Glen Arbor most affected by graying Leelanau County

By Linda Alice Dewey
Sun contributor

For many good reasons—the area’s beauty and its good life, for starters—Glen Arbor has become a haven for us retirees. By 2015, the influx of seniors pushed the average age of a resident to around 63. Now, census estimates reveal Glen Arbor’s residents as the oldest in Leelanau, one of the oldest counties in the state.

Last week, Glen Arbor Township supervisor Peter Van Nort contacted the county for current stats and learned that 47 residents in the township’s 49636 zip code area use the county’s senior services. Their average age is 83.6, while the countywide average age of the same populace is 78.

This age change has happened relatively fast. From 1990 to 2016—the 60-and-over segment of our population swelled from 25 to 39 percent. Twelve percent of the 2016 population was 75 or older.

“This has happened so quickly and massively that I think we need to become more mindful of it,” says Northport village president Phil Mikesell, who chairs Age-Friendly Leelanau, a committee formed two years ago by the Leelanau Women Voters (LWV) to study the situation.

Local governments are just now beginning to wrap their proverbial heads around the new challenges this new change presents.

The problem

One issue that affects everyone here—seniors more than others—is how hard it is to find help with odd chores and fixit jobs. A major reason for this is the lack of affordable housing. “One of the obvious issues—and we’re not doing anything about it at the moment,” admits Van Nort, “is the fact that we don’t have the kind of housing to support a younger population.”

A few employers in the area are taking innovative steps to make sure they have the help they need for the busy summer season. However, “there’s a lot of effort going on by individuals (instead of) by groups,” Van Nort says. “Trying to find land and building opportunities to build affordable housing is a big issue for the whole county, but also specifically for Glen Arbor Township. There’s a lot of talking and thinking about it, but no actual action underway.”

There’s another aspect to this housing crisis, observes Mikesell. “While there’s understandable attention to workforce housing, we found that nobody’s even thinking about the issue of appropriate housing for seniors. We’ve got a lot of [seniors] in unsuitable housing—either too big or in disrepair. So, the goal could well involve purposed housing, zoning for granny flats, etc. At this point,” he remarks, “a first step would be to have the community more conscious of and intentional about senior-friendly housing.”

What distinguishes Leelanau from other counties, Mikesell continues, is not only the high proportion of seniors living here, but also the area’s highly rural character. This goes against the grain for community planners endeavoring to create ideal settings for seniors. “All the best practices for aging, from the United States to the State of Michigan, all deal with urban areas. You need good sidewalks, community centers, things that make sense in high density areas.”

We don’t have much of that, he says, which presents distinct challenges to county planners and senior services agencies, “such as transportation for seniors—we have no nearby medical facilities.”

Another problem is that so many retire here without the traditional network of family support. “So when they have challenges,” county administrator Chet Janik says, “they request services. This causes a significant financial burden on the senior services budget.” Calls for those services spiked in the past year—after the 2017 budget was voted in place, causing a budget crisis. “We will not be able to serve every senior there that requests services and still have a balanced budget,” Janik concludes.

On a positive note, with respect to the rate of senior-related emergency calls, Glen Lake Fire Department chief John Dodson says, “Absolutely, we have an older population; but we have a healthier population too.” He points to statistics from www.countyhealthratings.org that show Leelanau as the second healthiest of Michigan’s 83 counties for three of the last four years. “From the healthcare perspective,” he informs us, “our calls creep up, but it’s not typically because of the age of the population. It’s because of the tourism.”

That may be true, says Mikesell. We do see a lot of active seniors for whom life is good. “The problem, is when people begin to lose mobility,” he says. “Then there are some other issues that arise.”

Leelanau County Emergency Services Manager Matt Ansorge predicts, “The citizens that we have in our county, their need for emergency services is only going to go up.”

Dodson does concede that the aging of the population presents a different issue for his department. “It prohibits us from getting volunteers.” Consequently, the fire department now employs full-time employees rather than relying on volunteers. But recruiting young staff has proven difficult. A major cause—lack of affordable housing.

Solutions?

In its search for answers, Age-Friendly Leelanau focused on four areas of concern.

1) Transportation. Mikesell calls this “the big one”—things like getting people to medical appointments. One partial solution is Share Care, a county-wide paid membership organization with volunteer drivers and 400 members. In addition, “Munson will already do some kind of transportation service; BATA is trying to respond,” he says, then suggests that perhaps “an Uber-like service might be available” in the future, but that might be expensive.

2) Availability of medical care. In the absence of good old-fashioned country doctors, future remote care using modern technology might fill the gap. “Maybe a medical consult without going to Traverse City, like a Tele-Med call up service,” where the person hooks up electronically with a physician or nurse. However, he surmises, “It probably won’t happen,” because seniors in their 80s and 90s would need to know how to work the app on their phones.

3) Community Support. This is already happening in Glen Arbor, says Van Nort. “[Seniors are] recognizing that involvement keeps them young at heart and prolongs life. Pickleball is a good example of that,” he comments. “If you were to survey a lot of the people [currently] playing pickleball five years ago, they might have said, ‘Me? Playing a sport?’” But they are.

4) Housing. Van Nort says one developer has been looking at building a small multi-family development which would include affordable housing down by the Crystal River. The question right now is how to handle sewage waste. (Both Woodstone in Glen Arbor and the New Neighborhood in Empire had to come up with their own sewage treatment plans.)

In addition to all the above, Janik says, “We are having a dialogue with other entities—Share Care, Munson, the Area Agency on Aging (in Traverse City( to see if there is (potential for) collaborative effort.”

“Leelanau County is very localized and decentralized,” says Mikesell. “Right now, there is no organized senior support.” To fill that need, the LWV is forming a coalition of Leelanau communities to deal with these issues. The new “Alliance for Seniors” will begin meeting in September. Anyone interested in representing our area can email Phil at MIKESELP@wabash.edu.

“As a county government and as agents within the county,” says Mikesell, “we need to be more aware and creative. There are a lot of things out there.”