Population growth, decline brings changes to small town Oklahoma

Saturday, July 9th 2005, 11:08 am

By: News On 6

OOLOGAH, Okla. (AP) _ Wes McMillen graduated high school here and left in 1989. He spent some time in Tulsa, lived in Colorado and moved to the West Coast where he watched a decade pass in Oregon.

Over the years, he kept coming back to Oologah for vacations. In fall 2002, he said, the town looked different.

``And I fell in love with the place again,'' McMillen said. ``I really missed the family atmosphere and I wanted to be a part of that.''

McMillen moved back to Oologah and started planting some new roots. He wasn't alone in his decision to live in this rural community, about 30 miles northeast of downtown Tulsa. Oologah has become the fastest growing small city in the state in the past four years, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

With a nearly 26 percent growth rate between 2000 and 2004, Oologah ranks first among small cities in the state, according to an analysis by The Associated Press.

The AP limited analysis of the data to towns with populations between 1,000 and 10,000 to eliminate the fluctuation caused when a few families move into or out of a smaller community.

There are 182 communities in Oklahoma that meet the criteria. They range in size from the Ottawa County community of Fairland, population 1,010, to the Oklahoma City suburb The Village, population 9,910, according to the census estimates.

Most of the fastest-growing communities were small towns just outside the suburbs ringing the state's two central cities, Oklahoma City and Tulsa. The top 10 included five towns near Oklahoma City and three surrounding Tulsa.

Jay and Grove, communities around Grand Lake, were the exceptions. These two cities, which grew 12 percent and 10.5 percent, respectively, benefited from the growth of Bentonville, Ark., into a metropolitan area, said Rob Gragg of the Oklahoma Department of Commerce.

``Those are like a volcano about to explode,'' said Gragg, rural development coordinator for the department.

Supporting the world headquarters for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has drawn employees from across state lines, Gragg said. In turn, land that might have been used for golf courses and retirement villas is getting snapped up by workers serving Wal-Mart or one of its suppliers, Gragg said.

``There growth has potential to just keep going,'' he said.

Elsewhere, the census figures continued to document the dwindling population in the rural western half of the state.

Watonga, in Blaine County, topped the list with a population decline of 14 percent, according to the census estimates. Five cities along a corridor that ran from Medford in north central Oklahoma to Boise City at the tip of the Panhandle ranked among the 10 small cities with the largest population loss. Other cities on that list were in the southwest, including Hollis, Mangum and Sayre.

These communities wrestle with their isolation from major arterial roads and their distance from the marketplace and work force in Oklahoma City or Tulsa, Gragg said. One of the keys to increasing population in these communities is finding ways to develop the resources they have, Gragg said.

Rural Action Partnerships is one program that attempts to tie smaller communities together and give them some of the synergies of larger ones, he said.

For these communities to grow, it may ultimately take an economic shift, Gragg said. Rather than being content with producing raw materials _ oil, wheat, milk and beef _ people in these communities need to look at finished work, he said.

``There's getting to be a dairy cluster in Hollis and Frederick,'' Gragg said. ``But it's not enough just to ship milk to Texas. We need to be looking at a plant producing yogurt and other products.''

Meanwhile in Oologah, the latest estimates bolstered the belief that the Rogers County community was succeeding, Mayor Jerry Holland said. As a bedroom community for Tulsa, Oologah was fortunate, Holland said. The town has been able to provide city services to newcomers while maintaining a small-community feel that drew people in the first place, he said.

``People move into the area and they seem to adopt the local attitude,'' Holland said. ``We're still a small town and we are going to try to stay that way.''

Working at the restaurant he bought, McMillen said he enjoyed being back in Oklahoma. He said he liked the friendliness and sense of community he found still thriving in the place he once left.

Going out to Oologah Lake felt like having access to a secret _ a spot away from the crowds at Lake Tenkiller, Grand Lake and elsewhere in northeastern Oklahoma, he said.

``I like the privacy of Oologah Lake,'' he said. ``It's still kind of a secret.''