In the past year, Sitka gained 150 new jobs and $37 million dollars in wages. When Meilani Schijvens of Rain Coast Data presented her annual update on behalf of the Sitka Economic Development Association, “The State of Sitka’s Economy,” she said it’s a new record.
“I have a question mark on this slide, but I’m going to say this with absolutely zero question mark. You are at your peak jobs ever in the history of Sitka,” she said. “You have more jobs now than you have ever had before.”
Schijvens said jobs are up across many sectors this year, including seafood, healthcare and tourism, the three industries that make up half of Sitka’s economy.
She said wages are up and rising at a rate faster than inflation, which is good for workers, and the community’s housing supply has increased. And it’s not the only thing that’s up.
“I often will have good news about Sitka, and then I have to tell you your population is down, but not this year. This year your population is up by 10 new residents,” she said. “It’s the third time that’s happened in a dozen years. So it’s a small number, but I’m very happy to be reporting it to you.”
Still, Sitka is not immune to the region’s larger population trends. Schijvens said in about the last decade, Sitka has lost over 875 residents of “prime workforce” age and nearly 600 kids [590], while gaining almost 400 [380] senior citizens as Sitkans age in place. She said those demographic shifts have put pressure on the workforce.
“So altogether, we’ve lost 975 residents, nearly 1000 residents, but we’ve gained 270 jobs. So there’s jobs, but it’s really tough to find people to fill those jobs, and so that’s why those wages are going up at a faster rate than inflation,” she said.
So what do you do when you’re losing people and adding jobs? Hire from outside. Not counting self-employed Sitkans or Coast Guard, Schijvens said about 40% of Sitka’s wage-earning workforce are non-residents. They only earn about 16 percent of the total workforce earnings, but also put pressure on the housing market.
Housing access is a concern across Southeast, but Sitka is adding more supply to the pool than other communities. Schijvens lauded the community for developing over 400 new housing units in the past 15 years.
“I’m assuming a lot of these are snowbirds. I’m assuming some of them are vacation homes,” she said.”
However, she said the number of vacant homes has increased by nearly the same amount. While she said the American Community Survey data should be taken with a grain of salt because they don’t actually survey that many respondents, she pointed to Sitka’s property tax rate as a possible incentive for the trend.
“You’ve got a just a much lower mill rate when we compare it to other communities. Six points compared, you know, Valdez is 20,” she said. “It almost incentivizes people to have a home here and then have a home someplace else as well.”
Still, Schijvens said in a recent business survey, Sitka earned the best quality of life rating of any community in Southeast Alaska and a majority of business leaders felt the economy was either “good” or “very good.”
After her presentation, Schijvens took some time to answer questions from the audience. The city’s Planning and Community Development Director Amy Ainslie asked if Schijvens had a more detailed wage and earnings breakdown to better understand how money is moving through the community.
“In local government we’re hearing from citizens a lot about economic stress in this time, and at the same time, we hear these kinds of presentations that jobs are up and wages are up, and the economy has a really bright outlook,” Ainslie said. “I’m wondering if we have a better sense of how those wages and earnings are getting distributed…throughout our economy, and to see you know what percentage of our households are not experiencing the kinds of gains that the economy is overall.”
Pat Alexander felt the data didn’t reflect many Sitkans’ experiences.
“You know, as I watched your presentation, I wondered, ‘Where is this magical place? I want to live there. I want to move there,'” she said. “But do you ever include any reality from the people who live in the place about what their perspective is?”
Schijvens agreed that the business indicators don’t necessarily paint the full picture. It doesn’t really factor in affordability, which she says is key to Sitka’s outmigration.
“People are struggling in this community, absolutely,” she said. “There’s that divide between economics, between how the overall economy is doing and then the household economy, how how individuals and people are doing.”
Schijvens acknowledged that while those experiences weren’t a part of her presentation, they are part of the fabric of Sitka. “It’s a good point,” she said.
