Kansas: High Growth Islands in a Sea ofDecline

CHAPTER 4

Kansas: High Growth Islands in a Sea of Decline

Garden City, Kansas, is not typical of towns on the Great Plains. Signs there come in three languages: English, Spanish, and Vietnamese. Arguably, some of the best Southeast Asian food between California and New York can be found in restaurants along Garden City's main street. Schools are populated with non-English-speaking immigrant children, and on the edge of town, sprawling trailer parks populated with highly mobile immigrant workers have sprung up. In 1970, Garden City was home to just 15,000 people and was growing at a slow pace of less than 1 percent annually. By the mid-1990s, the Garden City population was estimated at 27,000, with most of that growth having occurred since 1980 (Stull and Broadway 1990; Benson 1994). A resident who had left in 1978 would strain to recognize the place at the turn of the twenty- ................
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