Talk:Census-designated place

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Moved CDP Policy Proposal to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cities.

I removed A third instance occurs when a city's boundaries place it in more than one county. I do not think CDPs are used for incorporated cities where the boundaries span counties. There may be separate entries for the portion of the municipality in each county along with an entry for the entire municipality, but the portions are not identified as CDPs. There may be a CDP with the same name as a nearby municipality, but which is outside of the municipal boundaries. older≠wiser 13:49, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] CDP as annexed area

LouI added or be annexed by a neighboring town as an example of a formerly incorporated place being a CDP. I'm not so sure that instance is applicable. I'm sure annexation procedures vary considerably from state to state, but I was generally under the impression that only incorporated entities like cities could "annex" land. If the annexing entity is incorporated, then the annexed land will not be a CDP (as CDPs are not defined within incorporated places). older≠wiser 13:20, Dec 7, 2004 (UTC)

...except in Massachusetts. AJD 13:54, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The exception for Massachusetts and other New England Towns is explained elsewhere in the article. A question: in the case of MA, where the entire state is part of an incorporated municipality, how would disincorporation and annexation work there? If a city disincorporated (unlikely as it seems), what would happen to its land. And are Towns in MA able to annex land in the same way as cities? older≠wiser 14:05, Dec 7, 2004 (UTC)

You wouldn't get one with out the other: that is, in Mass., as far as I know, a town can only disincorporate if its land is to be annexed onto a neighboring city or town. I see no reason for the same thing not to be true of cities. And yes, towns can annex land: the most recent example I know of is the construction of the Quabbin Reservoir, when a few towns in the Swift River valley (Dana, Enfield, Prescott, Greenwich) were disincorporated, razed, and flooded. What remained of their land was annexed to New Salem and a couple other adjacent towns—even though those areas, I believe, remain uninhabited. So if you compare a town map from the 1920s to a present-day one, you see that the town of New Salem covers much more area than it did. AJD 15:52, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)

But wait, it's both more and less complicated than that. In Massachusetts, only the Great and General Court of the Commonwealth can alter municipal boundaries, and they can do so at whim. So it is theoretically possible to create a gore, for example, and such places have existed in the past. (Still do in Vermont and New Hampshire.) However, the state no longer has any administrative mechanism for dealing with unincorporated localities, and so you are correct as to the effect in that the legislature would not intentionally create such a place today, preferring to assign such territory to an adjoining town. 18.26.0.18 04:56, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

But getting back to the subject, what is notable with respect to the CDPs in Massachusetts is the fact that they mostly aren't used for annexed areas. Consider, for example, the towns annexed by the City of Boston over the years: Charlestown, Dorchester, Roxbury, West Roxbury, and Brighton. None of these are CDPs, although there are some CDPs contained within some of them. There are no census units corresponding to either the original towns or the current city-recognized "neighborhoods", AFAICT. 18.26.0.18 05:11, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The first statement by Bkonrad (older/wiser) is essentially correct. I spent this morning doing research and will attempt to correct the Covedale article soon. The difficulty is that when Cincinnati annexed Covedale (in the 1890s), the village disincorporated. A fragament reverted to the townships that the area came from. These remaining fragments are what the census now reports as Covedale CDP. As soon as I can figure one how to word it, I'll adjust this article as well. Wish I had clearer answers, but the whole subject remains confusing, doesn't it? Lou I 14:10, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] CDP is strictly a bureaucratic concept

Which exists only in the mind of the Census Bureau. It often has nothing to do with what is actually on the ground, i. e. a real community. Perhaps when writing articles on any "CDPs" you might want to distinguish between the two concepts. I live in one of these CDPs, only we call it a town, and it has been a town to its residents since it began, long before the Census Bureau created the concept of a CDP. This needs to be addressed. Think about it. Glacierman 06:42, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

That's not entirely true. Yes, CDPs are statistical abstractions. The Census Bureau defines CDPs in cooperation with local officials to provide statistical data for populated places that are not incorporated municipalities (or other legally defined administrative divisions of the state or county). However, despite the input of local officials, the Census Bureau definition of a CDP may not always precisely correspond with local understanding of the area with the same name. When referring to the statistical data, I think it is important to identify that the statistics are that of the CDP. When describing aspects of the town other than the statistics, there's certainly no problem with using the term town (or whatever other locally appropriate appellation there may be, e.g., hamlet, village, community, neighborhood). See similar discussion at Talk:Hungry Horse, Montana. older ≠ wiser 14:12, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

This type of thing is surprisingly difficult to determine what you should use. Clearly we should use CDP as it refers to the statistics, but it is not so clear that the article should use CDP as the dominate name/type. There are a lot of issues. The postal service, census bureau, local/state governments, and local populous may all refer to the same name but a slightly geographically different area. Which one do we use? I live in Pennsylvania where many towns are legally a "Township". So the official name has is "Something Township", but the locals typically call it the town of "Something" instead. Just some thoughts. -- RM 17:22, 31 October 2006 (UTC)