Where can I find current demographic data about New Orleans?

The most recent official demographic data on New Orleans comes from the 2006 American Community Survey (ACS) program of the US Census Bureau. This data (released in September 2007) provides a detailed picture of demographics of the New Orleans area, approximately one year after hurricane Katrina and the subsequent levee failures.

ACS data is collected from a small sample of households across each county (or parish) in the first month of the year, and then a different small sample of households in February, and a different small sample of households in March, and so on, until by December a large enough sample has been collected to generate annual demographic estimates for every county in the country. All of the sample data collected from January through December in 2006 was combined and averaged together to create these 2006 ACS estimates. These estimates can be thought of as representing the average characteristics of a county (or parish) during the time period January 1, 2006 through December 31, 2006. For the New Orleans area specifically, these estimates represent the average characteristics of each parish during a time when the area was experiencing significant population flux. In addition, they represent a demographic profile of our area that is several months old. The New Orleans area has continued to grow since 2006, so you’ll want to use this data as a starting point and perhaps use the postal data available on our homepage to show continued change since 2006.

To obtain the postal data, go to our home page http://www.gnocdc.org

And to get the 2006 demographic information, print out our Step-by-step guide to getting ACS data.