The story of how the city built entire neighborhoods for a population that never materialized is, in some ways, a story of bad timing and unforeseeable events – a fluke. But the experience also illustrates the risks many smaller communities can take in pursuit of economic development, and of the catastrophic fallout that can result if the gamble doesn’t pay off. In Junction City, the recovery process has not been without obstacles, and there are open questions as to the social costs of its charted path. The population has been in decline, with Junction City losing 408 people from 2022 to 2023 and 4.7% of its population since 2020. But the city has, in other ways, made a remarkable comeback, in large part due to high levels of transparency, introspection, and trial and error on the part of the city’s political leaders. Source: KLC Journal
