise of women's suffrage and the feminist movement (which makes your "male chauvinist pig" remark VERY interesting).
"Did your Mama hit you when you were little?"
Yes. It's a pity yours didn't do the same for you.
" The rise of socialist aspects of government track with the rise of women's suffrage and the feminist movement...".
Correlation does not necessarily mean causality.
I lived in Doraville for a while (1998-2001).
It was overrun by illegals in the time I lived there.
Side note: That Treasure Island was one of the first 3 Home Depots. Treasure Island had gone out of business and Marcus and Blank were able to get cheap leases. There was another in a closed Treasure Island location on Terrell Mill in Cobb, and I forget where the 3rd one was.
The Doraville police chief speaks fluent Spanish. I think he was the son of missionaries, know he lived in Mexico a lot as a kid. A useful skill in Doraville, today. He’s also a 2-star in the Army National Guard.
It’s not white flight as much as affluent flight.
People with the means will always move to places they perceive are better for them.
The problem is that eventually you run out of “Greener Pastures.”
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