A little over five years ago now, my wife accepted a job with Bayfield Public Schools. Offer in hand, we took to the streets to find ourselves a new home. Few homes on the market fell within our price range; those that did often required significant repair and deferred maintenance. We remained optimistic even as our search pushed us farther and farther from Bayfield–only three truly single family homes had been listed so far that year, and each of the three was off the market as soon as it was on–but our expectations shifted quickly as we realized the inherent challenges in not only securing housing near her work but securing housing at all.
Every year, the same is the case throughout the county and beyond: new employees to the area struggle to find appropriate housing in the municipality where they work. Whether its scarcity or unaffordability, many shift their search to neighboring communities. Around here, that often means Ashland. With the largest housing stock and the greatest gradation of housing price bands, Ashland offers homeseekers the greatest opportunity to secure housing. In light of this, it’s important to ask: What are the consequences of a lack of broad affordable workforce housing? What does commuting cost the workforce, and what does it cost the communities?
Quite a bit actually.
Once people commute long distances, transportation costs effectively replace housing costs–and the system stops functioning as intended: economies shift, social infrastructure erodes, social and community capital dissolve, and the health of individuals and the environment suffer.
Housing experts encourage people to spend no more than 30% of their gross income on housing, but that can prove challenging in Bayfield County. Assuming this year’s median homes sales, $325,000 for Bayfield and $210,450 for Washburn, those limits amount to approximately $2,079 and $1,347 per month (assuming a conventional mortgage with 20% downpayment at 6.5%). For people who earn the county’s household median income of ~$71,000, Washburn falls within the 30% threshold–$1,775/mo–for housing expenses. Bayfield does not. Even without a commute, Bayfield remains unaffordable for the average household in Bayfield County. With even a small commute, the bulk of the county is rendered unaffordable. So many end up living where it is most affordable–in our case, Ashland–and commute to Bayfield County.
Assuming one lives in Ashland and commutes to work in Bayfield or Washburn, the costs of commuting, per month, would be–given IRS’ standard $.76/mile computation (which accounts for fuel, depreciation, maintenance, insurance, registration)–as follows: $792 to Bayfield and $375 to Washburn. Yearly, that’s $9,500 and $4,500 respectively. (And none of this analysis even accounts for the hours spent commuting–nearly 1 ½ weeks total for someone moving between Ashland and Bayfield.) When considering adjacent housing costs, a commute to Bayfield, even at Ashland’s median home price, would push monthly expenses beyond the 30% threshold. At current median income levels and current median home prices, the only affordable options for working and living in the area’s three cities, one could comfortably live and work in Washburn or Ashland, live in Ashland and commute to Washburn, or live in Washburn and commute to either Bayfield or Ashland. One could not do either from Bayfield. Even from Ashland, it’s cheaper to commute to Bayfield than live and work in Bayfield.
Aside from the direct cost commuters pay to live and work, the consequences of a commuting culture–one rooted in scarcity and unaffordability–extend beyond that of the individual. Communities suffer as well. When workers don’t live where they work, their earned income doesn’t circulate back into the local economy; they’re effectively exporting their purchasing power. Critical infrastructure slowly falters and decays; staffing essential services (teacher, EMS, healthcare workers, food service, public works, etc.) grows more challenging and responding to emergencies more daunting–a crisis already evident among the county’s EMS system. Further, a community’s social and civic fabric–which depends on an engaged populace, which is difficult amid a) a transient population, and b) a commuting population limited on time–may unravel.
Granted, most rural residents expect to travel as a basic element of country living. It’s not uncommon for residents to bounce between municipalities daily, even if not directly commuting. We like the wide open spaces. But none of that negates the fact that the unaffordability of many homes in Bayfield County is pressing people to live in municipalities other than where they work, and the nature of that relationship–working elsewhere than where you live–can have pernicious effects on a community’s livability and viability.
My family and I were lucky to have secured, despite the odds, a home where we live and work. For every story like ours, though, there are more of less auspicious endings, of endings more often than not rooted in individuals, on the coldest of winter mornings, trudging out into the dark, clearing their cars and walks of snow, and settling into another long ride to work. Hey, though, at least the commute’s pretty!