Census: Lawrence Incomes Went Up (Updated)

Update: This story was updated on March 30 with figures from the recently released 2010 census.

Lawrence didn’t change much over the past decade, according to the 2010 census and results from the 2005-2009 American Community Survey.

Population figures remained steady, with an estimated 6,483 residents split close to evenly between men and women, a slight decrease from the 2000 total of 6,522, figures showed.

Demographics remained consistent. Where the population of Lawrence was, according to the 2000 census, 95.2 percent white, it’s now 95.5 percent Caucasian. The 2010 census recorded 109 individuals identifying as Asian and 87 as African-American.

None of the drastic nationwide economic changes of recent years appear to have left a major mark. In fact, the village became even more of a high-income place to live.

Median household and family incomes jumped from an estimated $104,845 and $129,779, respectively, to an estimated $108,768 and $147,917, far above the American averages of $51,425 and $62,363. Yet, per capita income figures dropped slightly, from an estimated $51,602 in 2000 to an estimated $51,212.

Poverty rates, which were in 2000 lower than the U.S. average, plunged from an estimated 6.3 to 1.8 percent for individuals and 4.3 to 3.5 percent for families, while nationwide numbers climbed.

According to the 2010 census, there were 2,045 occupied housing units in Lawrence, a jump from 1,390 in 2000. Those occupied by their owners came in at an ACS estimated median value of $877,000, way above the U.S. average of $185,400. There were only 235 empty units, about 10.3 percent of the total, the census showed.

The average household size has remained consistent, taking a small bounce from 3.09 people in 2000 to 3.31 from 2005-2009.

An estimated 94.6 percent of the population aged 25 or older is a high school graduate or higher, while 64.9 percent of the population holds a bachelor’s degree or higher. Some 1,035 residents are foreign born, compared with 937 in 2000.

Perhaps due to the aging World War II generation, the number of civilian veterans dropped from an estimated 370 and 8.4 percent of the total population in 2000 to 241, or 5.4 percent, from 2005-2009.

Still, the essence of Lawrence over the past decade is that things haven't changed much.

“We have a lot of families that are multi-generational and living in the village,” said Mayor Martin Oliner. “It’s often you see two, three or four generations of families living in the community. We're not a community where people leave, and that's because of the extraordinary infrastructure we've built.”