Sacramento region gained people but flubbed economic opportunities over 50 years

By Dan Walters | CALMatters OPINION – Fifty years ago this month I moved to Sacramento and a few months later, just after Jerry Brown became governor, began covering politics for the long-defunct Sacramento Union newspaper. I have lived in five different homes — soon to be six — and my workplaces have always been in downtown Sacramento, near the Capitol. That experience, plus research for my 1985 book on California megatrends, forms the background of some observations about the Sacramento region’s evolution. So here goes: In 1974 the six-county region (Sacramento, Yolo, Yuba, Placer, Sutter and El Dorado) was home to barely a million people. However it was on the cusp of explosive growth, as was the entire state, thanks to a wave of migration and a baby boom. Today the region has about 2.5 million residents, making it the nation’s 28th largest metropolitan region, equal to the Las Vegas and Austin, Texas areas. Much of the growth has been in Sacramento’s suburbs, so the city now contains just a fifth of the region’s population and has ceased to be its economic center, while jobs and businesses have flourished in the suburbs. As the local economy evolved from state...