SALT LAKE CITY — Many experts have been saying that the population is expected to double in Cache County, in addition to many other parts of the state over the next 30 to 40 years.
On KVNU’s For the People program on Monday our guest was Mallory Bateman who is the State Data Center coordinator at the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah.
She explained how they go about their research when it comes to long-term growth projections.
“So our model is actually a demographic and an economic model, and so we consider things like birth rates, mortality rates, life expectancy. Then we combine that with the economic projections for the area to try to get a better understanding of what the future might look like for the state. That’s the quick version,” she said.
Bateman said they do long-term planning projections about every four years. She said they do it this because they get updated information, such as the state’s birth rate decreasing some. These and other factors such as a mine closing, for example, or a big project coming into an area that will impact jobs, could cause them to modify projections.
“I will say that with the new information we have this time around, it’s actually around a 69 percent increase out to 2060 up in Cache County at least. So it’s not quite the doubling that maybe has been anticipated in prior projections. So maybe a little bit more moderated growth, but yeah, growth can create a lot of changes to the community that sometimes are good and sometimes can be challenging.”
The Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute does a full scope of research from economics, to demographics, to public surveying, to analysis that can be digested by lawmakers, by students or the general public.
They make it available via blog, via social media and more. You can visit their site at Gardner.Utah.edu.