State Population Rise of 1.2% Lowest in 2 Decades

California’s population increased to 32.3 million during 1994, when the state had its lowest growth rate in more than two decades, the Finance Department said Thursday.

The 1.2% growth rate for the year tied California’s record low growth rate of 1971-72.

Los Angeles, the state’s largest city, dropped to 3.59 million residents, a decline of 23,500, or 0.7%. Long Beach dropped 0.7%--down 3,000 people to 433,200.

As of New Year’s Eve, California had 32,344,000 people, about 392,000 more than the year before. That was the result of 587,000 births, 227,000 deaths and a net in-migration of 32,000 people.

California’s population is approaching nearly double that of the nation’s next two most populous states. As of mid-1994, Texas had 18.4 million and New York 18.2 million people.

The Finance Department, the governor’s budget-writing office, tracks California’s population. The agency’s annual report offers little analysis, but provides a statistical snapshot of population movement.

The fastest growing community in the state was Blythe, whose 28% growth to 16,700 in the year was mostly the result of a new prison. Second-fastest was Palm Desert, which grew 23.2% to 33,700.

Brentwood, Coronado, Adelanto and Temecula all grew by more than 10%.

Orange County increased by 43,000 people to 2.64 million, the largest numerical increase among the state’s 58 counties.

The report included 470 cities. Of those, 391 gained population, 58 lost residents and 21 stayed the same.

For the second consecutive year, the city of San Diego reported the highest numerical gain in population among cities--12,900, for a total of 1.19 million. San Jose had the second highest growth, 12,700, followed by Bakersfield with 10,900.