Three-quarters of the increase was among whites.
But even cities like Portland, whereas in San Francisco, local officials were wringing their hands a few years ago about the lack of children, are seeing a surge in children.
San Jose, where the child population has been flat since 2000, is a notable exception.
“I think there is a new generation of white, well-off parents who want to stay in the city, in high-amenity cities like San Francisco, New York, Washington, D.C., and Portland,” said Bill Frey, a demographer with the Brookings Institution. “They are willing to pay for private schools and child-safe neighborhoods in order to do this. It’s a trend that wasn’t apparent for the baby boomers, who left for the suburbs when they started having kids.”
While San Francisco has had perhaps the most dramatic kid increase relative to its overall growth, the number of infants, toddlers and young children is growing faster than the overall population in most big cities.
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But in San Francisco, Seattle, Portland and even Manhattan, all cities where officials worried a few years ago about the dwindling number of children, white families are fueling increases in the child population.
The city has seen aninflux of highly educated professionals, a “creative class,” Adamssaid. “Like Seattle and San Francisco and the Bay Area, they care a lotabout the sustainability and quality of life. That has attracted a lotof the younger, creative types who now are of childbearing age.”
Relativeto other big cities, children remain a relatively small share of thepopulation in San Francisco. But the city topped 9,000 births in 2007for the first time since 1994, and the San Francisco Unified SchoolDistrict received 500 more applications for kindergarten spots thisyear than last, the second year kindergarten applications surged.