N年前（1998）与一个青年拉丁美女护士聊天，大家都complain Cupertino的房子如何烂，如何贵。她和老公刚有一个小孩，花26万在Vallejo买了一个新大宅。现在看，该房没升值，而且社区比较乱，不安全。对小孩的成长也不好。如果当时在Cupertino的好区买，而且忍到现在，房子应该值60－80万。
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Rachel Raskin-Zrihen, The (Vallejo) Times-Herald
Vallejo made a new Newsweek magazine list of 10 "dying" American cities, though several city officials and the director of an economic think tank strongly question that characterization.
Vallejo is the only California city to make the list, which is dominated by old, industrial towns such as Pitt*****urgh, Pa., and Detroit. But only New Orleans, which is still suffering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, is shedding residents faster than Vallejo, according to Newsweek's list.
The "dying cities" list comes just days after a Times-Herald report on a Forbes magazine list ranking the Vallejo area the ninth most "miserable" in the U.S. The Newsweek list was actually published in January.
Read more coverage on Vallejo.
The foreclosure crisis was one reason the Vallejo area made the list, an accompanying article notes, saying, "even as recently as December, one in every 113 homes was foreclosed on, one of the highest rates in the country."
This, the story notes, "has made the city a less desirable place to live and unfortunately, not much may change in the near future."
Jeffrey Michael, director of the University of the Pacific Eberhardt School of Business, Business Forecasting Center, disagrees. He said that while growth here was less robust than expected in recent years, the trajectory is still north.
"I wouldn't characterize Vallejo as a dying city. We think it will start growing again along with the rest of the Bay Area," Michael said.
He and Vallejo Councilman Michael Wilson said they can't imagine any Bay Area city actually dying, and suggest the designation is entirely too strong.
"There is the mysterious non-growth in population, but we see growth in Vallejo -- slow growth, but growth," Michael said. "And after the dot-com bust, the Bay Area population generally declined, with many people moving out of California entirely."
Wilson said Vallejo "is not dying, but reinventing."
City Councilwoman Marti Brown compared the city to a butterfly coming out of its chrysalis, and Mayor O*****y Davis said he resents the list's implication.
"We should not allow journalists or surveys to define who we are," Davis said. "I don't accept that we're No. 2 among America's dying cities. That implies no hope and no chance of improvement, and that's false, I believe."
The list was based on the most recent Census Bureau data on metropolitan areas with a population exceeding 100,000, the story's authors said. This was used to find the 30 cities that suffered the steepest population decline from 2000 to 2009.
The Vallejo area's population grew only slightly in 2010, but that's expected to pick up through 2015 to just under 1 percent annually, Michael said.
Dying cities
Newsweek magazine's list of "America's Dying Cities" based on declining population:
1. New Orleans
2. Vallejo
3. Hialeah, Fla.
4. Rochester, N.Y.
5. Cleveland
6. Pitt*****urgh, Pa.
7. Detroit
8. South Bend, Ind.
9. Flint, Mich.
10. Grand Rapids, Mich.
Source:
Vallejo, at a glance
Vallejo, according to Newsweek's Main Street list:
Total population (2009): 114,622
Proportion under 18 (2009): 24.4 percent
Change in total population (2000-2009): -1.8 percent
Change in residents under 18 (2000-2009): -3.2 percentage points
Source: Main Street report for Newsweek
