The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
People moving to area for county jobs need transition place
[ By Mark Reaman ]
Workforce housing inventory in the valley is scant everywhere and different circumstances call for different types of housing. Questions from neighbors over a three-bedroom workforce housing unit in the Buckhorn subdivision in the North Valley that has been empty since last fall demonstrates the various uses of units.
The unit in question is a townhome located in the Elk Valley development. Owned by Gunnison County, there was a family living in it until September when they moved out. Since then, the deed-restricted unit has been empty. Basically, that unit is being used for what is termed “recruitment purposes.”
According to Gunnison Valley Regional Housing Authority (GVRHA) interim director Chris Peterson, there are eight Elk Valley units. One is owned by Gunnison Valley Health and the seven others are owned by the county and managed by the GVRHA.
“The county always has the right to hold an Elk Valley unit for recruitment, or release it to us to rent,” she explained. “With this particular unit, and the valley-wide hiring crunch, the county has been showing it to potential new staff members but does not allow it to be occupied when they come to visit. They have always planned that if a new hire is to lease it, they would continue to look for more permanent housing while residing there. Generally, our leases for county staff members are six to 12 months.”
Gunnison County manager Matthew Birnie said the units were built by the county and continue to be owned by the county. He agreed that the unit is there to fill a niche in the workforce housing situation. It is there to help new employees more smoothly land in the area.
“We have reserved that one for new County employees transitioning into the Valley,” Birnie explained. “It has been vacant for a bit because we have had some folks identified for it that have either not ended up coming or have found other options. We have had a lot of job vacancies and can’t fill some of our more specialized positions from folks within the valley so need to recruit people in. It is nearly impossible to bring someone in unless we have a place for them to land.
“We have master leased units in Paintbrush which have recently come online as well,” Birnie continued. “Most of our employees prefer to live down valley so they have chosen those options instead of that unit. We have filled all of our reserved Paintbrush units so I expect we will fill that (Elk Valley) unit soon. It can be either a transitional unit or could be longer term depending on the employee’s situation. We have learned that we need at least one open unit for new people on an ongoing basis. We do periodically put out calls to our employees when we have an available unit. We haven’t been faced with deciding between providing a unit for an existing employee vs. keeping one open for recruitment.”
Not counting the senior housing units at Mountain View Apartments, the county owns the 8 units that were built at Elk Valley and they have master leases on 5 units at Paintbrush used for workforce housing.
