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Live where you work, unless at the beach. Affordable housing slim at resorts

Taylor Goebel
The Daily Times
Casey VanCleve, formerly homeless, found shelter and received help from Diakonia Inc. to help her get back out on her own on Friday, Dec. 15, 2017.

After decades of working in the manufacturing industry, Casey VanCleve didn't retire: she became homeless. 

Disabling conditions ended her career as a forklift driver in Sacramento, California. With no family or support system, VanCleve nose-dived from steady income to shelter after shelter.

“I worked my tail off all my life for 30 years,” said VanCleve, who moved to Ocean City, Maryland, in 2014. “I loved it.”

Fibromyalgia, degenerative arthritis and mental health conditions severed VanCleve’s paycheck, her security, her roof.

“I am the new face of homelessness,” she said. “It’s not the idea that America has of homelessness — you think of someone who hasn’t bathed, or they don’t want to be housed. There’s a lot of people in this country that are homeless because they missed a paycheck.” 

VanCleve’s story of homelessness mimics nationwide trends as the miles between low-cost housing, employment and solid infrastructure hubs widen.

"I've been on the tri-county housing list for two and a half years," VanCleve said. "Affordable housing isn't a huge deal in Ocean City. It's hard to come by, even in Salisbury." 

Steep housing rates impact folks working in resort areas such as Ocean City and east Sussex County, Delaware, where seasonal work and low-paying jobs clash with high land and construction costs and paltry financial incentives to build low-cost rentals. 

Resort areas are a microcosm for the growing affordability gap in the United States: There is a housing shortage for extremely low-income renters in every state, according to National Low Income Housing Coalition.

“We have an affordable housing crisis all across this country,” said Sean Kelly, vice president of Leon N. Weiner & Associates Inc., a Wilmington-based developer of multifamily affordable rental housing. “Incomes are not keeping up with the escalation in rent.”

In Sussex County, vacation rentals, single-family homes and affordable housing are all in demand, but without financial incentives, the latter tends to get little notice. 

“Maybe there’s a nonprofit out there with tons of money that can do it, but guys like me can’t do it,” said Preston Schell, president of Ocean Atlantic Cos.

Affordable housing and homelessness are "inextricably intertwined," said Tina Showalter, executive director of Housing Alliance Delaware.

"The affordable housing rule of thumb is no one should have to spend 30 percent of their income for shelter, and that rule has exploded in our state," she said.

Domestic violence, a broken-down vehicle, layoffs at work, generational cycles of poverty, disabling conditions: these factors can easily write anyone's homeless-bound narrative. 

Diakonia, a nonprofit organization in West Ocean City that provides emergency and transitional housing.

“What we know about homelessness is that once you enter, the climb out is daunting,” said Claudia Nagle, the executive director of Diakonia, a nonprofit organization in West Ocean City that provides emergency and transitional housing.

VanCleve went to Las Vegas to stay with her brother, but he took off, leaving her alone. She hopped on a Greyhound bus and trekked to Virginia, where her sister lived.

“That didn’t work out, so I moved to Salisbury,” she said, adding it was the only nearby city she found online that offered housing while she waited for her Social Security benefits.

VanCleve's stay at the Salisbury shelter came to an end, so she left her temporary roof for another. 

In 2016, nearly half of Americans experiencing sheltered homelessness had a disability, according to Housing and Urban Development.

“Most of our people work,” Nagle said of Diakonia residents. “If they’re not working, it’s because they have some health issue or disabling condition that prohibits them from working.”

Diakonia averages 300 calls every month for housing requests it is not able to meet.

VanCleve arrived at Diakonia in 2014, carrying all her belongings in a bin and suitcase.

“Nobody in this country knows how bad homelessness is,” VanCleve said. “I can guarantee that. And to be on the Shore and be homeless: Nobody here thinks that anyone is homeless.”

Between 2016 and 2017, the Homeless Alliance for the Lower Shore of Maryland found homelessness had increased by 17 percent in Worcester, Somerset and Wicomico counties.

Rebecca James, was hurt at work which caused her and her family to become homeless. Thursday, Feb. 15, 2018.

In Ocean City, homelessness fluctuates between the summer and offseason. 

“In the past, (people) had enough income and there was enough housing that they might not have been …” Ocean City resident Greta Rolland paused, a short silence filling the air. “It was a struggle for them but they weren’t homeless.”

Rolland, an information system administrator at the Homeless Alliance for the Lower Shore of Maryland, said she comes across more homeless people in the summer, since rentals are cheaper in the winter. 

Background: New 'Housing First' approach to fighting homelessness working in Salisbury, mayor says 

The seasonal discrepancy may affect the accuracy of the Department of Housing and Urban Development's annual Point in Time count, which requires programs like the Tri-County alliance to count homeless people on one night in January.

In 2017, the count for the Lower Eastern Shore was 260, but a more thorough count for a different assessment report by the alliance found 1,162 homeless people in the same year.

By anecdotal accounts, Rolland said people who work in the service industry — where part-time and seasonal jobs run aplenty — are hit hardest by the town's expensive rentals.

Nagle couldn’t think of any low-income housing in West Ocean City.

“When housing is the primary factor in stability and you’re living in a community where the average rental is only six months, people find themselves trapped in a destabilizing cycle,” Nagle said. “With fluctuating housing prices and job instability caused by the tourism cycle, you’re looking at families and individuals potentially being displaced every six months.”

The crisis goes beyond seesawing rental prices.

Tom Ayd is trying to build low-cost housing in Ocean City. His affordable rental apartment development company, Green Street Housing, is encouraged by the state to build housing in more affluent areas, rather than ones with concentrated poverty.

The Immanuel Shelter is located in Rehoboth Beach and provide winter shelter to those experiencing homelessness in the surrounding areas on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

“I wanted to personally be the one who builds the next nice new affordable housing development,” said Ayd, a Stephen Decatur High School graduate.

They just cost a lot less than the market rate ones, he said.

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But Ayd said he has a hard time building in places like Ocean City and Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, because they’re already well-developed.

“There’s not much residential-zoned property that hasn’t been built on,” he said.

New homes in Sussex County price out families and seniors earning lower incomes. 

The average Sussex renter's wage is $12.92, according Housing Alliance Delaware. That's a $5 wage gap in affording a two-bedroom rental at fair market rate. 

An employee making minimum wage ($8.25 per hour) would need to work at least 85 hours per week to afford such a rental.

"The median income of a health care aide or a preschool teacher is not sufficient to afford quickly rising market rents," said Kelly, the vice president of an affordable housing developer.

The median price for a home in Sussex County is about $295,000, making it difficult for a good portion of the workforce — those in retail, construction, health care and many other industries — to live near their employment. 

Janet Idema, Board of Directors, The Immanuel Shelter located in Rehoboth Beach on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

"Wherever there are employment centers, there will be a demand for housing that can support the workforce," said Amy Walls, who chairs the advocacy sub-committee of the Sussex Housing Group.

Schell, the president of Ocean Atlantic Cos., told Sussex County Council members that it would be easier to build moderately priced housing over affordable housing, which he said was not financially feasible without incentives that reduce the developers' cost.

Dropping the rent to 50 percent of the market rate — which is about $1,200 — without strong incentives would cause developers to lose money, he said.

"Because we're a second home and retirement mecca, our land costs reflect that," Schell said in a separate interview. "Our market rate rents relative to construction costs do not support subsidizing a portion of the units as being affordable."

The difference between "moderately priced" and "affordable" housing is a few hundred dollars every month, enough to push low-income earners away from apartments from which Schell Brothers and other developers could profit.

Councilman Robert Arlett said developers “are going to go where they’re going to make a dollar,” since both low-income housing and pricier vacation rentals are in demand.

Even with more incentives and allocated land, developers must contend with concerned residents.

“If I make an argument for something near shopping, near transportation, and has county infrastructure, I’ll naturally have neighbors,” Schell said at the meeting. “And those neighbors will naturally show up behind me and tell you guys how horrible of a plan this is. They’ll usually say something along the lines of, ‘We’re in support of affordable housing. We understand it’s a need in our community. We just think this is a bad location.’ And then when you ask anyone, ‘Well, what’s a good location?’ there’s silence.”

Currently, low-income folks may have to wait up to two years for an affordable rental in Sussex County. As of late 2017, Delaware State Housing Authority had an open list of more than 11,000 people waiting for public housing and private housing vouchers in Kent and Sussex counties.

County mandates and incentives for developers to build affordable housing into fair market infrastructure would create socio-economic variety, instead of dropping substandard housing into impoverished areas. 

“In Sussex County, from a market perspective, we would like nothing more than to build more housing there,” Kelly said. “The demand is absolutely there. It is absolutely there.”

The housing crisis can hit working families particularly hard in resort areas.

"As soon as we label what homelessness looks like, it changes," said Susan Kent, director of Love Inc., a national church-supported nonprofit with a location in Seaford, Delaware, that assists homeless people. "This year, we're experiencing a large increase in families."

The Immanuel Shelter is located in Rehoboth Beach and provide winter shelter to those experiencing homelessness in the surrounding areas on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

Last year, 144 people received emergency housing at Diakonia in Ocean City. Of those, 43 percent were families with school-aged children.

Rebekah James became one of the 144 when she arrived at Diakonia with her four children in September, three days after being evicted from her home.

The Virginia native strolled into one of the family units, taking her time to sit on a couch adjacent to a small kitchen. She left her walker by the dining table.

"I learned to just open my mouth and say, 'I’m homeless, and I really need y’all to work with me,' " James said.

She worked at Mountaire Farms for six years, commuting four hours each day from Virginia to the Selbyville plant. She worked her way up to a supervisory role and, wanting to provide her kids with better opportunities, moved to Berlin.

James continued to do what she loved for the next two years, this time with a shortened commute. Her kids attended Stephen Decatur High School.

"They excelled just by moving," James said, with A-plus grades, two kids studying nursing and computer information technologies, and a son who recently struck a basketball scholarship with the University of Maryland Eastern Shore for proof.

But two years into the move, a serious fall took James out of work. Suddenly, she had no income.

"I never thought I would ever be homeless," James said. "I never thought it would be a paycheck for me being out on the street."

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Affordability issues hit resort areas beyond Rehoboth Beach and Ocean City. 

Like Ocean City, Asbury Park, New Jersey has a boardwalk with shopping, expansive beach and good eats. But the median income is just $32,000 per household, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Immanuel Shelter is located in Rehoboth Beach and provide winter shelter to those experiencing homelessness in the surrounding areas on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

That is considerably less than the Monmouth County median household income of $94,000, according to the most recent New Jersey statistics provided by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

But a new affordable housing project could help. The $20 million project, called The Renaissance, is scheduled to open in April 2019. It will feature three low-rise buildings and 64 residential housing units.

The apartments will rent from anywhere between $300 a month and $1,400 per month, according to Ginger Dawson, vice president of The Michaels Development Co., which is spearheading the project. 

To qualify for housing, eligible applicants can earn no more than 60 percent of the median income in the Monmouth County area. For a family of four, that means earning about $54,000 or less. 

The city is studying a number of measures, including an inclusionary zoning ordinance, which would mandate new developments set aside a certain amount of housing units for low- and moderate-income families. 

To make up for the cost, developers could raise market rate prices somewhat, according to Brett Theodos, principal research associate in the Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center at the Urban Institute. 

"For the privilege of building in a community, the city says part of that entails you have to produce affordable units as well," Theodos said, adding that these measures are targeted to people earning 60 to 80 percent of the median income, not extremely low-wage workers. 

In localities where there is some market strength, evidence shows developers will keep developing, regardless of the mandate, according to Theodos.

In Collier County, Florida, a tourist-income-based economy coupled with a service-oriented workforce has led to scant affordable housing — something the county is slated to address this year. 

But the nation's housing crisis extends beyond restaurant servers, landscapers and other lower-income employees.

"We're talking about folks in regular professions — ambulance drivers, school teachers and policeman who have been priced out of the market here," Collier County housing and grants manager Cormac Giblin said. "It becomes a quality of life issue, not only for them but for the very affluent people they’re here to provide services for."

The local economy has been hit by Collier County's decades-long inability to support its workforce with affordable housing. Big companies facing employee shortages have relocated to other counties where they can find a sustainable workforce, Giblin said. 

Employers like JW Marriott are looking for viable solutions on Marco Island, one of Collier County's popular tourist destinations.

Marco Island is four by six miles long, so there is little space for further development, much less affordable housing.

As JW Marriott undergoes an expansion that will grow the resort by about 200 employees, being able to get staff to work is a top priority.

"We recognize that to continue to tap into associates who want to work at JW Marriott, we're going to have to come up with a transportation solution," said Amanda Cox, director of sales and marketing.

Marco Island has a transportation system that busses workers in from up to 40 miles away, which Cox called a key component of the company's success there. 

Collier County's housing and grants department this year is working to increase the supply of affordable housing by finding dedicated funding sources, creating public-private partnerships and implementing other recommendations from its community housing plan. 

About 500 miles south of Ocean City, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, carries unemployment and few cheap housing options for hospitality employees in the offseason.

“A lot of the hospitality jobs are part-time and low-pay,” said Kathy Jenkins, the executive director of New Directions, a homeless shelter in Myrtle Beach. “People come here thinking this is a great place to start over, not realizing how seasonal it is.”

Its largely seasonal economy carries problems that are glaringly similar to Sussex and Worcester counties' transportation dilemmas.

The Immanuel Shelter is located in Rehoboth Beach and provide winter shelter to those experiencing homelessness in the surrounding areas on Monday, Dec. 11, 2017.

“The affordable housing is farther out in the county, but there’s no transportation to take them from the rural areas into the city,” Jenkins said, “so it’s sort of a Catch-22.”

Lower-income workers living on the more affordable southern end of Worcester County — in Pocomoke City and Snow Hill areas — must take hours-long bus rides to the more job-fertile northern part of the county, said Rolland, administrator for the Tri-County alliance.

Insufficient year-round public transportation also makes it difficult for western Sussex County residents to work in the eastern part of the county, where incomes and rent are higher.

Walls, who chairs the advocacy sub-committee of the Sussex Housing Group, said the organization works with a restaurant employee who uses public transportation to get to Rehoboth Beach from Milton, where he lives.

Depending on transportation schedules, it can take him hours to get to his employment, and he sometimes gets off when the transportation system shuts down for the night, forcing him to spend his last two hours of wages earned on an Uber ride home.

Running more regular routes and placing housing near bus stations could help workers, according to the Sussex Housing Group.

“In coastal Sussex County, it’s terribly expensive and that’s just the nature of the animal,” Councilman George Cole said during the planning December meeting.

Cole said high-density housing would cause more traffic issues, but Schell disagreed.

"If you want to address traffic, encourage people to live close to where they work," he said, arguing that other kinds of development are still allowed by the county. "If (the county) is going to keep allowing guys like me to sell to retirees, (more people) will keep going to restaurants and hospitals, which means we're going to need people to work there and we need to supply that kind of housing, too."

It’s been about three months since Casey VanCleve, who lost her job due to disabling conditions, left Diakonia in Ocean City. She still comes back to volunteer.

Rebecca James holds the key to her new home. After months of staying at Diakonia after a work injury and becoming homeless.  Thursday, March 1, 2018.

More than two-thirds of discharged households that left the shelter headed for permanent housing in 2017.

VanCleve stood inside the transitional housing at Diakonia that she once called home, and laughed.

Morning light came through the lacy shades of her old room in the women's house. 

"You have a dresser," she said, excitedly, about Diakonia's accommodations. "Being homeless, the only thing I really wanted and truly missed was having a dresser." 

The building was quiet. Everyone left by early morning, as required, to work on their housing situation, job prospects, mental health or substance abuse issues, and contribute to the Diakonia community. 

VanCleve attributes much of her current situation to Diakonia. Through the West Ocean City organization, she gained her support system.

"It's a series of bad things that happen to you and once you’re homeless …" Greta Rolland said, trailing off once more. "Really and truly homeless people are the bravest people I know. I could not imagine not having a place to live."

Sitting on the couch, Rebekah James recalled Diakonia being the first place she called after her eviction.

Her daughter, Keyvina, was studying at Wor-Wic Community College to become a pediatric nurse practitioner. At 20 years old, Keyvina temporarily quit college to help her mother, picking up long hours at McDonald's as a manager. 

James had much-needed surgery during her stay at Diakonia. Sitting calmly, she exuded a palpable energy, doting on how her daughter is slated to return to school in the fall. 

Echoing her daughter, James wants to go to school to become a registered nurse once she receives physical therapy.

That week in February, while coming home from church, James and her kids stopped by a rental in Snow Hill. She felt "confident" they could get it, so she messaged the landlord. They met up and had a conversation.

She told him everything, from her injury and her family being evicted to becoming homeless and living in a shelter.

"When he shook my hand, I knew the house was mine," James said.

That weekend, he told her he would rent the house to her and asked when did she want to move in.

"I've been waiting, looking, looking and now ... " James stopped, letting the news sink in once again.

The mother of four stood up, slow and steady, and grasped her walker. Strolling out onto a wide, shadowed porch, she breathed in the chilly, vibrant air of another day. 

"I have such determination, I can't stop," James said. "I just can't."

Asbury Park Press's Austin Bogues contributed to this report. 

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