Sullivan County declining population – It’s time for a new direction!
Sullivan County, Tennessee and its cities have a problem with a declining population. This has been a problem since year 2000 and Sullivan County comes out as the loser as keeping the population. Elected leaders need to ask some hard questions why this is occurring and make changes to stop this trend. Elected leaders may be faced with cutting services or raise taxes because of reduced revenue coming in. However, cutting services or raising taxes and not addressing the problem would show that the elected leaders is not capable of handling the problem.
In the table below are the top 11 Tennessee Counties and their population rank based on state population estimates. Sullivan County goes from a year 2000 rank of 6 to a rank of 11 in year 2030.
Rank | 2000 | 2005 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | 2025 | 2030 |
| 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 | Shelby Davidson Knox Hamilton Rutherford Sullivan Montgomery Sumner Williamson Washington Blount | Shelby Davidson Knox Hamilton Rutherford Sullivan Williamson Montgomery Sumner Blount Washington | Shelby Davidson Knox Hamilton Rutherford Williamson Sumner Montgomery Sullivan Blount Washington | Shelby Davidson Knox Hamilton Rutherford Williamson Sumner Montgomery Sullivan Blount Wilson | Shelby Davidson Knox Rutherford Hamilton Williamson Sumner Montgomery Blount Sullivan Wilson | Shelby Davidson Knox Rutherford Hamilton Williamson Sumner Montgomery Blount Wilson Sullivan | Shelby Davidson Knox Rutherford Hamilton Williamson Sumner Montgomery Blount Wilson Sullivan |
Below are graphs for selected East Tennessee county and city population estimates. In the “County Population Estimates”, all counties are showing growth while Sullivan County is showing a decline.
The “City Population Estimates” graph shows population growth for all cities except Sullivan County cities, Kingsport and Bristol.
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Data for the above is from the State of Tennessee via the links below.
Population Projections for the State of Tennessee
TACIR, in conjunction with The University of Tennessee Center for Business and Economic Research, has published a new report containing population projections for Tennessee cities and counties in five-year intervals from 2010 to 2030. The purpose of the projections is to aid in local planning efforts, such as those outlined in Public Chapter 1101 (PC1101). The complete report and tables are available below.
Population Projections for the State of Tennessee, 2010 to 2030
Population Projection Tables HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Tennessee HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Tennessee Counties HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Municipalities* Arrayed by County HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Municipalities* Alphabetically HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Municipalities* by Development District HTML | EXCEL
- Aggregate Projections for Tennessee Counties within MSAs HTML | EXCEL
*Does not include the effects of annexations after 2000.
