Carrie Tolmsa had to do something this fall she’s been dreading.

When school started, the Ypsilanti Township resident signed her two school-age children up for free lunch.

“I didn’t want to do it because in some way, it’s a big acknowledgement that we just don’t have money,” she said Wednesday afternoon on a break from her part-time job. “I mean a school lunch isn’t that much money, but we just don’t have it anymore. Every little bit of savings help now.”

Tolmsa is among a growing number of Washtenaw County residents living in poverty.

Nearly 15 percent of county residents lived below the poverty line in 2009, according to data released earlier this week by the U.S. Census Bureau. That's an increase of nearly 2 percentage points in the last two years.

The poverty line is $22,050 in yearly income for a family of four or $10,830 in yearly income for a single person.

The percentage of Washtenaw County children living below the poverty line also has climbed by nearly 4 percentage points in the last two years, to 13.7 percent. That trails the state average, which is 22.1 percent of children living under the poverty line.

The overall poverty rate is higher in the city of Ann Arbor than in the county as a whole. Nearly 21 percent of Ann Arbor residents live under the poverty line, which includes University of Michigan students living at school.

The percentage living in poverty is especially high for single mothers. According to the data, 37.6 percent of Washtenaw County single mothers with children under 18 lived below the poverty line in 2009, an increase of 8 percentage points since 2007.

“When we are talking about people living below the poverty line, we’re talking about people who are desperate, not just hurting,” said Jane Zehnder-Merrell, a senior research associate at the Michigan League for Human Services and the director of the Kids Count in Michigan project.

The numbers also show a decline in how much money the average local resident earns.

The median income for Washtenaw County households has fallen $4,000 from 2006 to 2009, which was $54,603. The mean household income has also fallen, from $80,000 in 2006 to $73,803 in 2009.

Pittsfield Township resident Bill McKey and his wife, Judy, are dealing with falling income.

“I bet we’ve each lost somewhere around $15,000 a year in income with salary cuts and having to pay more for health insurance,” he said. “We’re having a hard time paying the bills, especially for the house. We didn’t expect to have less money coming in when we bought it. But at least we have jobs and health insurance. Lots of folks don’t have either of those.”

The Census figures show the percentage of county residents with no health insurance at all — including not having any public health insurance — grew from 7.7 percent in 2008 to 8 percent in 2009.

The growth in poverty and the number of people living with less money is placing stress on the safety net, Zehnder-Merrell said.

Funding from local and state governments is being cut, and many agencies are also experiencing drops in private giving.

Local residents say it's not uncommon to wait days for help from the state, and Department of Human Services offices are often overflowing, with waits of several hours to see case workers.

“We’re hurting and we’re in for a rough ride,” Zehnder-Merrell said.

David Jesse covers higher education for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidjesse@annarbor.com or at 734-623-2534.