MACHIAS – Washington County lost 1,367 people between 1990 and 2000.

But those who are missing did not move away.

Most were never born.

In the past 10 years, the number of Washington County residents under 18 has plummeted, from 9,039 to 7,781 – a loss of 1,258 children.

The decline in that age group is already being felt in Washington County’s 23 elementary schools and eight high schools.

Most are struggling with decreases in state funding as a result of declining enrollments, according to Betty Jordan, coordinator of the Washington County Consortium for School Improvement.

The consortium works with school systems across the county, helping them to cut costs by pooling resources.

“I know Augusta’s answer is consolidation. But people don’t realize how large Washington County is,” Jordan said. “How long do you have a child on a bus?”

Washington County is 2,528 square miles – almost the size of Rhode Island and Delaware combined. And county schools are spread up and down the coast, including the peninsulas, she said.

The family atmosphere that exists in Washington County’s community-based schools is what larger school systems are striving for, but, ironically, the schools are having problems because they are small enough to have such an atmosphere, she said.

Jordan believes the most cost-effective way to stretch Washington County’s dwindling education dollars is through technology – using distance learning to offer students more classes than their local school systems can fund.

The loss of so many children may not be as negative as it appears, according to Deirdre M. Mageean, interim director of the Margaret Chase Smith Center for Public Policy. Mageean said that Census Bureau population estimates from 1990 through 1998 showed Washington County to have the highest “dependency ratio” in the state.

The ratio is the number of young and elderly compared with the number of working people in a population. It is the working people who pay for services such as schools, hospital beds, social services and subsidized housing, she said.

Washington and Piscataquis counties had the highest dependency ratios in 1998 as a result of their numbers of both young and elderly, particularly those elderly who are over 85, Mageean said. If the 2000 census is showing 1,258 fewer children, that could well lower Washington County’s dependency ratio.

The decline in Washington County’s under-18 population is countywide.

All the population centers – Baileyville, Calais, Eastport, Jonesport, Lubec, Machias and Milbridge – are showing significant decreases.

Just 11 of Washington County’s 49 communities have more children than they did a decade ago, and most of those increases are marginal. One or two families moving from one of the county’s population centers can make a big difference to small towns, but the countywide totals continue to fall.

“The number of births just aren’t replacing the number of 1990 children who are now older than 18,” said Eric Von Magnus, the census information officer for the state planning office.

Statewide, Maine has 7,764 fewer children than it did in 1990. In sheer number, both Piscataquis and Aroostook counties have lost far more people under the age of 18 than Washington County, but Washington County’s loss is far out of proportion to its population.

With just 33,941 residents, Maine’s easternmost county makes up less than 3 percent of the state’s 1,274,923 people. But Washington County accounts for 16 percent of Maine’s drop in people under 18.

The county’s birthrate has been dropping for almost a decade, but that is a statewide trend due to the aging of baby boomers, according to Richard Sherwood, policy development specialist for the state planning office.

And from 1989 to 1998 – the last year that birthrates are available – Washington County’s birthrate has generally been higher than that for Piscataquis, Penobscot, Lincoln and Franklin counties.

The number of Washington County births has lagged behind the number of deaths in the county since 1995, but that doesn’t explain the decrease in the county’s under-18 population.

Nowhere is that loss more dramatic than in Jonesport, where the town’s loss of 117 people in the past 10 years is confined to the under-18 age group.

Bruce Crowley, superintendent of schools for the Jonesport and Beals school systems, said the two communities have been excellent about raising the additional local money that is needed to run the two elementary schools and Jonesport-Beals High School.

Crowley believes Washington County’s declining child population is the result of young people and young families leaving Washington County to find employment.

“These children are being born, but they’re being born somewhere else,” he said. “Washington County has no industry, and students who’ve gone on to school have no choice but to leave or not use their education.”

Census figures on age populations – aside from over and under 18 – won’t be available until summer, but Dianne Tilton, executive director of the Sunrise County Economic Council, said there is enough anecdotal evidence and requests from employers to justify exploring why young people are leaving Washington County.

The council is spearheading what is called the Economic Futures Project to find out how the county can do a better job retaining its better-educated young people and provide more opportunities for them, she said.

There are employers throughout Washington County – including social service organizations and area hospitals – that can’t find qualified people, she said.

The relationship between employment opportunities and population is one of the many questions that Eastport City Manager George “Bud” Finch has about the Census 2000 figures for his city.

Eastport’s population is down to 1,640 – a 17 percent drop.

“Why can’t I see 100 empty houses?” Finch asked. “The employment in this area is the highest it’s been – with aquaculture, the [ICT call center] in Calais, and the hospitals in Calais and Machias. I can’t imagine they got the right count.”

The only explanation that Finch can think of is that a large percentage of Eastport homes are now owned by nonresident taxpayers who claim other states as their residence for tax purposes. There are more people around on the city streets and there are a lot of Florida license plates, he said.

Jack Clukey, town manager of Baileyville, said he can see the for-sale signs in his town and neighboring Calais and knows that people have moved out of the area in the just over five years he’s been in Baileyville.

The town’s population has dropped 17 percent – down 345 people, to 1,686 residents. Although some people have moved out to surrounding towns like Princeton and Alexander, others have left the area to replace the jobs they lost at Georgia-Pacific Corp., he said.

The company’s production of pulp is as high as it has ever been, but G-P had 1,190 employees in 1989 and currently employs 694 people. And 37 of those employees – the workers at the company’s Chip-N-Saw operation – have been indefinitely laid off since June, Clukey said.

Not all 496 jobs are gone, he said. G-P sold its forestry and wood procurement division and the company that purchased it – Wagner Forest Management – retained some of the 109 positions in that division, Clukey said.

And the company that sells clean wood chips to G-P employs approximately 30 people, he said.

Calais City Manager Nick Mull said his city was shocked by Calais’ 13.2 percent loss in population. Calais’ population dropped to 3,447 – down 516 people since 1990.

“This should send a signal to Augusta that we need some help in this area,” Mull said. “We’re not asking for much, in my opinion. But we’re trying to do some positive things to bring in new business.”

Mull said Calais has received $2 million in federal funds for the proposed Down East Heritage Center and needs a $2 million state match if the project is to be successful. Legislators should also make sure that the new international bridge doesn’t bypass Calais, and he’d like the state to rethink the Passamaquoddy Tribe’s proposal for a casino in Calais.