In 2007, I graduated college and made a home in Crawfordsville. I want to tell you about my first home. From 1987 until college, I lived in Springfield, Ohio.
I love Springfield, which has its struggles:
Since 1970, the population has declined by 20%
From 2000-2010, we lost half our manufacturing jobs
From 2000-2020, Springfield City Schools plummeted from 10,092 students to 7,024 Springfield was one of the 15 fastest shrinking cities in America in 2017, population at about 59,200. It is now around 57,910, including immigrants (schools at 7,267). People are dying and moving faster than any incoming momentum.
In 2014, Clark County started Welcome Springfield to revitalize the economy. The overall population is still down. However, so is the unemployment rate, and median income is up.
(Side note: Widely-cited statistic of 12,000-15,000 immigrants is misleading: That’s all county-wide foreign-born residents from any country of origin.)
A Rust Belt town struggling to revitalize, Springfield grapples with housing, healthcare, brain drain. They also need translation services, ELL support in schools, and adult driving instruction. In 2023, county and city officials traveled to DC seeking aid.
Instead, Springfield received national attention for rumors that have since been traced to their sources: a woman posting a rumor she misheard on Facebook, a woman who filed a police report about her missing cat (who turned up days later), and a Neo Nazi who spoke at a city meeting. (Also, ODNR has one officer assigned to just Clark County, who has reported no change in the goose population.) Diseases are down from 2015.
Crawfordsville reminds me of Springfield: local leaders committed to the city’s future and a vibrant arts community. This is why I want you to love Springfield. My parents still live there. I still have a 937 area code. And the neighbors’ cats are fine.
Emily Race
Crawfordsville
