RENO – For the first time since the 1950s, Nevada’s population numbers are slipping.

The State Demographer, Jeff Hardcastle, released preliminary estimates Wednesday indicating that Nevada’s population is 1 percent leaner than it was in July 2008. According to Hardcastle, the city of Sparks population also shrunk over the past year. In 2008, 91,684 people were counted in the city. This year, 91,237 people live in Sparks, a net decrease of almost one half of 1 percent.

The annually calculated state population numbers can determine how funding is allocated to municipalities, how many representatives a state has in government and how many judges are allowed in a certain area.

As such, the city of Fernley and Churchill County are disputing Hardcastle’s findings, claiming that their populations are possibly larger than Hardcastle believed.

“Governments in Nevada have rights to appeal the estimates if they have concerns,” Hardcastle said. “They (Fernley and Churchill County) are doing that over the next few weeks. If you have your community losing population, they don’t like that.”

The final report should be released at the end of January, he added.

The numbers were collected by rationalizing county assessor’s office data with labor force and school enrollment numbers.

“We get housing and accounts form the assessors’ offices and sometimes the local governments,” Hardcastle said. "We try to use an occupancy rate (for the housing component) because not all houses will be occupied.”

This data was obtained by rationalizing the number of homes on the county assessors’ lists with reports from local utilities.

The labor force component of the count was obtained by counting both those with jobs as well as those on the unemployment line.

The U.S. Census Bureau released its preliminary 2009 population projections on Dec. 23, stating that Michigan (-.33 percent), Maine (-.11 percent) and Rhode Island (-.03 percent) were the only states to decrease in population. However, the Dec. 23 report did state that Nevada and Florida experienced negative net domestic migration, which means more people are moving out than moving in. Both states were experiencing net inflows earlier in the decade, according to the release. However, both are now experiencing net outflows.

And while employment prospects in Nevada have improved, some of the decrease in the state's unemployment rate may be people finding jobs elsewhere. Nevada’s November unemployment rate dropped to 12.3 percent, down from 12.9 percent in October and a record 13.3 percent in September, according to the latest numbers from the state Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation. November’s national unemployment rate was 10 percent.

Hardcastle did not comment on any linear connection between Nevada’s unemployment rate and the state’s recent dip in population. When asked if people are leaving to seek jobs elsewhere, Hardcastle pointed to the Census Bureau information.

“Yes, we do have people leaving Nevada but we do have people coming in,” he said. “It has not happened since the 1950s that we have lost population statewide. We have had counties that have had ups and downs but as a state not since the 1950s.”