Today the KC Star’s Matt Campbell has an odd story that tries to whip up panic about how the population of Omaha is set to surpass that of Kansas City. He cites 2008 Census data that lists KC with 452,000 and Omaha with 439,000. But his numbers are wrong. This past February the Census Bureau acknowledged that they had significantly under-counted KC and revised our population up to 475,000. And there is evidence that our population might actually be over half a million. The Star reported this in June 2008 and February 2009, but apparently Mr. Campbell forgot to read his own newspaper.
Another omission is the fact that Omaha has few suburbs. Most of the suburban-style areas are in the city limits. It would be as if Overland Park, Leawood, Lee’s Summit, and Independence weren’t independent cities but part of KCMO, easily pushing our population up towards one million. Regardless of central city size, the KC metro area is still twice the size of the Omaha metro area. And our economy is more than twice the size.
It’s unfortunate that such a prominently placed story has such glaring omissions.
John Landsberg at Bottom Line Communications says Campbell's conclusions are "deeply flawed."
A good copy editor would have helped Campbell avoid mistakes like using flawed census data that has subsequently been corrected and updated -- but most of the experienced copy editors are gone.
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7 comments:
One thing remains. The dying city of Kansas City Missouri has only their ability to entrap citizens wishing to flee through annexation to maintain their level of population.
If you want a real indicator of the dire straits that this cesspool is in, compare the population today with the geographic area and population in 1940. You will find that KCMO has had to confiscate an area double it's former size to maintain that same level of population.
That is not the sign of a healthy environment. If not for the Northland and an arbitrary willingness to hedge the numbers without fact or evidence, KCMO would be in the lower 40's and the second largest city in the area.
To conduct this study, UMKC, the city, and various community groups partnered with a national non-profit that analyzes urban markets with eye towards attracting investment and business. Similar studies in other cities have resulted in millions of dollars in new investment in urban neighborhoods.
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Imagine that, they get ACORN and a few other "Community Groups" to help them alter the Census count, all for money.
If KCMO is so healthy and growing, why are they shutting down schools with declining enrollment?
Omaha grows by annexing and has done so with in the past few years (it took over the nearby town of Elkhorn before the town could annex enough subdivisions to be ward off annexation). Omaha proper is almost bigger than Minneapolis and Atlanta proper. That doesn't mean a lot. Yes, it's the suburbs that add to the metro area.
Yeah, it's a mistake that could have been caught.
Kansas City however has not relied on annexation for growth. They rely on it to maintain what they used to have.
KC's population is now almost exactly the same as in 1940 with a geographical area larger than New York City.
Omaha on the other hand would have grown even without annexation over he past few years. They are not having entire districts flee their schools and are not closing them down left and right due to declining enrollment and revenue.
Kansas City is dying a slow and painful death. They now must manufacture population just to keep what revenue that they had.
Keep in mind that one federal judge killed KCMO. One lousy, stinking federal judge. Can you imagine what this country will be like when the majority on the Supreme Court is like the Ninth Circuit?
Sotomayor has been reversed 2/3s of the time that her cases were reviewed and we're going to put this incompetent racist on the highest court in the land?
One judge killed KCMO by destroying its school system and wasting billions upon billions of dollars. How unfortunate that we don't tar and feather these scoundrels and run them out of town as we once did.
One judge killed KCMO by destroying its school system and wasting billions upon billions of dollars
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You raise a good point however, the KC Star played a major role in KC's demise by promoting and turning the government over to the midtown crowd in the first place.
Absolutely, The Star is first and foremost the handmaiden to corruption in the metro area.
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