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Arizona

 

Summary Demographic State Data (and Source)
Population (2009 Census Bureau est.):	6,595,778
Population (2000 Census):	5,130,632
Foreign-Born Population (2009 CB est.):	925,376
Foreign-Born Population (2000 Census):	656,183
Share Foreign-Born (2009):	14%
Share Foreign-Born (2000):	12.8%
Naturalized U.S. Citizens (2009 CB est.):	299,329
Share Naturalized (2009):	32.3%
Legal Immigrant Admission (DHS 2000-2009):	175,994
Refugee Admission (hHS 2000-2009):	21,099
Illegal Alien Population (2010 FAIR est.):	390,000
Cost of Illegal Aliens -  (2010 FAIR):	$2,569,000,000
Projected Population - 2050 (2006 FAIR):	13,800,000

 

Learn More About Arizona's Landmark Immigration Law

 

Arizona : Census Bureau Data

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Arizona : Extended Immigration Data

 

LIMITED ENGLISH PROFICIENCY STUDENTS

Data are not available nationally on immigrant students (either legally or illegally resident in the United States) who are enrolled in primary and secondary schools (K-12). However, many of these students are enrolled in Limited English Proficiency/English Language Learning (LEP/ELL) instruction programs. Many may be U.S.-born, but the majority of these students may be assumed to be either immigrants or the children of immigrants, with the exception being areas with native Americans who speak a native language other than English.

 

FOREIGN STUDENTS

The 2009/10 annual report of the Institute of International Education (IIE) lists the number of foreign students attending post-secondary school in Arizona as 10,676. The following schools in Arizona have major concentrations of these students:  Arizona State U.-Tempe (4,483), U. Arizona-Tucson (2,889), N. Arizona-Flagstaff (594), Mesa CC. (220), and Scottsdale CC. (160). These schools account for about 78 percent of the foreign students attending school in Arizona in 2009. 

For information on foreign student issues see: Foreign Students in the United States.

REFUGEES

Arizona has received over 21,099 refugees over the most recent ten fiscal years (FY'00-'09) including 4,320 in FY'09.

 

 

 

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Arizona : Immigrant Admissions

 

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Arizona : Poll Data

 

Rasmussen Poll: Arizona Law SB 1070
July 2010

Do you favor or oppose the state's new immigration law?

The U.S. Justice Department has decided to challenge the legality of Arizona’s new immigration law in federal court. Do you agree or disagree with the decision to challenge the legality of Arizona’s new immigration law?

 

 

A Rasmussen poll of likely Arizona voters conducted on June 29^th, 2010 found:

• Arizonans favor SB1070 66% to 24%.
• Oppose the Justice Department’s lawsuit against the state 62% to 23%.
• 73% support strict sanctions against employers who hire illegal workers.  Only 15% oppose strict sanctions.
• Oppose automatically granting citizenship to a child born in the U.S. to illegal alien parents 64% to 26%.

A Rasmussen poll of 500 Likely Voters in Arizona conducted on April 13^th, 2010 found:

• 83% of likely Arizona voters say that immigration is an important factor in determining who they will vote for in an election (Rasmussen, April 2010).

A Rasmussen poll Arizona Survey of 500 Likely Voters conducted on July 21^st, 2009 found:

• 51% say Congress should pass immigration reform before health care reform.
• 65% believe that enforcing the borders is more important than legalizing those already here.

A Rasmussen poll conducted of 500 Likely Voters in Arizona on November 28^th, 2007 found:

• 80% oppose granting drivers’ licenses to illegal aliens.
• 68% say that when police officers pull someone over for a traffic violation, they should routinely check to see if that person is in the country legally.
• 71% believe that if an illegal immigrant is discovered in this manner, they should be deported.

A Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications telephone poll taken from October 2007 (of 677 registered voters) found that:

• 69% of registered voters support penalizing businesses that “knowingly hire illegal immigrants.”
• 83% opposed issuing drivers’ licenses to undocumented immigrants.
• 62% support Sheriff Joe Apario's stance on immigration law enforcement.

A Rasmussen Reports in partnership with FOX Television Stations, Inc. conducted on October 3^rd, 2007 of 500 likely voters found:

• 74% of Arizona voters want the Sherriff’s Office to continue recent sweeps to arrest and deport illegal immigrants.
• 77% would like other law enforcement agencies in the state to follow the lead of Arpaio’s team.

A Cronkite/Eight Poll taken from January 18^th - 21^st, 2007 (of 600 registered voters) found that:

• Immigration is the number one issue among Arizona residents, gaining 33% of the vote. Coming in a distant second was education gaining only 20% of the vote.

An Arizona State University School of Journalism poll taken May 18^th - May 21^st, 2006 (of 351 registered voters) found that:

• 86% support adding 6000 Border Patrol Agents.
• 85% want to hold employers accountable for the legal status of their workers.
• 79% want to refuse automatic citizenship for undocumented workers.
• 70% agree that the National Guard should as assist border support in support roles.
• 54% agree with building a fence on public property across the border to stop illegal aliens from gaining access to the United States.

A Eight/KAET-TV and the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University from February 22^nd - 25^th, 2006 (of 600 registered voters) found that:

• 65% support charging undocumented immigrants with criminal trespassing.
• 55% agree with felony charges against employers who knowing hire undocumented immigrants.
• 51% consider undocumented immigrants who commit serious crimes “domestic terrorists”.

ThinkAz Poll October 2005 (of 603 Arizonans who voted on Proposition 200) found that:

• 64% of these voters believe that putting the onus on employers would be "effective".
• 44% plurality of respondents said eliminating automatic U.S. citizenship for babies born to undocumented immigrants in the United States would be 'effective' in controlling illegal immigration.
• 42% of repsondents said limiting limit access to a public school educationwas as "effective".
• Only about 30% favorgranting "immediate U.S. citizenship or amnesty" to undocumented immigrants who have lived in the United States for at least three years.

Arizona Republic Poll on October 19^th 2005 (of 600 Arizona residents) found that:

• Only 4% of respondents saying the government's attempts to secure the border are "very successful". Nearly one-third called the efforts "moderately" successful.
• 85% predicting it could be moderately or very successful in the future.
• 67% of the respondents thought the statelegislature has done enough during the past year to deal with illegal immigration

Social Research Laboratory Pollof Northern Arizona inlate March 2005 found that

• 53% of Arizona respondents agreed that immigration has been harmful when asked “Overall do you believe immigration …in recent years has been good or bad for the country?"  Fewer than half that many (24%) chose “good,” while 14% said not much difference or 9% no opinion.

Asked about spending more or less on immigration related activities,

• 84% would spend more on Arizona border enforcement.
• 70% would spend more on enforcing employer sanctions.
• 61% would spend more on deporting "undocumented immigrants".
• 55% would spend more on helping "undocumented immigrants" get jobs where "needed".
• 73% would spend less and on providing social services for "undocumented immigrants".

KAET-TV/Channel 8, September 2003:

• 70% support an initiative that would require proof of citizenship when voting and applying for state and local welfare services.

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Arizona : Illegal Aliens

 

FAIR Estimate

FAIR estimates the state’s illegal alien population as of 2010 is as many as 390,000 persons. This is part of an overall estimate of the U.S. illegal alien population of about 12 million persons.

INS ESTIMATE

The Immigration and Naturalization Service (now dissolved into the Dept. of Homeland Security) estimated in February 2003 that the population of resident illegal aliens in Arizona was 283,000 in January 2000. According to this INS estimate, only five states had higher numbers of illegal aliens than Arizona. Most of the state’s illegal alien population may be presumed to have arrived after the 1986 amnesty for illegal aliens, when nearly 83,000 applications (29,249 long-term illegal residents and 53,319 agricultural workers) were received from aliens who claimed Arizona as their residence. The illegal alien population has continued to climb since October 1992 when it was estimated at 57,000 illegal residents. The estimate by the INS was about 115,000 as of October 1996. The INS played down the apparent doubling of the illegal alien population in four years by noting that it believed the 1992 estimate should have included about 38,000 more Mexicans. The most recent estimate by DHS put the illegal population in the state at 470,000 in 2010.

OTHER ESTIMATES

In a report on "The Costs of Illegal Immigration to Arizonans" released in May 2004, we estimated the illegal alien population in the state has likely risen to 425,000 persons. That estimate included an estimated 55,000 public school students who were illegal aliens.

The Pew Hispanic Center estimated that the illegal alien population in Arizona was 400,000 in 2010.

Fiscal Cost of Illegal Aliens

FAIR’s 2010 fiscal cost study, “The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers” estimated the following cost outlays and tax receipts:

Arizona Fiscal Costs In 2009
Due to Illegal Aliens ($M)		(Pct.)
K-12 educ.	$1,390.5	54.1%
LEP educ.	$279.6	10.9%
Medicaid	$259	10.1%
SCHIP	$60.5	2.4%
Justice	$339.7	13.2%
Welfare+	$85.5	3.3%
General	$153.0	6.0%
Total	$2,568.6
Tax Receipts	$142.8
Net Cost	$2,425.8

Source:“The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers,” FAIR 2010.

Updated November 2010

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Arizona : Immigration Impact

 

Water: Through a series of conservation efforts, Arizona residents have been able to bring down daily per capita water use from 154 gallons to 115 since 2000, a sizeable 26% reduction.¹ Nevertheless, population growth and dwindling water resources challenge the notion that Arizona can continue to expand with unchecked growth. "I have no doubt that within the next five to ten years, we will be in a shortage," said David Modeer, Tucson, Arizona's Water Director. "It does not look good."²

Even with the reduction in water use, at 115 gallons per person, per day, public demand in 2050 may increased by up to 850 million gallons each day. Without a doubt, supplying water to this expanding population will put Arizona in a predicament in the near future. The problem arises because most surface water supplies are completely allocated and groundwater is being consumed at an unsustainable rate.³

Making the looming water crisis direr, historic prioritizing of water rights means that Arizona will be the first state to suffer whenever the surface water resource of the Colorado River comes up short. Arizona currently gets one-third of its water from the Colorado River. But as the river dries, Arizona will lose up to eighty percent of this resource before neighboring states incur any significant loss.⁴ Unfortunately, reduced runoff into the Colorado River has occurred annually since 2000.⁵

Traffic: Vehicle traffic on Arizona highways increased by 71 percent between 1990 and 2008, double the national average. One-fifth (20%) of roads in Arizona were assessed to be in poor or mediocre condition in 2010, and 12 percent of its bridges are structurally deficient or obsolete.⁶ Phoenix is one of the most congested urban areas in the U.S. The average commuter was delayed by 44 hours and used an additional 31 gallons of gas due to traffic conditions in 2007. Tuscon commuters experienced similar delays, logging 41 hours per driver in delays and burning through 26 gallons of fuel. Between the two urban areas, wasted fuel and time cost commuters a total of $2.3 billion in 2007.⁷

As population growth puts more traffic on the roads, the average commute for Arizona residents increased 15 percent during the 1990s, to 22 minutes in 2000. This was a faster rate of increase than the national average of 14 percent.⁸ Nationwide, the amount of travel in urban areas that was not congested dropped from 74 percent in 1982 to 45 percent in 2007. Prevalence of severe congestion nearly tripled, and the peak period of work-related congestion dubbed “rush hour” has more than doubled in length since 1982.⁹ About 14 percent of Arizona commuters had a commute of 45 minutes or longer in 2008.¹⁰

Phoenix is now the fifth most congested area in the country,¹¹ with roads so congested that the fire department has trouble reaching accident victims—and is considering adding motorcycles to its fleet to speed up response times.¹² Despite a $122 million plan to widen Interstate 10, state transportation officials say the freeway will be "bumper to bumper," with more cars than road space by 2025 because of population growth.¹³

Air Quality: More than half of Arizona counties assessed for ozone risk by the American Lung Association in 2010 received an “F.” No county received an “A.”¹⁴

Solid Waste: Arizona generates 1.1 tons of solid waste per capita each year.¹⁵ If this solid waste production does not change, and the state's population continues to grow as projected, the states production of solid wastes will increase by an additional 8.3 million tons per year.

Disappearing open space: The amount of developed land in Arizona increased by 988,100 acres from 1982 to 2007, growing at a pace of 61,820 acres per year over the last ten years of that period.¹⁶ As Arizona's population has risen, so has the need for additional housing: The total number of housing units in Arizona increased by 32 percent during the 1990s and 16 percent between 2000 and 2005.¹⁷ This has led to dramatic losses of open space; Maricopa County, home to more than 60 percent of the state's population, consumes an acre of farmland every hour.¹⁸

A study of urban sprawl between 1970 and 1990 that calculated the impact of population increase and per capita land use found that 353.6 square miles of additional land were consumed by urban sprawl in the Phoenix metropolitan area, and 92.0 percent of that sprawl was attributable to population increase. In the Chattanooga metro area sprawl consumed an additional 141.8 square miles and population increase accounted for 79.1 percent of the increase.¹⁹

National Parks: Migrant smuggling is causing serious harm to the fragile ecosystems and natural resources in southeastern Arizona, a recent government report found. It reported that wilderness areas are being damaged by the creation of unwanted trails and roads, damage to existing trails, and large amounts of trash: "This proliferation of trails damages and destroys cactus and other sensitive vegetation, disrupts or prohibits revegetation, disturbs wildlife and their cover and travel routes, causes soil compaction and erosion, impacts stream bank stability, and often times confuses legitimate users of trails on federal lands."²⁰

Trash and human waste left behind by illegal immigrants also affect soil and water quality.²¹ It is estimated that each undocumented immigrant crossing the border into the United States discards at least eight pounds of trash in southern Arizona, where thousands of acres are covered in trash.²²

An environmental impact study of the damage to the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, where officials caught 200,000 illegal aliens in 2001, finds that it could take 20 years for the area to recover from damage wrought by smugglers and illegal aliens trekking through. 200 miles of unauthorized roads have been carved into the park's wilderness.²³

Crowded housing: An estimated 99,031 of Arizona's housing units were classified as crowded in 2008, defined as units with more than one occupant per room. This amounted to 4.4 percent of the state's housing units. 28,963 of those were severely crowded, with at least 1.5 occupants per room. Per housing unit, the state's rate of crowded housing is nearly 150 percent of the national average and trails only Hawaii, California, Texas and New York.²⁴ Following the national trend, crowded housing rates were driven upward by immigration. 28 percent of Arizona's children in immigrant families live in crowded housing, compared to just 13 percent of children with native-born parents.²⁵

Arizona is home to some of the most crowded cities in the nation. Seven of Arizona's eight metropolitan areas with more than 65,000 people were in the top 100 nationally in prevalence of crowded housing, and all eight were within the top half. The Show Low area is third nationally in rate of severe crowding fifth nationally crowded housing, and Flagstaff and Yuma were both among the 25 most crowded cities.

Crime: The population growth in Arizona's prison system ranks among the top four states in the country, and the population in Arizona's prisons is expected to increase by 52 percent by 2017.²⁶ Arizona has 4,000 more prisoners than the system was designed to handle which has forced officials to transfer 1,200 inmates to Indiana.²⁷

Poverty: Arizona's immigrants are more likely to be poor than their native-born counterparts. In 2007, 21.5 percent of foreign-born households were below the poverty line, compared to 12.8 percent of native households. An additional 15.1 percent of the foreign-born and 8.5 percent of native households had incomes between 100 and 149 percent of the poverty level.²⁸ 34.5 percent of children in immigrant families were poor in 2006, compared to 17.5 percent of native children. ²⁹

School Overcrowding: Nearly one-third, or 31 percent, of Arizona's children have immigrant parents. Seven percent are themselves foreign-born.³⁰ This influx of immigrants and their children is contributing to severe school overcrowding problems in the state. Public school enrollment in Arizona increased by about 255,000 students between 1998 and 2008. Over the same period, the number of students per teacher increased from 19.0 to 19.7, the third-worst ratio in the country. Nationally, only two other states had fewer teachers per student in 2008 than in 1998.³¹

In Phoenix, schools are so crowded that some students are attending classes in a former mall and in a converted grocery store.³² In Mesa, schools have even run out of room for classroom trailers, over 700 elementary school students attend classes in an old grocery store.³³ In Gilbert, which is growing faster than any U.S. community its size, schools are so crowded that some students went without desks and cafeteria tables at the start of the 2003-04 school year.³⁴

Illegal Immigration: In some areas, such as Douglas, residents are so fearful of alien smugglers that they say they avoid going out alone at night.³⁵ In Cochise County, which shares 84 miles of border with Mexico, problems associated with illegal immigration cost residents 37 cents of every tax dollar they pay (according to the county's sheriff).³⁶ Approximately ten percent of the county's health department budget goes toward treatment of illegal aliens.³⁷

Endnotes:

1. Harold Kitching, "Quenching Growth," Casa Grande Valley Newspaper, May 6, 2008.
2. Tony Raap, Experts fear water shortage from Colorado River to strive earlier than predicted," Today’s News Herald-havasunews.com, February 26, 2007.
3. Robert Glennon & Michael J. Pearce, "Transferring Mainstem Colorado River Water Rights: The Arizona Experience," Arizona Law Review: Volume 49, 2007.
4. Tony Raap, Experts fear water shortage from Colorado River to strive earlier than predicted," Today’s News Herald-havasunews.com, February 26, 2007
5. Cary Blake, "Arizona faces potential water supply shortage from Colorado River by 2011," Western Farm Press, December 6, 2007
6. The Road Information Project, “Key Facts About Arizona’s Surface Transportation System and Federal Funding,” May 2010.
7. Texas Transportation Institute, “Urban Mobility Report 2009.”
8. Tony Raap, “Experts fear water shortage from Colorado River to strive earlier than predicted," Today’s News Herald-havasunews.com, February 26, 2007. Cary Blake, "Arizona faces potential water supply shortage from Colorado River by 2011," Western Farm Press, December 6, 2007
9. Texas Transportation Institute, “Urban Mobility Report 2009,” p 8-9, 22-24
10. American Community Survey, 2008 Estimates, Custom Data Table.
11. Katie Warchut, "Freeways Ease Congestion, But More Crops Up," Arizona Republic, October 1, 2003.
12. Judi Villa, "Fire Dept. Mulls Motorcycle Medics," Arizona Republic, August 25, 2003.
13. Garry Duffy, "I-10 Gridlock," Tucson Citizen, February 24, 2004
14. American Lung Association, “State of the Air 2010.”
15. Report Card for America's Infrastructure 2005," American Society of Civil Engineers.
16. USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, “Summary Report: 2007 National Resources Inventory.”
17. Table DP-1-4, Profile of General Demographic Characteristics: 1990," 1990 Census, U.S. Census Bureau.
    "Table DP-1-4, Profile of General Demographic Characteristics: 1990," 1990 Census, U.S. Census Bureau.
    "Data Set: 2005 American Community Survey: Arizona 2005," American Factfinder,   U.S. Census Bureau.
18. Jon Kamman, "3.1 Million More People Likely in Arizona by 2020," Arizona Republic, January 8, 2002.
19. Beck, Roy and Leon Kolankiewicz, "Weighing Sprawl Factors in Large U.S. Cities," NumbersUSA, March 2001.
20. Report to the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations on Impacts Caused by Undocumented Aliens Crossing Federal Lands in Southeast Arizona, a joint project by the Immigration & Naturalization Service, the Interior Department, and the Environmental Protection Agency, April 29, 2002.
21. "Environmental  Damage from Illegal Immigration, Border Enforcement Activities In American SouthWest,", California Political Desk, February 1, 2006.
22. "A Summary of 2003 - 2005 Accomplishments," Southern Arizona Project to Mitigate Environmental Damages Resulting from Illegal Immigration. U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management.  Report to the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations on Impacts Caused by Undocumented Aliens Crossing Federal Lands in Southeast Arizona, a joint project by the Immigration & Naturalization Service, the Interior Department, and the Environmental Protection Agency, April 29, 2002.
23. Mary Jo Pitzl, "Increased Illegal Crossings Strain Organ Pipe to Limit," Arizona Republic, January 14, 2004.
24. American Community Survey, Three-Year Estimates 2006-2008. Data retrieved using ACS Custom Table tool.
25. Kids Count Data Center, which used 2008 American Community Survey Data.
26. Dennis Welch, "Bulging prison bill going up," East Valley/Scottsdale Tribune, February 7, 2007.
    "Arizona's Prison Population Projected to Grow Twice as fast as General Resident Population, Independent Study Finds; State Selected as One of Five Justice Reinvestment Learning Sites," Justice Center of the Council of State Governments, February 6, 2007.
27. "Will Rising Prison Costs Spark Reform?" Tucson Weekly, March 22, 2007.
28. Migration Information Source State Data (Migration Policy Institute)
29. Urban Institute, Children of Immigrants Data Tool.
30. "Arizona State Factsheet," Migration Information Source, Migration Policy Institute.
31. NEA, “Rankings and Estimates,” 1999 and 2009 editions.
32. "Districts Ease School Overcrowding with Abandoned Commercial Buildings," Associated Press, August 2, 2000.
33. Haya El Nasser, "Schools Forced to Roam in Search of More Room," USA Today, August 18, 2000.
34. Stephanie Paterik, "Old West Takes Off-Ramp," Arizona Republic, December 2003.
35. "Public Elementary and Secondary School Student Enrollment, High School Completions, and Staff From the Common Core of Data: School Year 2005-06', National Center foe Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, June 2007
36. "Arizona Lawmakers Get Earful on Border Issues," Associated Press, October 31, 2001.
37. "Social, Financial Costs of Illegal Entry Said High," Associated Press, May 18, 2001.

 

Other Resources  

State Local Reform Organizations

State Representatives Voting Record

 

Updated November 2010

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