Editor’s note: Don Keelan is a writer and certified public accountant who lives in Arlington. This piece first appeared in the Bennington Banner.
If nothing else, the 2010 U.S. Census data for Bennington County should be a wake-up call of monumental proportions. So why is it that I believe it has fallen on deaf ears?
In a 10-year period, 2001 to 2010, the county had a net increase in population of 131. The largest town in the county, Bennington, grew by 27, not enough to half fill a school bus. People aren’t moving in; they are moving out or moving up-state to Chittenden County.
One would have to go back to the 1930s to have witnessed such anemic growth in population. The overall state totals were nothing to brag about either: 17,000 in 10 years, a 2.5 percent rate increase. Had the state experienced the growth percentages of prior decades, say the 1960s and ‘70s, the state’s population would had witnessed a growth closer to 90,000 within the last 10 years.
Rutland County fared much worse than Bennington County. It lost 2.8 percent of its population since 2000. However, that city’s newspaper believes there could be a silver lining in all of this. A Feb. 16 editorial in the Rutland Herald noted that with the arrival of a “second wave” of vegetable growers, goat cheese producers, and broadband, a newfound land base economy could take hold and thereby reverse the downward trend in population. Can they be serious?
It is a well known (but not frequently discussed) fact that many farms that grow fruit or produce milk in Advertisement Vermont can only meet their production quotas by bringing in undocumented workers.
We need to open our eyes to the seriousness of the census problem. And to be motivated to do that it might help to address what the census data is telling us about southwestern Vermont — for example:
1) We will lose a number of our county’s seats in the Vermont Statehouse — due to redistricting, the “Forgotten Kingdom” (Senator Dick Sears’ description) will take on greater significance. Our 12 elected state legislators could easily turn out to be 8 or 9 by 2012 — whereby Bennington County will make up 5 percent of the Legislature. There goes what little influence we had in Montpelier.
2) Not only has the population total remained constant, the mix has been and is forecasted to be detrimental — the only age category that will grow is that of 60 and over (based upon another recent study). The young people have left, are leaving or will not come here — it is too costly.
3) The pressure to close schools within the county will only become greater than it already is. Will our vacant schools become the area’s new “rest homes?”
4) Vermont, and Southwestern Vermont is no exception, has witnessed a geometric growth in non-profits these past 10 years. Where will the next corps of volunteers and board members come from, as well as the young adults to operate the hundreds of NFP’s in Bennington County?
5) A telling example of the “age gap” is that the average age of Arlington’s volunteer fire department is 51. And the county in general can hardly fill its training school roster, let alone get “all hands” out on a serious call.
The situation we find ourselves in did not occur yesterday — it was years of yesterdays that put up roadblocks for reasonable and rational development to take place. There has been, and unfortunately still exists, a negative attitude toward welcoming businesses to Vermont. Furthermore, there are some in state leadership roles who are just as unfriendly to those large employers that have been here for decades.
Frankly, I’m not ready for a constant diet of locally grown organic vegetables and goat cheese. In the 1990s when Vermont raised the “draw bridge” to our state, did anyone forecast a gain of 131 individuals over 10 years in Bennington County? It’s time to lower the drawbridge and provide the young people with gainful employment opportunities. And the young people will come if we have companies locate to Southwestern Vermont that carry on service and manufacturing operations.
