Small towns in Nebraska are disappearing. Small towns in Nebraska are growing.

Both of those statements are true. It is the geography behind them that is critical - and provides a public policy challenge for the state that will last for decades.

Recently released census data confirms a trend. Towns in the southern tier of counties from the Missouri River to the Colorado border are uniformly losing population. Towns in the Sandhills and north-central Nebraska also are seeing their numbers steadily decline.

But small towns around Lincoln and Omaha are gaining population, as are towns and small cities along Interstate 80 as far west as Sidney and Potter. Clusters of towns near Columbus, Hastings and Sioux City also are gaining population.

The policy implications of this population shift are myriad.

The most obvious will come in the next couple of years as the Nebraska Legislature uses numbers from the 2010 census to redraw legislative and congressional districts. The officially nonpartisan legislature will, as you might expect, do its best to create districts that favor Republicans.

But it will be confronted by some tough choices, as it must create more legislative representation in the east, in and around Lincoln and Omaha, and fewer in the west. That change in urban/suburban/rural representation will dramatically impact policy decisions for the next decade and longer.

But there are more critical population-related challenges facing the state than redistricting politics.

The first question usually asked in a discussion of this data is, "Can small towns be saved?" The answer, unfortunately, is probably not.

The depopulation of agricultural-based areas of the Great Plains has been going on for more than a century and isn't likely to stop anytime soon. That doesn't mean all small towns are doomed. Some will be able to recruit industry, develop tourism or find some other way to survive. But as the ethanol boom and bust demonstrates, it won't be easy.

As towns lose population, a host of challenges must be confronted. Among them are providing good medical service and retirement housing for an increasingly elderly population. Another is consolidation of school districts so, as is the case today in Frontier County, two tiny high schools aren't trying to operate six miles apart from each other.

The challenges aren't limited to areas losing population. Population growth can put a strain on services in any size community and often require more law enforcement. Ramping up services means raising taxes, something every government entity is loath to do at any time, but particularly when the economy is down.

Transportation challenges also must be addressed as the small towns around the cities transform even more into bedroom communities that will generate ever-more traffic to be accommodated on an aging highway system.

None of these challenges will be easy to address. But the state cannot afford to ignore or diminish the truth of the population trends contained in the census data. That will only push the challenges into the future and make them even more difficult to reckon with.