EL DORADO — With the closure of four major employers in Union County leading to almost 3,000 job losses over the past decade, the El Dorado Promise scholarship program hasn’t been enough to stave off a steady population decline.
The population of El Dorado dropped 12.29 percent, or by about 2,650 people, in the past decade, according to 2010 Census figures released this month. Overall, Union County lost 3,990 people, or 8.7 percent, according to the census numbers.
However, officials with the school district, city, county and economic development agencies said the population would have declined more without the college scholarship program, which offers to pay up to 100 percent of tuition and fees for qualifying high school graduates.
In 2007, Murphy Oil Corp. announced funding for the 20-year El Dorado Promise scholarship program, aiming to further residents’ educations while improving their quality of life.
Since then, the El Dorado School District has turned around a decades-long trend in dropping enrollment, posting an increase of 5 percent, or almost 200 students, since 2007. Now, the district is pairing with the El Dorado Chamber of Commerce to start a program to entice some of those college graduates back to the area.
El Dorado Schools Superintendent Bob Watson said he believes that the enrollment increase resulted from some population growth, not merely from skimming students away from surrounding Union County school districts or pulling them from homeschooling or private schools.
“I think people moving into the area are choosing to move into El Dorado, yes, because of the Promise. But we also get new students in high school who aren’t eligible for the Promise but still come to El Dorado because we’re a great school district to start with,” Watson said.
According to the Promise website, school districts surrounding El Dorado - including the other five Union County districts - have all lost students.
The number of home schooled students has been on the increase in many areas but has decreased from 82 to 76 students in El Dorado over the past four years.
The El Dorado School District does not track the number of students at private or religious schools, but some religious schools in the area have either closed or reduced their grade-level offerings in the past few years because of a lack of enrollment and funding.
According to statistics from the El Dorado Promise office, the Texarkana School District, which has a similar enrollment size when compared with El Dorado, dropped about 5 percent in enrollment, despite the Arkansas side of Texarkana gaining more than 13 percent in population, according to the 2010 Census.
“It’s obvious that we’re pulling some students from private or religious schools.The other thing is we’re not losing students at the same rate, either. We were losing 100 to 85 students a year, and the least I can recall was still 55 students before the Promise started,” Watson said.
Census population estimates, which are taken every year between decennial counts, showed a slight uptick of 72 residents in Union County’s population between 2007 and 2008.
But that increase was short-lived, and the number of jobs continued to fall. During that time, the county lost about 300 jobs before losing nearly 1,000 more between 2008 and 2009, when the population estimate also fell.
Watson and El Dorado Promise Director Sylvia Thompson said serving as an economic draw for workers and businesses was only one aim of the scholarship program. Thompson said the program is also increasing the skills and education levels of students in El Dorado.
“About 85 percent of the graduating students are choosing to attend college,” she said. “What’s even more exciting is that 68 percent of our first class is on track to graduate with a degree. That’s amazing compared to the overall degree completion rate in Arkansas, which is closer to 25 percent.”
JOB LOSSES
University of Arkansas at Fayetteville economist Kathy Deck said a decades-long population loss in Union County - including an accelerated decrease during the past decade - shows that families moving out are outpacing new ones moving in.
After a population peak in the late 1970s followed by decreases through the 1980s, the county lost 1,090 residents between 1990 and 2000. Then in the latest past decade, it lost more than triple that - 3,990.
The decreases are strongly tied to Union County having fewer jobs, said Deck, the director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Arkansas’ Walton College of Business.
Large employers - including a Pilgrim’s Pride chicken processing plant, Cooper Tire, Prescolite luminaire manufacturing and a Georgia-Pacific sawmill - closed in recent years.
The chicken-processing plant’s closure cost the county about 600 jobs but also hit hard about 290 chicken growers in the El Dorado and Farmerville, La., area, leaving many chicken houses sitting empty.
Overall, the county lost more than 3,000 jobs since 2001, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. In 2001, there were 21,611 people employed in the county. In 2009, there were 18,332, according to the bureau’s quarterly census of employment and wages.
“The challenge for all of us is balancing an investment like the El Dorado Promise with current economic opportunity ... because families look at the whole package,” Deck said.
“We look at quality-of-life issues, which include how much economic opportunity is there for us? What kind of economic opportunity is there for our children? Is this incentive enough to outweigh the gains of moving somewhere else?”
She said stemming population loss in communities such as El Dorado requires more than one strategy.
“When we look at economic development you have to have a two-pronged approach ... one, increase the skills and education of your labor force, and two, you have to increase the job availability for them at the same time,” she said.
“You can invest a lot in training your labor force ... but if that other piece hasn’t been successfully implemented, then that labor can go anywhere,” she said.
BIGGER PICTURE
Union County, El Dorado and the El Dorado Chamber of Commerce have been working to create economic opportunities and stave off job losses. Last week, the chamber’s meeting room was set up for new-member events, and residents throughout the city were talking about the city’s new conference center opening Friday night.
The city and county governments and the chamber each have new leaders who started in January, including Union County Judge Mike Loftin, El Dorado Mayor Frank Hash and El Dorado Chamber of Commerce President and Chief Executive Officer Henry Florisheim.
They have been working closely on several ongoing and new initiatives, such as rebranding El Dorado from “Boomtown” to “The Festival City,” and working to capitalize on entertainment and tourism dollars. The new El Dorado Conference Center is a piece of that plan.
Other plans include improving the network among existing businesses to promote buying and contracting locally. And Florisheim plans to begin a regular networking luncheon starting April 8.
Florisheim talked excitedly about his plans for the chamber during a week full of preparations and member drives. One of his big plans for the Promise program - starting with the first crop of students expected to graduate with degrees this spring - is matching those students with local companies looking to hire.
“We have these students who are approaching graduation, and the question is, ‘can we get them back here?’” he said.
“We’re working on promoting this concept to the business community, starting a job fair or internship programs with the schools. We hope to have something to send out to those Promise students by the end of the semester.”
Thompson said the district is excited to help with the job matching program.
“I think for a lot of students, their only real exposure to possible jobs in their hometowns is through their parents’ work,” Thompson said.
“I think half the battle is going to be letting graduates know that these companies and jobs exist, and they can come back and put their skills to good use.”
Front Section, Pages 1 on 02/23/2011