Coupling: More Gay Oak Parkers Live Together

Oak Park ranks high among the Chicago's suburbs with the most same sex households, a Chicago Tribune analysis of recently released 2010 U.S. Census data has found.

Census figures show a total of 361 same sex households in Oak Park: 162 male-male households and 199 female-female households. (The Tribune's programming aces compiled the data in an interactive map, which you can browse here.)

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In Oak Park, with its longtime community ethos of tolerance and diversity, the numbers probably aren’t a surprise.

"We're not breaking any new ground here," said Sylvia Menninga, president of Oak Park PFLAG, an advocacy and support group for the parents with gay children. "The impact [of civil union legislation] is more about legality...and we have the responsiblity to continue to be at the forefront."

But the data shows the number of same sex households are up in all of suburban Cook County, including Oak Park’s neighbors: River Forest has 32 same-sex households (18 male-male and 14 female-female). Forest Park has 95 same sex households (52 male-male and 43 female-female.)

The increases follow a national trend where same same sex households are on the rise, apparently at a rate that’s surprising some researchers.

"I didn't expect it to be quite that large," Gary Gates, a demographer at UCLA's Law School Williams Institute told the Tribune. "It could suggest that there was a much bigger 'closet' in 2000 than I expected, and there now is much more acceptance of gay households."