Census Data For Ladue and Frontenac Show Minor Changes Over the Past Decade

and recently released census results indicated little change in the population of each city. While Ladue saw a 1.4-percent decrease take place during the prior 10 years, Frontenac saw a decrease of one person, going from 3,483 in 2000, to 3,482 in 2010.

“I actually see that almost as growth, when you consider other areas saw full percentage point declines, or more, such as the 8.3-percent decrease in St. Louis City,” said Bob Shelton, Frontenac city manager.

In Ladue, where census results put the current population at 8,521, resident and Missouri Assistant Attorney General Caroline Bean expressed surprise at the results.

“Given the increase in our school district enrollment, a 1.4-percent decrease comes as a surprise, but I think Ladue traditionally has had a lot of people who don’t move away, and with less population turnover, you have less supply in the housing market, so that might have driven some folks to neighboring areas,” Bean said.

Certainly, the growth in the enrollment has been dramatic throughout the past several years. Since 2003, the district has added more than 700 students to its total enrollment, who represent a more than 20-percent growth during that period. The district expects to increase from 3,930 students this school year to 4,040 next year and 4,168 in the 2012-2013.

While Ladue saw 161 students leave the district last year, with the majority moving out of the St. Louis metro area, some 335 students entered the district, with that number evenly split between students coming from local public and private schools, or coming in from schools outside the St. Louis area.

With this type of growth, Ladue is not expecting to see a reduction in district services and programs directly related to the census results.  

“As a district, we don’t anticipate any substantial impact on our programs from the census results, in terms of the slight decrease in Ladue’s total population,” said Rob Highfill, Ladue School District's director of information technology services.

Ladue mayor, Irene Holmes, believes the slight decrease in population is unrelated to the larger decreases seen in the city of St. Louis and other areas.

“I think people are having less children, and subsequently, we are not seeing population growth,” said Holmes.

Ladue rotary member, Jim Horne, a local attorney and CPA, concurred with that general sentiment, but added that some residents may be claiming Florida or other snowbird destinations as primary residences.

“With an aging population of relatively affluent people, you’re probably going to have some residents now claiming Florida as their primary residence, which may lead to the slight decrease,” Horne said.

In Frontenac, the reality of people coming and going was not overlooked, despite the essentially flat census result.

“We have had a lot of new construction in the city over the past several years, and most of that is of the tear-down-and-rebuild nature,” said Shelton, “But we thought the building of a larger home on an existing lot would lead to the presence of more families living in such homes, and while it’s probably the case, we also have to consider that average family size has, perhaps, getting smaller over the past decade. 

Based on the nominal change in population, Frontenac does not expect to see any change in it share of sales tax revenue, and subsequently anticipates no impact on city services.