A revised 2010 population count from the U.S. Census Bureau added 202 residents to Cave Springs, a small city in Northwest Arkansas that has grown in area because of land annexed since the census.
The new count, known as a “population certification,” differs from a special census and is important because it’s used to calculate state turnback funds for cities.
Cave Springs’ initial 2010 count was 1,729 residents, and the new count is 1,931 residents, Mayor Larry Smith said.
“The city gets around $80 a head for every person in the city limits on turn-back money,” Smith said. “We’ll put that money to patching streets and fixing streets inside the city limits.”
Similar requests for updated 2010 Census counts on the basis of expanded city boundaries are pending for Bella Vista, Elm Springs and Prairie Grove in Northwest Arkansas and Brookland in northeast Arkansas, said Jeff Hawkins, executive director of the Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission. The commission has assisted the cities in their applications to the federal Census Bureau.
Certification requests were made under the bureau’s Geographically Updated Population Certification Program. The U.S. Department of Commerce reactivated the program in October 2013 after a five-year suspension.
Updates through the population certification program cost $657 or $1,969, depending on the type of request. The certification takes into account population changes that are tied to land annexed into a city. It doesn’t count such things such as births or new residents moving into the area.
Brookland has requested a special census under a different U.S. Census program that involves an actual count of the residents now living within city boundaries, including land annexed since the 2010 Census. The city has made an initial payment to the Census Bureau of $70,000 and expects to pay an additional $26,000 for the updated census, Mayor Kenneth Jones has said.
Jones said he met with U.S. Census representatives last week and interviewed people to become census-takers for the special population count. Jones expects workers to begin counting people in the Craighead County town by Oct. 20 and hopes to have the tally completed by early December.
Brookland’s population in the 2010 Census was 1,642. Jones said he suspects that more than 2,000 people now live in the town about 5 miles northeast of Jonesboro, because of commercial expansion along U.S. 49, several newly built apartment complexes, incorporation of land south of town and a new subdivision.
Cave Springs will begin to benefit from the higher population count when the state Treasury disburses state turn-back funds to cities Oct. 10, said Debbie Rogers, state chief deputy treasurer.
Cave Springs annexed land under six ordinances that were passed between February 2011 and October 2012. One parcel annexed in September 2011 had initially been annexed by Springdale. Smith, the Cave Springs mayor, said the territory annexed into Springdale came within several blocks of his house.
Smith told the Springdale mayor and City Council that his city’s fire and police departments could provide faster responses in that area. Springdale then de-annexed the land, and Cave Springs annexed it, Smith said. He estimated that 150 people live there.
Other annexations took in land west of his city and south of the city, Smith said.
The Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission assisted Cave Springs by providing the Census Bureau with ordinances and digital maps showing the annexations, Hawkins said. That allowed the bureau to update a boundary and annexation map for Cave Springs and conduct a new tabulation of the city’s population using the expanded boundaries.
Cities such as Cave Springs that required updated maps to obtain population certification had to wait until after Aug. 1 to receive their certificates, Hawkins said.
Information for this article was contributed by Kenneth Heard of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.