Sleeping Bear Gateways Council offers update on workforce housing study at virtual town hall
From staff reports
The Sleeping Bear Gateways Council—a citizen group that works to engage local elected leaders, businesses and citizens to discuss the benefits and challenges presented by a growing visitor population to the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore—will hold a second virtual town hall today to present and discuss the results of its Seasonal Workforce Housing project.
The virtual town hall is scheduled from 5-5:45 pm. Click here to participate via computer, tablet or smartphone, or to join via phone, call +1 (646) 749-3112 and use Access Code 505-465-597.
Visitation to the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore set a single-year record of more than 1.7 visitors in 2020, as COVID-weary Americans flocked to rural national parks.
Click here to read our September 2019 feature story on the Sleeping Bear Gateways Council and its history.
The goals of today’s meeting include: to solicit supporting letters needed to obtain a USDA $90,000 grant; to provide an overview of Phase II plans based on Phase I conclusions; to plant the seeds for engagement in Phase II work, and to field questions from the audience.
Last summer the Sleeping Bear Gateways Council worked with the research firm Avenue ISR to study seasonal workforce housing needs in this area. The final report of the Phase I study is available here. Principle research questions asked in the study were:
- What is the demand for seasonal workforcehousing in gateway communities?
- Who are the employers with the greatest workforce housing needs?
- What is the response of employers to potential solutions—pros and cons, questions or concerns, overall willingness to participate, etc.?
According to the Council, 61 respondents helped both quantify and qualify the region’s housing deficiency, which will be addressed in Phase II. The Council also underwrote the creation of a “housing exchange” available on its website, which provides a digital clearing house that matches landlords with participating employers sponsoring employees looking for seasonal housing.
