ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - Population loss has been a major issue in St. Louis-area for the last few years. St. Louis City is no different, with latest findings from a SLU Professor finding that St. Louis City is losing a majority of its black population.
Ness Sandoval, a sociology professor at Saint Louis University, presented latest demographic trends to the Budget and Public Employees Committee meeting Wednesday morning.
Before presenting his findings, he joined Total Information A.M. to discuss it
In Sandoval's findings, he found that an average of 75 families are leaving the St. Louis City every month since the start of COVID-19 pandemic, with a majority of those families being black.
"88% of those families are black," said Sandoval, "When we look at population change, it's not simply people leaving, but when you have families with children leaving, that number becomes a pretty substantial number of residents who are no longer in the city and they're moving out to the suburbs."
Sandoval thinks that there are many reasons for why a majority of Black families are leaving the suburbs, from challenges of education within the St. Louis City area to finding activities for their kids to affordable housing for families.
"I think when parents scan an urban environment and they have children, they're looking for opportunities for their children," said Sandoval, "A good education, what types of other activities, are the parks safe? Are the neighborhoods safe? When you go into the calculus to stay or to move, there are many factors that go into that decision."
While St. Louis City is seeing many families leave the area and moving into the suburbs, they are seeing an increase in single people, -"solos"- and couples with no kids -"Dinks".
"We see that there's actually an increase in dinks and solos in the city. There is this transition that's happening in the city," said Sandoval, "About 57% of the households in the city are nonfamily right now. Within the next few years, it'll probably be over 60% of the household that will be nonfamily households."