Kelly’s and Rebecca’s comments on housing reminded me of this article from the Colorado Sun. Apologies if I have already posted, my list of items to post is long and my memory is not perfect (nor is the search engine on TSW). I think there’s definitely something there, especially compared to the difficulties and long-term nature of building permanent housing. Or reducing the cost of housing more generally (requires, I don’t know, messing with the economy?) so definitely above our pay grade.
Kristin McGrath and Collin Vlass have gathered plenty of first-hand information about trying to live in an RV while working in Colorado.
McGrath is a nurse anesthetist student and Vlass fights wildland fires.
Last year, McGrath learned she would have to move five times to do clinical work for her degree. She and Vlass have two dogs and own a house in Durango, “and seeing housing prices go crazy, rent gouging and having the dogs, we knew it was going to be astronomically expensive to find housing anywhere for a couple of months,” she said.
So they bought a used RV thinking they’d live in RV parks while they worked. But that plan would turn out to be more difficult than they thought.
In Manitou Springs’ Pikes Peak RV Park, where they currently reside, the two pay $1,300 a month for a concrete parking slab, water, power, sewer and the use of amenities — coin-operated laundry, bathrooms with showers and access to the Manitou Pool & Fitness Center. It’s the most expensive park they’ve lived on their journey, McGrath said, and “it seems as though they’ve seen the demand and are cramming as many RVs in there as possible.”
The crowding issue sometimes creates problems with renters not knowing which hookup pedestal to use, and McGrath said on the couple of instances when other campers unplugged them from electricity and turned off their water, the managers on site told them “it didn’t happen.”
When you mix vacationers with long-term renters, “they rarely have situational awareness,” Vlass added. “It’s bad because Kristin is pregnant and has to get up at 4, 5, 6 a.m. to go to school. I’m sorry, but even if it’s like nine people who came from three different spots in Colorado and chose Manitou for their reunion, even though we’re paying a pretty premium cost, there’s no separation between us and them.”
At least the two have been able to live in RV parks while traveling for work, something not everyone can manage due to aesthetics.
Many Colorado parks have restrictions around who can and cannot stay. A big one: If your RV is 10 or more years old, forget it, because they’re often rejected for being too worn or weathered, out of a concern they’ll ruin a park’s image.
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But for the Coloradoans living in wheeled homes out of necessity, very little assistance has been available.
Jonathan Damon, a ski coach who lived in Colorado for a time, characterized long-term RV camping here as “a nightmare” and “impossible,” because “there are too many wealthy people who don’t want to see affordable living near their backyard.”
A situation last year in Grand County highlighted another challenge nonrecreational RV campers face, when a couple renting a site from Sun Outdoors Rocky Mountains resort, in Granby, was forced to leave after miscalculating the price of their site.
After renting at Sun Outdoors for a short time, camper Aaron Keil realized he couldn’t afford the $2,500-per-month rate. With no other place to legally park his RV, he moved onto Bureau of Land Management land outside of Kremmling. He planned to move campsites every two weeks, to stay in compliance with BLM policy, according to reporting in the Sky-Hi News. But he didn’t see the part of the policy that states each move must be 30 miles — as the crow flies — from the last site.
Steven Hall, Colorado communications manager for the BLM, said it’s difficult to get an accurate number of people using BLM lands for “residential use,” but “it’s an ongoing challenge for us with law enforcement and recreation staff in field offices like Kremmling.”
Hall said two of the most popular places for this kind of camping are the outskirts of Grand Junction and Cañon City, and that when BLM finds someone who has violated the two-week restriction, they’ll contact the person, let them know they’re in violation and help them find another campsite “where they would be in compliance.”
If a camper ignores the warnings long enough, agency law enforcement will “take action, including escorting them off the land and seizing what they’ve left behind,” Hall said. Cleanup can be a big job, because sometimes what’s left behind is the RV.
“BLM is trying to preserve the natural environment, which is hard to do if you have someone living there. People get concerned about ongoing hygiene issues and the watershed. But I worry less about people not using BLM land to help solve the housing crisis and more about the unused land that gets snapped up by market-rate developers,” said Curtis, from the safe parking organization. “We can’t build housing without land, and if you’re an affordable housing provider, you’ve got to have a wing and a prayer to get access to usable land that’s decent, near transit and a grocery store — all things we need to have.
And yet, some people (including, but not limited to, federal employees) who need space have cars.. so don’t need to be “near transit and a grocery store.” So there’s that. It seems like such places could be limited to preferentially feds and then if space is available to other public employees. It seems like it might be worthy of piloting such an approach at least.
Are you suggesting that BLM get into the RV park business? I can see that working in some locations.
When I worked on the Kaibab NF, we were having a difficult time in recruiting employees due to the high cost of housing. Particularly in Williams, where the SO and one District are located. Williams is about 30 miles west of Flagstaff and the very high cost of housing there was affecting the greater area. The fact that the greater Forest Service had largely gotten out of the employee housing business years ago (what a lack of forethought that was), had made the problem worse.
I began exploring how other Forests were trying to address the issue. I talked with folks on the Bridger/Teton where the cost of housing is astronomical. They do have some limited government housing and if you move to the Forest, you could move into one of those for a limited time. I am thinking it was 2-3 years and then you had to find something else. They also had built their own trailer park on FS land, right in Jackson. I went to the BT on a fire and got to check it out. It was really well done, and employees could park their own trailers there and pay rent on the lot. I thought this was a really good idea and about the best solution that I had heard of. They have a really difficult time recruiting employees due to the high cost of living there, but they were coming up with solutions.