Next year, it’s possible that the region that likes to think of itself as the most progressive place in the country will have zero black state legislators and zero black mayors of major cities.
. . . Part of the reason why is a precipitous drop in the region’s black population. According to census data compiled by the Association of Bay Area Governments, the African-American population percentage in the nine Bay Area counties declined from 9 percent in 1980 to 6.7 percent in 2010 — among the lowest of any large metro area in the U.S.
In San Francisco, the decrease has been even steeper: The city’s black population declined from 96,078 or 13.4 percent of the total population in 1970 to 45,607 and 5.4 percent in 2016. And in Oakland, it dipped from 159,351 and 47 percent in 1980 to 101,936 and 26.1 percent in 2016. (It’s always been low in the South Bay.)
“Many of the African-Americans who used to be in San Francisco and Oakland are now living in Antioch or Tracy,” said Elihu Harris, a former Oakland mayor and state legislator.
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