Changing population changes politics

Walter C. Jones

April 1, 2008

Recent headlines heralded a report by the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) that metro Atlanta had exceeded the 4 million mark in the 10 inner counties. Add the 10 counties that surround them and the number is more than 5 million. What's more important than the civic pride of a growing hometown is what those numbers suggest about the political future of the region. The numbers suggest the metro region could grow up to be more like DeKalb County than a traditional northern big city.

The city of Atlanta is adding population again after decades of reductions, picking up 48,000 people from 2000-2007, or the equivalent of Smyrna's total population. Fulton County, as a whole, gained 118,000 in that period. Gwinnett topped the region with a gain of 152,000 newcomers, more than the combined populations of Rockdale and Walton counties.

But sheer numbers don't tell the whole story. Population doesn't automatically translate into political power because not everyone votes.

Higher income groups tend to vote reliably. The majority of the highest-paying jobs continue to be located in the 10 core counties, and Fulton, Cobb and Gwinnett are adding them as a greater percentage of their payroll expansions than anywhere else in the region. So those counties likely will gain political muscle faster than Henry, Clayton and Douglas counties, for example.

What are these voters likely to care about?

Density-related issues, such as traffic, mass transit, and law and order typically top the concerns of people dwelling close to their neighbors.

Suburbanites, on the other hand, tend to be as concerned about keeping property taxes down as they are with recreation and schools. With a region-wide density of just 1.25 people per acre, urban issues likely are to remain in the back seat for a while longer.

More than 70 percent of the region's population lives in the 10 core counties, where the density exceeds two people per acre as opposed to one person for every two acres in the outer counties. For the most density, look to the zip code 30308 (around 10th Street and North Avenue, West Peachtree Street and Argonne), where you'll find 13 people per acre.

Yet more people are living in suburbs than in cities, even considering the incorporation of Sandy Springs, Johns Creek and Milton. As the ARC notes, half the region's people lived in a city in 1970 while only 38 percent do today. And even the new cities are more like suburbs.

So continues the era in which the importance of cities is diminished. Folks living in unincorporated areas don't have the same kind of loyalty to a county as city dwellers often do. As a result, they are less inclined to follow a leader for the behalf of the county the way a charismatic mayor can make things happen in a city.

If you consider Fayette County has 53 percent of its people housed in one city or another while DeKalb has only 13 percent, you could conclude DeKalb is the model of the future. It's the county with the region's highest density at 4.2 people per acre and has no dominant city, making it sort of an urban suburb.

As the metro region evolves, ad hoc coalitions, civic groups and informal community activists will become an ever more important source of leadership as the influence of elected officials wanes. Often, business leaders step into those roles.

The growing density will certainly change the issues the majority cares about, and DeKalb offers a glimpse of that distant horizon, too.

If there are problems with how DeKalb operates, metro leaders would be wise to think now about how to keep them from replicating in their own areas.