Flickr user Pat Quinn (CC)
Alden Loury, Director of Research and Evaluation, crunched some hot-off-the-press numbers from a new census release today. Shortly after his data deep dive, Alden spoke on camera with Mike Flannery of Fox 32 this afternoon. You'll be seeing Alden in the media on the topic soon, so here's a first look at what he found:
Latinos have passed African Americans as Chicago's second-largest racial or ethnic demographic group
The 2016 estimates are 803,476 Latinos (the highest-ever estimate of Latinos in Chicago) and 793,852 African Americans (the lowest in decades).
- 40,000 (or 4.8 percent) drop in black population from 2015 to 2016.
- Black population within Chicago Public Schools dropped by 5.6 percent from the 2015-2016 school year to the 2016-2017 school year.
- Also, 2016 is the year when homicides surged in Chicago, increasing by 59 percent. Some of the highest homicide counts are found in majority black communities on the city’s south and west sides.
The exodus of African Americans from Chicago is not a new story, but the nearly 5% drop coupled with Latino growth reflects the first time the Census has estimated that there are more Latinos in Chicago than African Americans.
Stay tuned for more from Alden!