King County growth booms
Strong job market is pumping up population
April Middeljans moved from Illinois to Seattle last August because that's where she got a job.
"The job market for English professors is pretty tight," said Middeljans, who is now an assistant professor at Seattle Pacific University.
She and her husband, John, are renting a house on Queen Anne while they search for one they like and can afford in the city. They haven't completely eliminated Shoreline but are not willing to go as far as Snohomish County, where homes are more affordable.
"Our time is very valuable to us, so we want to reduce the commute as much as possible," she said. "And we'd like to stay with just one car for as long as we could."
Strong job growth in King County and longer commutes to outlying communities are two reasons experts give for new U.S. Census estimates saying the county is growing faster than it has in years. The numbers, released today, show that more people moved to King County from elsewhere in the U.S. than left for another county last year -- reversing a trend going back at least to 2000.
King County has grown every year, thanks to people moving from abroad and the net "natural" increase of births minus deaths, according to Census estimates. But from 2000 on, between 4,000 and nearly 20,000 more people a year left for another county than moved here from one. The Census Bureau doesn't say where these people went, but thousands more moved into Pierce, Snohomish and other nearby counties than left in each of the past six years.
"It absolutely has everything to do with the fact that we continued to lose jobs, especially in the Seattle area, straight through to 2004," King County regional labor economist Cristina Gonzalez said. "I think people forget that, even through the state started to recover in 2003, King County continued to lose jobs for a full year."
All in all, King County's population was 1.8 million on July 1, 2006, up 5 percent from July 1, 2000, putting it 27th among Washington's 39 counties for percentage growth.
But the county's population went up just 0.3 percent in 2002 and 2003 each -- significantly below the state rate -- compared with 1.5 percent in 2006.
And King County has gained the most people since 2000, followed by Clark, Pierce and Snohomish counties. Not surprisingly, California is the largest source of people moving to King County from out of state, according to the state Department of Licensing.
Continue reading this article from the Seattle P-I:
King County growth booms
