Attracting Young Families the Only Way to Grow

You’ve heard it before; Carter County’s population is declining, and Elizabethton’s will likely follow suit by the time the next census rolls out in 2020. The real question is what’s happening? Why are people leaving Carter County and where are they going? Well, when we look at the numbers, they’re not leaving – they’re dying. According to the Tennessee Department of Health, 746 people died in Carter County during the year 2016. During the same year, only 488 babies were born. Statistically Carter County is losing citizens at an average rate of 3.3 people for every 1,000 people annually. That’s around 184 people per year!

Of course, it never sounds like a good thing when we mention a population loss, but what are the true implications of this? Fewer people means less need for housing within the County. Less housing demand means an increase in dilapidated and neglected properties to deal with. Less housing demand means housing prices will fall or not grow as fast as they do in the surrounding areas (which also means less wealth is created within the County). Less housing demand and lower home values means less money being collected in taxes by governments, which may mean the need to increase taxes on those still living there. Less population means fewer workers for companies and businesses to hire and making it more difficult to recruit new and retain existing businesses to the county. I could go on, but I think you get the point – there are huge implications of a declining population.

So, what can we do to even start addressing this problem? Well, first let me explain the factors affecting population growth. There are two ways communities and counties grow – natural growth (more births than deaths) and migration growth (people moving from somewhere else). Natural growth occurs best when you have a healthy population of females between the ages of 16 to 35 – essentially of birthing age. As we have already discussed, natural growth for Carter County is a no-go. We lack young families in Carter County and I suspect this would be evident if you looked at school enrollment over the past 5-10 years. This leaves us with migration growth as our only option.

Migration growth is a lot more difficult than natural growth, because we must sell our city and county to people who live elsewhere and convince them that our place is better. Thankfully, because of our proximity to Johnson City and Bristol, jobs don’t have to be the first priority (typically this is the hardest part). The average commute time for Carter, Unicoi, and Washington Counties is 21 minutes which easily puts the Tri-County Industrial Park and all the businesses in Johnson City easily within average commute times. In my opinion, the top priority for Elizabethton and Carter County is to make it attractive for young families. We have to start investing in ourselves to make our community and county attractive to an admittedly different, younger generation who look for different amenities where they live and place values on different ways of living than what we’ve seen in previous generations.

The next time your talk to your children, grandchildren, or just a young professional in their late 20s, ask them what they look for in their city and county when they’re deciding where to live. Their answers may be different and what you may even consider impossible to do here in Carter County but consider the alternative. The recent battle over the property tax increase in the County could very well be just the beginning of the County’s future if we don’t start working on making their desires our future. Let’s talk about it!