Hurry its timed in the year 2000, franklintown had a population of 30,000 people. its population had decreased by 3% each year since then. part a: can this situation be modeled by an exponential decay function, an exponential growth function, or neither? explain. part b: if the population continues to decrease at the same rate, what would you expect the approximate population to be in 2016? show your work.

Part A:
 For this case we have a function of the form:
 y = A * (b) ^ t
 Where,
 A: initial amount
 b: decrease rate
 t: time
 Substituting values we have:
 y = 30000 * (0.97) ^ t
 
 this situation can be modeled by an exponential decay function.

 Part B:

 We have the following function:
 y = 30000 * (0.97) ^ t
 For the year 2016 we have to:
 t = 16
 Substituting values:
 y = 30000 * (0.97) ^ 16
 y = 18427.6096
 Rounding:
 y = 18428
 
 The approximate population for 2016 is:
 y = 18428