3,000 community members participated in Uplift’s outreach process and, to no one’s surprise, several topics consistently came up when they were asked about the biggest barriers to economic prosperity:
– High cost of living, especially housing, and lack of quality jobs
– Underdeveloped infrastructure, especially internet and transportation
– Under-resourced childcare and eldercare
– Spanish and English language proficiency
More than 2.5 million people call California’s Central Coast home, and while residents take pride in their communities and there are numerous notable economic and aesthetic advantages, many residents struggle to get by with low-paying jobs in sectors such as agriculture, hospitality, retail and tourism. According to Uplift’s community engagement and research, about 45% of Central Coast families struggle to make ends meet. High housing costs, childcare challenges and other financial burdens make access to equal quality of life extremely difficult. Only about 25% of jobs in the Central Coast qualify as “quality jobs” (those that pay a “living wage”, offer employer-sponsored health benefits and provide stability re: job retention and upward mobility opportunity). Ventura County has nearly twice as many residents as the next two largest counties in the Uplift region, thus job-to-population ratio is higher for Ventura County (2.42 people per available job vs 1.9 in Santa Barbara County, for example). Housing is also the least affordable in Ventura County due in large part to alack of quality jobs combined with limited housing inventory that has resulted from zoning policy barriers and SOAR-related restrictions.
As engaged citizens, we already know these things. So, you might ask, what now? With the completion of Uplift Regional Plan Part I, the Uplift Central Coast Coalition will now transition from research to formal strategic planning. The strategy, informed by all that was learned in the research phase, will recommend directing significant resources and investment toward the economic initiatives identified as the most impactful to the overall goal of addressing and removing systemic barriers that hinder equal access to economic opportunities and prosperity. Once completed, the strategy will be submitted to the State with a request for funding. |