By Will Bryant
Staff Writer
While there is still plenty of information spilling out from the results of the 2010 census, the bits and pieces that have come in show that Carrboro has undergone significant demographic change in the past 10 years.
According to data recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau, the town’s population surged 16.2 percent in the past decade, rising from 16,782 to 19,582 people. This statistic mirrors the state of North Carolina’s growth in the first decade of the new millennium, as the Tar Heel State has undergone an 18.5 percent increase in its total population.
Asians
Of all the town’s demographics, none has experienced more growth than the Asian population.
According to the latest census data, the Asian population in Carrboro has gone from 864 to 1,596 in the past 10 years. This 84.7 percent increase is primarily due to the recent influx of Karen refugees. Many of these refugees have come to the Chapel Hill-Carrboro area because of the wide variety of work available at the university.
According to local Habitat for Humanity officials, some Karen refugees, many of whom have been brought here by local Lutheran churches, have found housing through Habitat. Through these church organizations, the refugees are able to find employment and reasonably-priced housing.
Latinos
From 1990 to 2000, the Latino population skyrocketed from 199 to 2,062 – a 936 percent increase in the town’s Latino population. According to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau data, the demographic is still growing.
In the last decade the Latino population has grown from 2,062 to 2,706; an increase that has put the Latino population of Carrboro at 13.8 percent of the town’s total population.
Sharon Sullivan Mujica, outreach director at CHICLE Language Institute, says Latinos are coming to Carrboro because the town is a great place to find a job and raise a family.
“They find it a place where they can put down roots,” she said. She adds that the population is also growing because the Latino youth have experienced strong acceptance in the local public school system.
Blacks
While the Latino and Asian populations have both increased dramatically in the past 10 years, the black population in Carrboro has seen its numbers fall from 2,273 to 1,969 in the past decade, a 3 percent drop in the population.
Census data indicate that more and more blacks are coming back to the South; however, Michelle Laws, president of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro NAACP, says the opposite is true for Carrboro because of the high unemployment rate in the area.
“Chapel Hill and Carrboro are places that aren’t too friendly to people who don’t possess certain skills or have a higher education,†she said.
Whites
Although the number of white Americans living in Carrboro has increased, the overall percentage of the white population in town has dropped from 72.7 percent in 2000 to 70.9 percent in 2010.
The drop reflects what is happening in larger cities like Charlotte and Atlanta, where whites are becoming a minority population.
According to studies done by the U.S. Census Bureau, the white population percentage in the U.S. is projected to fall under 50 percent in the year 2041.