The Northwest Corner in the 2000s

As we move farther and farther away from the turn of the last century and look toward 2007, it’s only natural that we try to define the current decade. After all, in a week and a half, we’ll only have three years left of it.

To begin with, what should we call the decade and what, more than any single aspect of life in the Northwest Corner, has characterized it so far? A Cornwall man has answered both questions with remarkable clarity and detail.

David Grossman, a former budget director for the City of New York, saw a troubling trend in which full-time and working-class residents of his town were being squeezed out of the area by high housing costs and an increasing influx of weekenders. So he set about examining what his town looks like and where it is headed.

The result was "Cornwall In The Zeroes," a 25-page examination of how the past 10 years has changed Cornwall and where the town is going in the 2000s (or the "zeroes" decade). Grossman’s findings could easily apply to most towns in the Northwest Corner.

The numbers of full-time residents and schoolchildren are shrinking across the board. The Region One school district, which includes Housatonic Valley Regional High School and six local elementary/middle schools, has seen a 9.3 percent drop in enrollment since 2004.

And birthrates are on the decline, too. From 1990 to 1995, Cornwall recorded 77 births. During that same five-year period in the next decade (2000 to 2005), there were only 57 births.

Both Cornwall and Salisbury have had recent property revaluations. Both towns have seen their grand lists, which are based largely on recent sale prices, shoot well up over 80 percent in only five years. Evidently, many full-timers are cashing in and selling homes — homes they spent decades building equity in — for top dollar to part-timers. As the local economy adjusts accordingly, there are fewer and fewer jobs to keep young people here, so they look elsewhere for opportunity.

The drop in the ranks of the middle- and lower-middle class has far-reaching implications. Who will tend to the needs of part-time residents if working people can’t afford to live here anymore? If the percentage of weekend residents in our towns eventually reaches, say, 75 percent, what kind of community will be left?

Who will staff the volunteer fire and ambulance services, or sit on the boards and commissions that do much of the heavy lifting in running our schools and municipalities? Perhaps the further decline in school enrollment will enable towns to take the savings and hire people to sit on zoning boards and recreation commissions. But who will be around during the week to take those jobs? Either way, it’s not a pretty picture.

No one, including those who buy part-time homes here, wants the Northwest Corner to become like the Hamptons. The chic Long Island summer playground for wealthy Manhattanites increasingly relies on poorly paid migrant day laborers and an assortment of other workers who have a very long commute.

There doesn’t appear to be a perfect solution, but clearly the state could do more to facilitate the construction of middle-class housing. Surely, Grossman’s idea of a means-tested homeowner tax exemption is worthy of consideration. The work of Habitat for Humanity and the various town housing trusts has helped. But with due respect to Robert Frost, we have miles to go and promises to keep.

Our upper-income residents should get just as fired up about the lack of affordable housing as they do about preserving open space. Otherwise, they will be blindsided when there is no one to cut their lawns, provide meals in area restaurants or put out a brush fire that threatens their homes. The promise of the continued quality of life is at risk in the Northwest Corner. That fact ought not be minimized or ignored and action to define and implement more solutions should not be delayed.