Tulare County, California


Tulare County is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2010 census, the population was 442,179. Its county seat is Visalia. The county is named for Tulare Lake, once the largest freshwater lake west of the Great Lakes. Drained for agricultural development, the site is now in Kings County, which was created in 1893 from the western portion of the formerly larger Tulare County.
Tulare County comprises the Visalia-Porterville, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area. The county is located south of Fresno, spanning from the San Joaquin Valley east to the Sierra Nevada.
Sequoia National Park is located in the county, as are part of Kings Canyon National Park, in its northeast corner, and part of Mount Whitney, on its eastern border. As of the 2010 census, the population was 442,179, up from 368,021 at the 2000 census.

History

The land was occupied for thousands of years by the Yokuts. Beginning in the eighteenth century, Spain established missions to colonize California and convert the American Indians to Christianity. Comandante Pedro Fages, while hunting for deserters in the Central Valley in 1772, discovered a great lake surrounded by marshes and filled with rushes; he named it Los Tules. It is from this lake that the county derives its name. The root of the name Tulare is found in the Nahuatl word tullin, designating cattail or similar reeds.
In 1805, 1806 and again in 1816, the Spanish out of Mission San Luis Obispo explored Lake Tulare.
Bubal was a native village located on the Western side of Lake Tulare. In 1816, Fr. Luis Martinez of Mission San Luis Obispo arrived at Bubal with soldiers and armed Christian Northern Chumash pressuring the people to send their children for baptism at his mission on the coast. Conflict broke out, and Martinez's party burned Bubal to the ground, destroying the cache of food harvested for the winter. Although Bubal's relationship with the Christian Salinans under Fr. Cabot at Mission San Miguel was better, between 1816 and 1834, Bubal was a center of native resistance. The marshes around Lake Tulare were impenetrable by Spanish horses, which gave the Yokuts a military advantage. At one point, the Spanish considered building a presidio with 100 soldiers at Bubal to control the resistance, but that never came to pass. The Spanish called the natives of the area Tulareños, and before 1816 and after 1834, they were incorporated into Mission San Miguel and Mission San Luis Obispo.
After Mexico achieved independence, it continued to rule California. After the Mexican Cession and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, the area became part of the United States. Tulare County was soon formed from parts of Mariposa County only 4 years later in 1852. There were two early attempts to split off a new Buena Vista County in 1855, and Coso County in 1864, but both failed. Parts of the county's territory were given to Fresno County in 1856, to Kern County and to Inyo County in 1866 and to Kings County in 1893.
The infectious disease Tularemia caused by the bacterium Francisella tularensis is named after Tulare County.
In 1908 Colonel Allen Allensworth and associates founded Allensworth as a black farming community. They intended to develop a place where African Americans could thrive free of white discrimination. It was the only community in California founded, financed and governed by African Americans. While its first years were highly successful, the community encountered environmental problems from dropping water tables which eventually caused it to fail. Today the historic area is preserved as the Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of, of which is land and is water.

Adjacent counties

Rivers

Parks

National protected areas

is a national park in the southern Sierra Nevada, east of Visalia. It was established in 1890 as the second U.S. national park, after Yellowstone. The park spans. Encompassing a vertical relief of nearly, the park contains among its natural resources the highest point in the contiguous 48 United States, Mount Whitney, at above sea level. The park is south of and contiguous with Kings Canyon National Park; the two are administered by the National Park Service as one unit, called Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks.

Flora

Tulare County is rich in native plant species due in part to a diversity in habitats, including creeks, rivers, hills, and mountains. Native plants include incense cedar, valley oak, California bay, manzanita, Salvia spathacea, mountain mahogany, milkweed, Epilobium cleistogamum, monkeyflower, Penstemon, California melic, and deer grass.

Government and policing

Administration

Tulare County is a general law county under the California Constitution. That is, it does not have a county charter. The county is governed by a five-member Board of Supervisors. Supervisors are elected by districts for four-year terms. There are no term limits in effect. The Chairman and Vice-Chairman are elected annually by the Board of Supervisors from among its members.

Sheriff

The Tulare County Sheriff provides court protection, county jail operation, patrol and detective functions in the unincorporated areas of the county. Incorporated towns have municipal police departments or contract with the Sheriff for their police operations.

Transportation

Major highways

Tulare County Transit provides a countywide bus service linking the population centers. A connection to Delano in Kern County is also operated.
The cities of Tulare, Porterville, and Visalia have their own local bus services.
Greyhound and Orange Belt Stages provide long-distance, intercity bus service.

Airports

The Porterville Municipal Airport located 3 nautical miles from Downtown Porterville has very limited commercial passenger service with WestAir. The airport offers general aviation to the public, it is also home to Porterville Air Attack Base on the south part of the airport. The Visalia Municipal Airport is a city-owned airport for the city of Visalia, California. Mefford Field is a city-owned general aviation airport located in Tulare.
The nearest full operation commercial airports are Bakersfield's Meadows Field Airport to the South, and Fresno's Fresno Yosemite International Airport to the North.

Crime

The following table includes the number of incidents reported and the rate per 1,000 persons for each type of offense.

Cities by population and crime rates

Demographics

2011

Places by population, race, and income

2010

The 2010 United States Census reported that Tulare County had a population of 442,179. The racial makeup of Tulare County was 265,618 White, 7,196 African American, 6,993 Native American, 15,176 Asian, 509 Pacific Islander, 128,263 from other races, and 18,424 from two or more races. There were 268,065 people of Hispanic or Latino origin, of any race.

2000

As of the census of 2000, there were 368,021 people, 110,385 households, and 87,093 families residing in the county. The population density was 76 people per square mile. There were 119,639 housing units at an average density of 25 per square mile. The racial makeup of the county was 58.1% White, 1.6% Black or African American, 1.6% Native American, 3.3% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 30.8% from other races, and 4.6% from two or more races. 50.8% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. 6.2% were of American, 5.7% German and 5.0% English ancestry according to Census 2000. 56.3% spoke English, 38.9% Spanish and 1.1% Portuguese as their first language.
There were 110,385 households, out of which 44.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 58.1% were married couples living together, 14.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 21.1% were non-families. 17.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 7.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 3.28 and the average family size was 3.67.
In the county, the population was spread out, with 33.8% under the age of 18, 10.6% from 18 to 24, 27.6% from 25 to 44, 18.2% from 45 to 64, and 9.8% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 29 years. For every 100 females there were 100.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 97.7 males.
The median income for a household in the county was $33,983, and the median income for a family was $36,297. Males had a median income of $30,892 versus $24,589 for females. The per capita income for the county was $14,006. About 18.8% of families and 23.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 32.6% of those under age 18 and 10.5% of those age 65 or over.

Crime statistics

The United States Office of Management and Budget has designated Tulare County as the Visalia-Porterville, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area. The United States Census Bureau ranked the Visalia-Porterville, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area as the 111th most populous metropolitan statistical area of the United States as of July 1, 2012.
The Office of Management and Budget has further designated the Visalia-Porterville, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area as a component of the more extensive Visalia-Porterville-Hanford, CA Combined Statistical Area, the 80th most populous combined statistical area and the 92nd most populous primary statistical area of the United States as of July 1, 2012.

Politics

Voter registration statistics

Cities by population and voter registration

Overview

Tulare is a strongly Republican county in Presidential and congressional elections. The last Democratic candidate for President to win a majority in the county was Lyndon Johnson in 1964. In the 2016 presidential election, Republican candidate and overall winner, Donald Trump, won Tulare by a 9.39% margin of victory, the closest margin of victory for a Republican in the county since Richard Nixon's 8.37% margin in 1960.
YearGOPDEMOthers
201651.09% 58,29941.70% 47,5857.20% 8,218
201256.24% 56,95641.22% 41,7522.54% 2,571
200856.64% 59,76541.35% 43,6342.01% 2,126
200466.15% 65,39932.87% 32,4940.98% 967
200060.20% 54,07036.75% 33,0063.05% 2,742
199653.90% 46,27238.06% 32,6698.05% 6,905
199245.71% 40,48235.22% 31,18819.06% 16,883
198859.61% 46,89139.04% 30,7111.36% 1,067
198463.88% 51,06635.11% 28,0651.02% 812
198058.32% 41,31735.51% 25,1556.18% 4,374
197654.52% 31,86443.72% 25,5511.76% 1,027
197259.93% 36,04836.20% 21,7753.87% 2,327
196852.17% 29,31439.47% 22,1808.35% 4,695
196439.83% 22,52760.08% 33,9740.09% 51
196053.97% 29,45645.60% 24,8870.44% 239
195652.50% 26,05147.17% 23,4070.32% 160
195257.07% 30,10842.10% 22,2080.83% 437
194846.98% 18,41450.22% 19,6812.80% 1,097
194449.30% 16,00549.97% 16,2210.73% 238
194042.85% 15,41455.96% 20,1291.19% 428
193630.78% 8,62467.66% 18,9561.55% 435
193232.27% 8,06662.53% 15,6315.21% 1,302
192863.76% 12,05735.09% 6,6351.15% 218
192450.79% 9,48418.34% 3,42530.87% 5,765
192061.26% 9,13632.43% 4,8376.31% 941
191643.96% 6,84546.87% 7,2999.17% 1,428
19120.72% 7342.31% 4,29356.97% 5,781
190847.95% 2,74240.73% 2,32911.32% 647
190448.61% 2,22135.96% 1,64315.43% 705
190041.41% 1,75553.00% 2,2465.59% 237
189633.80% 1,41064.07% 2,6732.13% 89
189231.96% 1,98442.09% 2,61325.95% 1,611

In the United States House of Representatives, Tulare County is split between 3 congressional districts:
In the California State Senate, it is split between 3 legislative districts:
In the California State Assembly, the county is split between, and.

Economy

The dairy industry, with sales of milk products, brings in the most revenue for the county, typically more than US$ 1 billion a year annually. Oranges, grapes, and cattle-related commodities also earn hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
In 2001, Tulare became the most productive county in the U.S. in terms of agricultural revenues, at US$3.5 billion annually. It surpassed Fresno County's US$3.2 billion, which had held the top spot for over two decades. Due to the importance of agriculture in the county as well as its location in the state, since 1968 the city of Tulare has been the site of the annual World Ag Expo, the world's largest agricultural exposition.
Minor league sports teams, such as the baseball Visalia Rawhide of the class-A level California League, two teams of the Minor League Football Association in Tulare and Visalia, and four teams of the Central California Basketball League based in Porterville, attract many residents and add to the amenities in the county.

Top employers

According to the County's 2010 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, the top employers in the county are:
#Employer# of Employees
1County of Tulare4,320
2Porterville Developmental Center3,000
3Kaweah Delta Medical Center2,000
4Ruiz Foods1,800
5Wal-Mart1,692
6College of the Sequoias1,160
7Cigna900
8Jostens720
9Land O'Lakes600
10Monrovia Nursery600

Utlities and infrastructure

Electricity service in Tulare County is served by Southern California Edison. TV and internet is served by Charter Spectrum.

Communities

Cities

The population ranking of the following table is based on the 2010 census of Tulare County.
† county seat
RankCity/Town/etc.Municipal typePopulation
1† VisaliaCity124,442
2TulareCity59,278
3PortervilleCity60,070
4DinubaCity21,453
5LindsayCity11,768
6FarmersvilleCity10,588
7ExeterCity10,334
8OrosiCDP8,778
9EarlimartCDP8,357
10East PortervilleCDP7,331
11WoodlakeCity7,279
12CutlerCDP5,000
13IvanhoeCDP4,495
t-14PixleyCDP3,310
t-14Terra BellaCDP3,310
15GoshenCDP3,006
16RichgroveCDP2,882
17StrathmoreCDP2,819
18TiptonCDP2,543
19Poplar-Cotton CenterCDP2,470
20Three RiversCDP2,182
21LondonCDP1,869
22Patterson TractCDP1,752
23WoodvilleCDP1,740
24TevistonCDP1,214
25MathenyCDP1,212
26Tule River ReservationAIAN1,049
27AlpaughCDP1,026
28PlainviewCDP945
29SpringvilleCDP934
30Linnell CampCDP849
31East Tulare VillaCDP778
32SultanaCDP775
33TraverCDP713
34DucorCDP612
35West GoshenCDP511
36East OrosiCDP495
37SevilleCDP480
38AllensworthCDP471
39Delft ColonyCDP454
40LindcoveCDP406
41ToolevilleCDP339
42TonyvilleCDP316
43Lemon CoveCDP308
44YettemCDP211
45MonsonCDP188
46Pine FlatCDP166
47Rodriguez CampCDP156
48El RanchoCDP124
49WaukenaCDP108
50Camp NelsonCDP97
51PierpointCDP52
52IdlewildCDP43
53Panorama HeightsCDP41
54California Hot SpringsCDP37
55HartlandCDP30
56Kennedy MeadowsCDP28
57Sugarloaf Saw MillCDP18
58PonderosaCDP16
t-59McClenney TractCDP10
t-59PoseyCDP10
t-59Sequoia CrestCDP10
t-59Sugarloaf VillageCDP10
60Poso ParkCDP9
61WilsoniaCDP5
t-62Cedar SlopeCDP0
t-62Silver CityCDP0
t-62Sugarloaf Mountain ParkCDP0