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Socioeconomics <br />Table 8. Demographics of the Riverfront area and Springfield. <br /> - Percentage or <br /> City of Difference <br /> Riverfront Area Springfield from Springfield Area <br />Population 6,693 44,683 14.98% <br />Per capita income $10,858 $10,222 $636 <br />Families below poverty level 19.97% 16.47% 3.50% <br />Average age 33.4 32.6 0.7 <br />High school graduate or higher 78.0% 77.7% 0.3% <br />Bachelors degree or higher 16.3% 10.8% 5.5% <br />Home ownership 42.75% 49.29% -6.53% <br />Median home value $56,700 $50,500 $6,200 <br />Rent $385 $423 -$38 <br />Source: U. S. Census (1990). <br />Although the percentage of Riverfront area residents who have attained a high school education <br />is the same as in the city of Springfield, a greater percentage (16.7) have received a bachelors <br />degree or higher than in the city as a whole (10.8 percent). Overall, the demographics of the <br />Riverfront site indicate an area with characteristics similar to the city of Springfield. <br />Comments made during the EIS scoping process indicated that the area around the Riverfront <br />site has a high rate of crime, relative to the city of Springfield. While the perception of the area <br />as a "high crime area" is based on personal perception and anecdotal evidence, the Springfield <br />Police Department has not found the area to be a particular problem area for policing (Smith <br />2000 personal communication). A review of police charts showing the number of calls for <br />service during the 1999 calendar year indicates that crime in the vicinity of the Riverfront site is <br />roughly comparable to the rest of the downtown Springfield-area. <br />As shown in Table 9, the overall racial composition of the area around the Riverfront site is <br />similar to that of the city of Springfield. The vast majority of citizens in Springfield are white, <br />and no single minority population has a greater representation than any other. The only notable <br />difference is that the Hispanic population of the area around the Riverfront site is nearly 2 <br />percent higher than in the city as a whole. While the Riverfront area comprises approximately <br />15 percent of the entire population of the city of Springfield, 23.7 percent of the Hispanic <br />residents live around the Riverfront site. <br />Alternative 2, Option A (Preferred Alternative) and Option B <br />The Chiquita site (formerly Agripac) is located in close proximity to an industrial/commercial <br />area north of Broadway and generally east of the Ferry Street overpass. Because of the close <br />proximity of the sites and the similarity of land use, it is assumed for this analysis that the <br />demographic characteristics of the three Eugene sites are similar. Because the three potential <br />Eugene sites cover portions of both the downtown neighborhood area and the campus <br />neighborhood area, the following demographic discussion combines these two neighborhood <br />-areas and addresses potential impacts on the larger area. <br />Final EIS 108 New Federal Courthouse <br />