One area that saw improve­ment in poverty lev­els before the reces­sion was Tulsa, Okla­homa. In fact, the poverty level dropped for the entire state in 2008, except for the senior population.

From the Tulsa World, Cur­tis Kil­man breaks down the US Cen­sus Bureau num­bers, and the fears for 2009.

Tulsa County res­i­dents whose income in 2008 was below the poverty level declined from 16.2 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion in 2006 to 13.8 per­cent in 2008, accord­ing to data from the U.S. Cen­sus Bureau’s Amer­i­can Com­mu­nity Survey.

Statewide, an esti­mated 15.9 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion was liv­ing in poverty in 2008, com­pared to a 17 per­cent poverty rate in 2006.

The lat­est cen­sus fig­ures indi­cate “some progress” was made in terms of fewer fam­i­lies in poverty, said David Blatt, pol­icy direc­tor for the Okla­homa Pol­icy Institute.

“Clearly you still see a sub­stan­tial seg­ment of the pop­u­la­tion that is liv­ing in dire cir­cum­stances,” Blatt said.

The poverty thresh­old in 2008 was an annual income of about $22,000 for a four-person family.

In the city of Tulsa, an esti­mated 18.3 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion was liv­ing in poverty in 2008, cen­sus data indi­cates. In 2006, 20.3 per­cent, or one in five city res­i­dents lived in poverty.

A greater per­cent­age of the pop­u­la­tion lived in poverty in Tulsa than in Okla­homa City, where 16.4 per­cent of the res­i­dents were poor in 2008.

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