Utah seeing a baby boom

And Utah is also seeing a rise in non-native English speakers. Just over 6 percent of the state's overall population said they couldn't speak English "very well." That accounts for about 43 percent of people who speak a language other than English at home, and about half of the state's Spanish speakers

That makes sense, Perlich says, given that an estimated one in three of the state's estimated 210,500 foreign-born residents said they had entered the country after 2000.

"They're very, very recent," Perlich says. "The people who are coming more recently are tending to come from Latin America and are Spanish speakers."

While Utah is seeing a larger share of its population as immigrants who don't speak English at home, the trend "is nowhere near the magnitude" as it is in some other states, says Tennert.

Tennert points to states like California, where nearly 43 percent of people speak a language other than English, along with New Mexico (37 percent) and Texas (34 percent).

The share of Latin American immigrants continues to rise as an influx of young workers moves in, Perlich says, and an older generation of European immigrants starts to pass away.

Some 63 percent of Utah's foreign-born were Latin American in 2006, compared to 54 percent in 2000. And the ratio of Mexican immigrants is also on the rise.

"One-half of our foreign-born is Mexican," Perlich says. "That's up significantly from the decennial census, which was 41 percent."

The 2006 ACS estimates include data for areas with populations of 65,000 or more. The ACS is based on an annual nationwide sample of about 250,000 addresses per month, along with a sampling of approximately 20,000 group quarters, comprising about 200,000 residents.

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E-mail: dbulkeley@desnews.com