is the boom in the Methow Valley changing the demographic ?
Who is leaving and who is staying and who is arriving?
Does anyone really care, or are we mostly counting dollars?
It is not as confusing for me, because I have already experienced a similar change in Telluride Colorado and then, in Moab Utah. No one causes the change. the free market economy is simply allowed to operate without much oversight. There are laws, but less sensitive folk with money can step way, way over the line without meeting up with enforcement.
when i arrived in all three places, they were each in a depressed condition. Real estate signs growing around the street signs like cancer cells overcoming and engulfing neighboring healthy cells. People wanting work, so that the price of labor reaches rock bottom. People with money end up with everyone elses stuff. But, no one is driven out. Anyone who wants to can live there. They simply have trouble earning money.
These are not areas of blight. I would not go to a area that has been exploited and left for dead. I certainly would not go to a city or a place that is chaotic and unpleasant.
Telluride was a real ghost town when i arrived in 1976. You could purchase a huge, ruined Victorian house on the main street for 2000 dollars. I was offered the place that i rented for something like 100 dollars per month. Why not stop paying my 25 dollars per month for the master bedroom, and purchase the building and the lot? No one would be that stupid, said clever young Alf! I was working for 25 dollars per hour, doing high risk roped painting and construction. So, i made my rent each hour!
The strange situation came about because speculators had bought up the land around telluride, and then started a ski area that would make the land much more valuable. Then, the ski area went bankrupt, and was run by a skeleton crew simply to try to make some use of the huge land gamble. We could ski a few lifts that were not really connected into a ski area, and sort of cross country ski a few miles when we wanted to use a different lift. It was very unusual. When you skied across the flats to another lift, quite often you would find a lift operator that was needing company. They had not seen anyone for hours! just running an amazing ski lift without a single rider!
The speculators continued to market their business or scam, and in time, they succeeded. After about a decade of enjoying the unencumbered possession of a pretty nice valley, the residents were booted out. I documented some of it in a series of cartoons. It was so surreal. Heavily armed sheriffs forcing residents out of their single wide trailers at gunpoint, and physically towing them down the mountain.
The town council, which used to be stoned hippies [like me], were replaced with lawyers in suits. The laws changed, so that anything could be built anywhere. An airport went in, even though it was the most dangerous landing place in the US. After a few years, the runway literally fell down onto the company that had built it. The entire works of the company were buried. Trucks, buildings and all. The stupid perched runway was simply rebuilt. There was no one left who cared about the valley.
At first, there was no housing for the employees of the now successful telluride ski area. There were literally no workers of any kind in the town. They had all been banished to unpleasant blighted areas. But, there was finally so much money in the valley that the poor stayed as close as possible.
They built blighted communities in avalanche run out zones, and in dank, unpleasant side canyons that get no sun at all in winter.
A huge fleet of brand new white trucks drove up the hill each morning to serve the wealthy. The workers in those trucks would go to jail if they tried to stay over night. You have to try to picture it. the workers were ordinary people. banished from their valley, they often wanted to linger after a shift, get drunk, and then sleep in their vehicle. I was a restaurant worker during this period. So, i was part of this thing. I would get off at 2 am, after feeding and serving drinks to very rich folk. I would then recieve a shift drink. At least one! At 3 or so, i would get into my car. If i did not drive, i would be hauled out of my vehicle, and imprisoned. If i drove, i would eventually be killed driving super tired and a little drunk on the interesting winter roads.
i got out of there, became a professional rock climber, tried and failed to move back, and finally, after drifting around for a decade, came to rest in the canyonlands region. I liked the landscape, and the way that the self reliant Mormons leave you the hell alone. I became one of the best know rock climbers in the world. It was easy. I had always been stronger than usual, and trained very very hard. Then, i failed to die on a rock climb, or to kill myself. It sounds crazy, but devoted rock climbers like myself almost never make it past the age of 50. Middle age is not so good for unroped climbers. we tend to be stubborn peter pan types anyway. We refuse to stop climbing without a rope, and fall down [go boom!].
Boom, the town of Moab finally made it big. speculators went big on giant hotels and river companies and residential real estate. They finally repeated what had happened to Telluride. The laws were changed so that tiny homes could not be used, even if you bought property. Camping was forbidden anywhere near the town. The wrong types of tourism were expanded, so that the desert was not a desirable living place. Everyone like me had to leave. We could not abide jet boats coming down the river one after another, and super loud motorized traffic everywhere that we tried to go.
I want to make it clear that that these gentrifications are not straightforward. in other words, it is not the case that each worker looses their home and must leave. There are increasing traffic accidents, fights, spousal abuse, child abuse, etc. When you squeeze humans, this is how they react. The police change from chasing cannabis providers and speeders to enforcing the new normal for the very rich. They are still the same honest and helpful people, but their mission is changed. In Telluride, one of my best friends and a second officer arrested me after a shift at my restaurant job. i was too tired, and could not drive down. They kept me standing barefoot in the snow in tighty whities for a super long time, before i told them that they could hop into the drivers seat and drive me down, lock me up, shoot me, or get the heck away from me. They got the heck away and did not ever contact me again. I had another officer fired and removed from the valley after he started messing with local women during fake traffic stops.
As far as the Methow valley, it was in a bust economy when i arrived. Moab had become so noisy and filled with greed that this northern valley was the perfect refuge. About half of the properties where i lived [carlton area] were for sale, and a person could stay in a lot of places. A caretaker of land was in a good place. You know what happened.
Covid!
Now, the clusters of for sale signs are down, and the street signs can be clearly seen again. The handypersons and wood cutters are mostly gone. Some folks had to be locked up or evicted. A lot of poor people are not poor because they are of low intelligence or have a mental illness. They are poor for other reasons. some will not exploit others [the best way to get money!]. Some are not mentally ill, but require more space or serenity than average. And, of course, some are mentally and physically disabled. Some are quite old and their mate is gone. Some are single people with no family support. [hi!].
Should they all be forced out? Well, if money is allowed to sort out the residents without any human consideration, the answer is a big YES. the economy and the law are set up correctly. No one need lift a finger. Each couple can stay on their 5 or 45 acres with their 5000 or 10,000 gallons of water per day. The Seattle folk can swoop in on Friday night like secretive visitors from space. The automatic door whooshes open and they disappear into their fortress!
The labor shortage is a problem, but it will take care of itself. there are already out of town contractors coming in to fill the gaps. Bedroom communities will grow up down the valley. The brand new white trucks are being purchased now. They will serve the rich instead of 'dirtbags' with their damaged Tacoma's. If it is anything like Telluride's 'rise', the community based organizations will weaken and die. you will call someone in Omak or Brewster when you need shoveling or plumbing. The white trucks will not park here for the night.
We have some organizations that seem to promote diversity and low income housing. In practice, they are helping somewhat wealthy people become really wealthy, so that they can live here. It looks like the long fight to keep the valley protected from exploitive tourism and industry is lost now. We will soon have tourists in boats and motorized rentals wherever we go. The fancy buildings are already going up. it is interesting that the new influx of currency is being used for baubles like a super nice library and rich person public buildings.
In my infantile mind, there are ridiculous visions of the Methow with a diverse community and support for old and sick and poor residents. I did not hope for a really nice library. That is because i am one of those old sick and poor residents. I just hoped to stay here. Refugees during the coming wave of infection will not have the easiest time. The economy will get bad again, and even more folks will be unhomed and driven from place to place. This place will be more like Syria or Afghanistan.
It is so obvious to me. but again, i am a poor person trying to whine or vote myself rich! please, go right on with the plunder!
