HANCOCK COUNTY — According to recently released data from the 2020 U.S. Census, the population of Hancock County has grown by 14.1% in the past 10 years. That means the county’s population has grown almost three times as fast as that of the state as a whole.
Of Indiana’s 92 counties, Hancock County was the fifth-fastest-growing over the past decade. All of the top five counties are in the Indianapolis metro area. The highest growth was in Hamilton County, with a 26.5% increase, followed by Boone County with 25%. Hendricks County grew by 20.2% and Johnson County by 15.8%.
Hancock County, with 79,840 people, is the 22nd-most populous county in the state. It has added 9,838 residents since 2010, census figures show. Neighboring Marion County remains the most populous in the state, with 977,203 residents, an increase of 8% since 2010. Lake County, Allen County, Hamilton County and St. Joseph County round out the top five.
The data is contained in a trove of information gathered in 2020 during the regular decennial census. The first release of information came earlier this week. More data will be released by the Census Bureau as it is compiled. The information will be used to apportion seats in Congress; figure in formulas for disbursement of funds in more than 100 federal programs; and aid in redrawing election district boundaries based on population shifts. Data will be studied for years by businesses, governments and other entities eager to learn more about their communities.
Statewide, Indiana saw a population increase, though not enough of one to grant the state an additional seat in Congress. The state gained over 300,000 new residents from 2010 to 2020 for a 4.7% increase in population.
Despite growth in the state, 49 of Indiana’s counties decreased in population over the past 10 years. Most of those were rural counties.
The state also saw a 4.6% increase in available housing units during the same period, keeping pace with population growth. Of those units, 8.7% are currently vacant.
Growth in the western part of the county has largely driven population growth, particularly in the Mt. Comfort/McCordsville/Fortville area, which has seen a high number of both industrial and residential developments that has drawn some backlash from residents for the amount of growth.
Statistics that are broken down beyond the county level will be released later this year, but guesses about how much each municipality has grown can be made based on estimates of their 2019 population.
McCordsville’s population was estimated to have grown a by 45.9% from 2010 to 2019, according to data released by STATS Indiana. It is one of the fastest-growing communities in the state.
Mt. Vernon Community School Corporation, which includes students in Fortville and McCordsville, has taken steps to prepare for what it expects to be a significant increase in student population over the next 10 years, with enrollment increasing by about 100 students in 2020. It is now rivaling Greenfield-Central, long the county’s largest school district, for that distinction.
In New Palestine, town manager Jim Robinson said the town has approved permits for 145 single-family homes in 2021. That’s a sign of rapid growth, even beyond what will be captured by the census; last year, the town approved 53. The town was estimated to have grown by 21.3% in 2019, according to STATS Indiana, a database maintained by Indiana University.
The estimated growth for Fortville in 2019 was 6.1%. Fortville town planner Adam Zaklikowsi said the town gave out permits to build 100 single-family homes in 2020 and 54 so far in 2021.
Greenfield’s estimated growth by 2019 was 10.9% since 2010. Mayor Chuck Fewell said he’s hoping the census results will show the city’s population has surpassed 26,000 residents. The 2019 estimate put the city’s population at just over 23,000.
Greenfield has approved 466 permits for homes so far in 2021. The total number of permits approved, including for businesses, is 721. Fewell said he expects growth in Greenfield to continue, including the addition of more restaurants, retail stores and industrial buildings.
“We’re able to grow because we have the commodity of land, and as long as we have that, we will continue to grow,” Fewell said.
The town of Cumberland, on the border of Hancock and Marion counties, was estimated to have grown by 12.6%. The towns of Shirley and Wilkinson were estimated to have grown by 3.9% and shrunk by 1.3% respectively.
Demographics
Like Indiana as a whole, Hancock County still has a substantial majority of white residents. The county’s population is 89.8% white, while the state’s is 77.2% white. Three percent of Hancock County residents are Black, while 5% responded that they are multiracial; other races each totaled less than a percentage point.
Hancock County now has 2,393 Black residents. In 2010, the Black population was 1,452.
Following the national trend, the number of residents who identified their race as white alone has decreased since 2010. While Hancock County’s white population increased in terms of absolute numbers, the share of white residents decreased from 95.2%.
That change was mostly due locally to an increase in people identifying themselves as part of two or more races. In 2010, only 1.2% of respondents identified as multiracial; that population has increased in the past 10 years by over 3,000 people, and over 350%.
In Indiana as a whole, the percentage of white residents decreased by 4.1%. The percentage of residents statewide identifying as multiracial increased by 241%. That trend was true in the nation as a whole, with multiracial residents growing from 2.9% of the population in 2010 to 10.2% in 2020.
While the increasing number of multiracial Americans is undoubtedly partially due in part to a higher number of children born to parents of different races, part of it could also be a shift in how people describe themselves. The 2020 census included for the first time a “write-in” option that allowed people to describe their racial identity in more detail.
“We are confident that differences in the overall racial distributions are largely due to improvements in the design of the two separate questions for race data collection and processing as well as some demographic changes over the past 10 years,” the Census Bureau said on its website.
The percentage of Hancock County residents reporting Hispanic origin, which is a separate question from race, also increased, from 1.7% in 2010 to 2.8% in 2020. Hancock County’s population of people who identify as Hispanic grew from 1,216 in 2010 to 2,202 in 2020.
In Indiana overall, the increase was from 6% to 8.2%.
The Census Bureau also released a “Racial and Ethnic Diversity Index” that compares the relative racial diversity of states’ populations. The index measures the likelihood that two randomly chosen people from a state would be of different racial and ethnic backgrounds. For Indiana, that number is 41.3%. That shows that Indiana is less diverse than neighboring Illinois, which has a diversity index of 60.3%, but more diverse than Kentucky, which has an index of 32.8%.
According to the census’s data on population age, 23.5% of Indiana residents are under the age of 18. That makes it the 11th youngest state in the country. Hancock County’s population was similar to the state average, with 23.8% of residents under 18.
The age of the state population, like the country as a whole, has increased since 2010. The percentage of the Indiana population that is 18 or older has increased by 6.5%. In Hancock County, it has increased by 2.4%.
Because of Hancock County’s overall growth, its population of both adults and children has increased. However, the adult population increased by 17.7% while the child population increased by only 3.6%. Other fast-growing counties, including Hamilton and Boone, also saw an increasingly over-18 population.
More census data, including local data broken down beyond the county level, will be released later in the fall.
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79,840 — the total population of Hancock County according to the 2020 U.S. Census
14.1% — the percentage growth Hancock County has seen in the past ten years
4.7% — the percentage growth the state of Indiana as a whole has seen since 2010
89.8% — the percentage of Hancock County census respondents who gave their race as solely white
23.8% — the percentage of county residents who are under age 18
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