The young professional age group is not coming to the city (Richmond: fit in, real estate)

[OuttaFlorida]

Census estimates: Roanoke population continues on the upswing - Roanoke.com


Very interesting article in the Times a few days ago. Roanoke population is on the upswing, but the young professional age group is not.....but moving to the surrounding areas.

Why do you think that is? What is lacking causing a decline in young professionals moving to the area?

Here's what I think:

1.) Lack of jobs for students graduating from V-tech, Radford, UVA to move into
2.) Reluntancy of employers to hire out-of-towners (based on our
experience)
2.) VERY expensive airport
3.) closest large metro area's 3+ hour's away
4.) lack of higher education institutions (but new med school is coming in
2010).
5.) Perhaps Roanokers want to keep it this way?

[Erin1264]

I think 90% + of it is #1!!

I'm a young professional and have been out of work since October and actively looking - no luck. Good thing DH has a good job.

[seanpecor]

I think it's important to note that the article is addressing losses in the 25-44 demographic within the confines of Roanoke City. Outside of the comparatively small city land area, but still well within the Roanoke "metro", the younger demographic is growing. In this context, available jobs within Roanoke City isn't a causative factor, because it's likely that people living in Salem or Franklin County may already be commuting into Roanoke City for work.

The folks in city government are pretty serious about changing the hearts and minds of people in the 25-44 demographic. The city itself now represents less than 1/3rd of the metro residential population and they are not competing well when attempting to attract young professionals and families. Yet, ironically, many of our wonderful public parks, greenways, landmarks, and urban destinations - the things that differentiates Roanoke from other comparable metro areas - are within the city limits!

To me, 75% of the problem would be solved by improving Roanoke City's public school performance. The scenario that repeats itself ad nauseum goes like this: a young family plans a relocation to Roanoke and does a real estate web search. They find a bunch of homes they like and can afford, but each time they look up school performance on a City home, the ratings are much lower than comparable County homes. For them to choose a City home, the house or its location would have to be so desirable as to outweigh the negative vibe they have regarding the performance of City public schools. Not surprisingly, this is often not the case. They pick a Cave Spring home, or a Penn Forest home, or a Hunting Hills home, etc.

The guerilla marketer in me has a solution that is 100% guaranteed to solve this problem, although it is ethically questionable Take one of the soon-to-be-closed Roanoke City schools and create a not-for-profit private school that is fully partnered with the city but that which is completely omitted from the SOL testing framework. Offer 100% free tuition to every academically struggling child in the entire city of Roanoke. This PREK-12 private school should absorb as much as 10% of the city student population, or about 1,300 kids. Recruit the best teachers from all over the country who want to make a difference with an innovative approach to community redevelopment. Get Carilion involved, both financially and academically. Track students who were previously struggling - but are now excelling in the new school - into higher paying medical professions. How does the guerilla marketing come into play? Well, by removing the lowest performing students from public school, and moving them into private school where SOL tests are not conducted, Roanoke City school ratings would turn around almost overnight. Within a few years, young professional families who conduct online research, will find City houses they'd love to own (close to a greenway, awesome city neighborhood with sidewalks etc) and they'll find school ratings that are comparable with Roanoke County. Is this approach ethically sound? That's questionable. Would it work? Damn straight it would. I think it would have a revolutionary impact on our community.

Sean

[540_804]

Sean makes a good point.

But as far as young professionals in Roanoke City, I think the city is ripe for a resurgence of this demographic in the city. It just seems like we're missing that one thing...a catalyst that would spur this growth...

I've lived in Roanoke just about all of my life (up until I was 19..now im 20 and split my time between Roanoke and Richmond) and to me it always seemed like numbers 1 and 4 could be the key to some real growth in the area..

Im not sure which I would place higher (jobs or education)...but I would like to see (and have always wanted) some institution of higher learning in the city. Not just community college or that health college downtown, but more of a credible branch of an established college..maybe the VT medical campus could be that...

You look at other states and universities and they have several campuses (think UNC or University of Wisconsin) and always wished Virginia had something like that so that Roanoke could have a college population.. For instance, I know I stumbled across a feasibility study for establishing a satellite VCU dental clinic that would serve as a teaching facility as well (the study dated back to 2007, Im not sure how far that plan ever went) and I was thinking, something like that would be perfect for Roanoke.

I always envisioned VT setting up a medical school (which I guess thats what we will be seeing in the near future) and maybe establishing a law school or business school in Roanoke....

I think that if there was a serious higher education presence in Roanoke, then more fresh-grads would stay here. In other areas its very common for fresh grads to start up their businesses in the area and that could happen here...


Who knows..maybe one day.

[mccamp]

Personally, I think the recession is going to be a game-changer for many cities.

I think it's important to remember that the recession/bad housing market started a few years back. That's keeping many people glued to present locations. What happens when the economy turns? That will be the key.

We're seeing a shift in thinking. Between the terrorist attacks of 9/11 to the markets collapsing, people are re-evaluating their goals. I think we're going to see younger people (25-44 year olds) decide to stay away from the big cities and to park themselves in mid-sized cities like Roanoke/Blacksburg.

Roanoke is in desperate need of marketing. It's a hidden jewel. When I tell folks up East about Roanoke, they're surprised. When they visit, they want to pack up their homes and live here.

Roanoke has a lot going for it, and from what I'm seeing, they're moving in the right direction.

[540_804]

Originally Posted by mccamp

Personally, I think the recession is going to be a game-changer for many cities.

I think it's important to remember that the recession/bad housing market started a few years back. That's keeping many people glued to present locations. What happens when the economy turns? That will be the key.

We're seeing a shift in thinking. Between the terrorist attacks of 9/11 to the markets collapsing, people are re-evaluating their goals. I think we're going to see younger people (25-44 year olds) decide to stay away from the big cities and to park themselves in mid-sized cities like Roanoke/Blacksburg.

Roanoke is in desperate need of marketing. It's a hidden jewel. When I tell folks up East about Roanoke, they're surprised. When they visit, they want to pack up their homes and live here.

Roanoke has a lot going for it, and from what I'm seeing, they're moving in the right direction.

Thats a very good point you bring up about the current economic climate altering the inter-city migratory patterns of young professionals and college grads. I never thought of that, but it makes sense.

And I also agree with what you said about Roanoke needing a serious PR job or aggressive marketing campaign highlighting the great things about the area. Not only to attract new residents and expose outsiders to this "hidden jewel" but also to retain the young talent that this city already has...

As young as I am I know how it is to graduate high school with the "I can't wait to leave Roanoke" attitude...because Roanoke is not really marketed as a city for young people..its marketed as an "All-American family town". While that aspect is important, its not what young people are necessarily looking for...fortunately for me, I discovered how great a city Roanoke is. If not I probably would have never looked back after I left for Richmond. I really want to stay and grow with Roanoke, but it would all depend on job prospects after college, but I still love Roanoke enough to wear I probably won't take a position anywhere outside of a day's drive to Roanoke.

As downtown continues to develop, hopefully younger people will start realizing what a nice place Roanoke really is to live. I was down town last Saturday driving around (looking at the Row by the Rail...I think thats what its called) and noticed quite a few young (mid-20s) people walking around..hopefully thats an indication of things to come

[Justme2010]

Another aspect one may contemplate is to attract selective and competitive foreign businesses as their distribution centers or the like for the East coast region quietly, when you have quite a bit of environmentally friendly businesses going on here, people including many young prof would come (one difficuty I can imagine is the out-dated mentality of probably not a small number of local residents... but I hope I'm wrong on the last part).

[seanpecor]

Stuart Mease works for the city of Roanoke and directs the effort to attract and retain young professionals to the area. I think in the few years that he has had the job, he has made substantial progress and I think he's responsible for much of the extra-regional press on Roanoke. And some national press as well. More people need to be devoted to this, however, and the effort needs to be cohesive.

The best way to net more young professionals begins with being positioned well when they're actively searching for their next home town. This means plenty of P.R. in regional press, and first page positioning in search engine results for relevant searches. Then, Roanoke has to perform well enough statistically to avoid being ruled out during this initial search. If the crime stats are too high, or if school performance is too low, then your "conversion" will diminish. Right now the biggest statistical problem is that all these relocation websites use the City school district ratings, and when people see them, they (understandably) presume that the school ratings apply to the entire Roanoke metro, which of course they do not. So until the City itself dramatically improves its school performance, the entire valley will suffer. The merging of the Roanoke City and Roanoke County school systems would solve this immediately, although that's impossible. County residents would be strongly opposed to that, even if the entire valley would benefit economically - and therefore academically - from the merging of both systems.

Sean

[highway29south]

The problem for us is the resistance to hiring people outside of the area and the lack of jobs available to apply to.

We fit into the "young professionals" catagory and we have been looking to move to the Roanoke area for some time now. But after sending literally dozens of resumes over the past few years to Roanoke for various jobs, we have never received a response.

My husband, who is the one applying for the jobs (I stay home now with our kids), has extensive experience as a manager in government and mental health and also teaches college and does seminars across the country. He has a master's degree and is a reliable source to our local media for any expertise needed in his field. I cannot see any reason anyone in Roanoke would not at least interview him with those credentials. But they don't.

And it's not for lack of trying. We have asked for help on this site, sent his resume to a city council member we met while visiting Roanoke, created a LinkedIn account, and he has tried contacting employers directly. No responses.

I can only conclude that it is about being an outsider that prevents us from moving there. I only wish I could get to the point where I am concerned about the school issues I am a native to Virginia and miss living in my home state and raising my family there. I just don't think it's ever going to happen with the way things are at this point.

[OuttaFlorida]

Originally Posted by highway29south

The problem for us is the resistance to hiring people outside of the area and the lack of jobs available to apply to.

We experience this as well and felt it was a major drawback to the area....we just got lucky. The Carilion system hired me pretty quick, but my girlfriend must have put in for over 50 jobs with 1 response, and she is VERY qualified in the social services field. We felt there was a tendancy to not hire out of towners and of course all our apps had a Florida address. I'd be interested to see if other have had this problem with an out of state or area address.