Big Cities Hit by Census Data Showing Declining Role : Population: Officials challenge the numbers, but social scientists say the U.S. is becoming a nation of suburbs.

For the nation’s financially strapped big cities, the 1990 census is bringing more bad news.

From Chicago to Atlanta and from Boston to New Orleans, census figures released Wednesday show declining or stagnant populations, meaning that these and other large cities may be facing less government aid and weakening political influence.

While many city officials contest the accuracy of the latest numbers, social scientists blame the decline of urban populations on a continuing flight to the suburbs that was exacerbated during the 1980s by the virtual disappearance of an urban manufacturing base in some towns and by middle-class home buyers’ search for affordable housing elsewhere.

“We are becoming a suburban nation,” said William Frey, a research scientist at the University of Michigan’s Population Studies Center.

Central cities are having “a far reduced role in surrounding metropolitan economies . . . while progressively losing their political clout,” Frey said.

The Census Bureau released population data on cities and counties in 17 states and the District of Columbia. California data is scheduled to be released this week, along with figures for cities and counties in the other 32 states. State and national census figures were released in December.

Except for New Orleans, the most pronounced population losses occurred in cities east of the Mississippi. But even Western cities that grew during the past decade could be penalized financially and politically because they did not grow nearly as fast as surrounding suburbs.

For example, Phoenix grew by 24% during the 1980s, but city officials expect it may lose as much as $8 million in annual state aid to surrounding suburban communities that grew by as much as 400% during the same decade. Moreover, Phoenix could lose four seats in the state Legislature and two in the state Senate, again to neighboring suburbs whose exploding populations justify increased representation.

A somewhat similar picture is emerging in Los Angeles, where the city’s 15% growth rate was dwarfed by the rate of expansion in neighboring towns and counties, according to preliminary census figures released in August. The city’s share of the regional population in Southern California has dropped from 18% to less than 12%.

Similarly, Seattle has grown by 4.5%, from 493,846 to 516,259, according to the 1990 census. But King County has grown nearly five times as fast, with its 1990 population exceeding 1.5 million.

In cities where population is not growing, officials worry more about the financial implications of the census, especially in places where the tax-paying populace shrinks while the poor grow in numbers and needs.

Many cities are already in financial trouble. The National League of Cities recently reported that half the nation’s cities are spending more than they take in. During the past decade, state and federal aid to cities has fallen from 50% of their budgets to less than 20%, the league reports.

Wednesday’s figures were an especially bitter pill for New Orleans, whose population has dropped by nearly 11%. The 496,938 figure was just short of the magic half-million figure that would have allowed it to qualify for a number of federal assistance programs.

“There is so much that these numbers affect: housing subsidies, welfare benefits, school lunches. . . . It’s so upsetting,” said Cindy Connick, a city population expert.

In Chicago, a population decline of 7.4% could cost the city $80 million a year in government aid that is based on population, said Susan Weed, an assistant commissioner of planning. The decline, Weed said, is fed by a long-running white middle-class exodus, leaving a city with a black plurality for the first time.

The Census Bureau has not yet released ethnic breakdowns of the population of Chicago or most other parts of the country.

Weed and officials in several other cities strongly disagree with census figures, arguing that census takers missed huge pockets of residents, including homeless people, minorities and immigrants who do not speak English.

“We believe there was a serious undercount,” said Weed, who estimated that 8% of the city’s population was overlooked. An accurate tally would put Chicago’s population close to 3 million, about the same as it was in 1980, Weed said.

In its preliminary count, the Census Bureau had said Boston had lost population during the 1980s. But after double-checking housing units and recanvassing neighborhoods, the Census Bureau found that the city had actually grown a little, from 562,994 in 1980 to 574,283 in 1990.

Although that was good news, the increase remains far below the level that city officials had originally expected. It is also not enough to keep the city from losing a congressional seat, said Allan Stern, director of management information systems for the city of Boston.

“This process has been an embarrassment,” Stern said of the census. “It is a shame that the government could spend this much money . . . and come up with such dramatic undercounts.”

Stern said Boston officials may sue the Census Bureau to demand that it use some kind of statistical adjustment to account for blacks, poor people and other inner-city dwellers who are thought to be overlooked in large numbers by traditional means of collecting census data.

New York City officials have been among the harshest critics of the census. After the preliminary count was announced in August, New York Mayor David Dinkins said the city’s population was undercounted by 800,000. City officials said the omissions could cost the city more than $1 billion a year in government aid. The Census Bureau has not released final figures for New York.

Several cities, including Los Angeles, are suing the Census Bureau to require the use of a controversial survey technique that many experts believe would provide a more accurate tally of inner-city neighborhoods where head counts are traditionally hardest to do. A settlement of one of the lawsuits filed requires the secretary of commerce, who presides over the census, to decide by July 15 whether to correct the census based on the survey results.

POPULATION CHANGES Population change 1980-90 of selected cities (Listed in descending order of 1990 population)

City 1980 1990 Percent change Chicago 3,005,072 2,783,726 - 7.4% Phoenix 789,704 983,403 +24.5% Indianapolis 700,807 741,952 + 5.9% Baltimore 786,775 736,014 - 6.5% Washington, DC 638,432 606,900 - 4.9% Boston 562,994 574,283 + 2.0% Seattle 493,846 516,259 + 4.5% New Orleans 557,515 496,938 -10.9% Oklahoma City 404,014 444,719 +10.1% Atlanta 425,022 394,017 - 7.3% Wichita, Kan. 279,838 304,011 + 8.6% Richmond, Va. 219,214 203,056 - 7.4% Jackson, Miss. 202,895 196,637 - 3.1% Little Rock, Ark. 159,159 175,795 +10.5% Providence, R.I. 156,804 160,728 + 2.5%

Source: Partial release of 1990 totals by U.S. Census Bureau on Wednesday, Jan. 23, 1990. Times director of computer analysis Richard O’Reilly contributed to this story.