California's vast inland valleys, from Redding to Riverside, remain the fastest growing regions in the state but already face serious economic and environmental challenges that could determine the state's future, according to a study released Tuesday.
Developing an economy that can sustain this rapid population growth with well-paying jobs is the challenge facing these communities and will determine whether California will continue to prosper, according to the report by the Brookings Institution.
Although often maligned as poor, ugly and polluted, the inland area, spanning 75,000 square miles, is the key to California's future. One in three Californians calls it home. Four of the nation's 10 fastest-growing cities -- Riverside, Bakersfield, Sacramento and San Bernardino -- are there.
High-priced real estate forced many families to flee coastal urban areas and pursue their dreams inland during the past decade. Inland California "represents not so much a break with the California dream, but its new homeland, the state of opportunity for a new generation," the study said.
Sustaining the dream without ruining the environment or agriculture will determine if California remains competitive and a beacon for opportunity in the 21st century, experts say. The San Joaquin Valley already rivals Los Angeles for some of the smoggiest air in the country.
"When you get that many people and that much economic power inland, you better take a look at it and understand it because that's where the future of the state is," said John Husing, president of Redlands-based Economics & Politics Inc., an economic research firm unconnected with the study.
The report paints a portrait of a region at the crossroads. People move inland largely to find affordable housing in the Inland Empire, Central Valley and Sierra foothills.
The population in those regions has increased 14% between 2000 and 2005, four times the rate of the rest of the state, the study said.
But the inland region's rapid growth brings serious challenges.
More than half the new arrivals are Latino, and many new residents are poor and significantly less educated than in the Los Angeles region or the Bay Area.
They need good jobs, but employers aren't likely to relocate until there's a capable, high-skilled workforce in place. Many companies are more likely to relocate to Reno, Las Vegas or Phoenix than to inland California, the study said.
