Demographic Profile of Senior in Wayne County, Michigan

allow for poverty status calculations for the population 60+, as tabular age breaks were
set at 55-64, 65-74 and 75+. Calculations made by the author estimated a decreasing rate
of poverty (19.0 percent in 1989 and 17.8 percent in 1999) for seniors in PSA 1-A.
While this put PSA 1-A’s rate almost twice that of any other region, the numerical losses
resulted in a drop in State share from 23.7 to 20.4 percent. Since the Office of Services
to the Aging (OSA) uses 150% of poverty as their measure of socioeconomic distress, the
author also made calculations of this factor. Subsequent to these calculations, OSA
requested that the Census Bureau produce a special tabulation at 150% of poverty. This
special tabulation, essentially mirroring the author’s tabulation, showed that PSA 1-A’s
State share was 16.1 percent, representing another decrease over the decade, and had
once again been surpassed by PSA 1-B which now contained 19.5 percent of the State
share.
PSA 1-A experienced significant decreases in State share of total senior population,
minority population, and persons below 150% of poverty. While other research attempts
to understand the health-related factors that contributed to this loss, the present study
dissects PSA 1-A’s service area geographically to in order to understand the differing
geographic components of change so that services can be better targeted to areas of need.
While the full report features detailed tables for Detroit’s subcommunities, and a brief
review of the Empowerment Zone, this summary dissects the region by its nine
communities, and then breaks out the City of Detroit by its 10 CRS Sectors, and creates
two additional sectors comprised of the other 8 communities – Hamtramck and Highland
Park in one, Harper Woods and the five Grosse Pointes in the other.
Sector Analysis
In 1997 the City of Detroit launched a community-wide effort called the Community
Reinvestment Strategy (CRS). This effort divided the city into 10 sectors, which have
now been identified as the official sub-zones for city departments to plan and deliver
services. As of 2002, the new city administration has initiated a citywide planning effort
based on these sectors, with planning staff assigned to sectors. In addition to the
Planning Department, these sectors are now recognized by Detroit’s Health Department,
Neighborhood City Halls, Youth Services and Senior Services as their planning/service
delivery areas. The Health Department has started to deliver health profiles by sector and
the Senior Citizens Department commissioned a survey, through Wayne State
University’s Institute of Gerontology, that was designed to gather data at the sector level.
The Detroit Area Agency on Aging, recognizing the opportunity to utilize multiple
sources of information to assist in planning, has accepted these sectors as a reasonable
geography for service planning. As DAAA’s service area includes more than just the City
of Detroit, the additional cities have been combined (Highland Park and Hamtramck;
Harper Woods and the five Grosse Pointes) to form an additional two sectors.
The major findings of the sector analysis were the following:
• Population change varied greatly among the sectors. Eleven of the 12 lost
population, with the largest decreases occurring on the far northeast side of
A Demographic Profile of Seniors in PSA 1-A 3