The prosperous American island beloved of the Obamas – and favored in the summer by hordes of the rich and famous – is facing a housing shortage that has become so severe that it is “threatening the public safety” of its residents.
Staggering seasonal rents, averaging nearly $1,000 a night, are forcing regular workers, including restaurants, retail clerks, doctors, correctional officers and 911 operators, to flee their jobs on Martha’s Vineyard in the midst of the lack of affordable housing. endangering the city’s public safety, authorities said.
Dukes County Sheriff Robert Ogden said: The cost of housing has gotten so bad that it is now considered a public safety issue on the island.
Ogden said his department, which oversees 11 islands, including Martha’s Vineyard, needs to staff 11 emergency operators who provide life-saving instructions to 911 and relay them to first responders by phone, including CPR instructions.
A home in the quaint New England neighborhood just south of Cape Cod can cost more than $6,500 for a week’s stay, particularly during the peak summer months. And the growing problem is that many owners are more interested in profiting from these short-term visitors than from their year-round residents.
Beautiful homes line Oak Bluffs Harbor on Martha’s Vineyard, located in Massachusetts on the Atlantic just south of Cape Cod.
Former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama own an $11.75 million vacation home on Martha’s Vineyard that they purchased in 2020.
The number, he said, has been difficult to maintain, as operators often work long hours and are burned out from working too much overtime, he said.
For the past six years, Ogden said he has been working to impose a local home sales tax to help pay for affordable housing on the island, but he said that still requires new state legislation.
He called it “a vicious cycle.”
“Every year we lose two to three dispatchers due to not only the high cost of living here, but also housing insecurity,” he said.
She shared that one correctional officer, who is trained, had to take cleaning jobs so she wouldn’t earn too much and lose her access to low-income housing.
‘Can you imagine that in any society you would say that I pay someone too much to stay at work?’ Ogden said. ‘How crazy is that?’
Former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama purchased the sprawling 28-acre vacation home on Martha’s Vineyard for $11.75 million in 2020. Houses and gardens reported.
Celebrities who have visited the island over the years include Reese Witherspoon, Bill Murray, Meg Ryan and the late Princess Diana, and enjoy the low-key atmosphere. Actor Michael J. Fox is known to call the Vineyard his home. gallant reported.
The Obamas are shown walking on the tarmac at Martha’s Vineyard Airport in West Tisbury, Massachusetts, August 2016, during their summer vacation.
The Obamas live on a 28-acre property in Edgartown, Massachusetts, on Martha’s Vineyard.
The year-round population on Martha Vineyard is approximately 23,000, but during the summer months that number increases to approximately 200,000.
About 56 percent of the island’s 14,621 homes are seasonally occupied, according to Martha’s Vineyard Commission (MVC), the regional planning agency for Martha’s Vineyard Island and the Elizabeth Islands.
Sheryl Taylor, who works at the high school as the equity and access coordinator during the year, told the Associated PressShe is forced to “couch surf” with friends during the summer months because the rents are too high.
Taylor has been traveling with a suitcase in her car going to different friends’ houses, despite the large number of empty houses.
Abelardo Neto, a painter, lives in an apartment on Martha’s Vineyard with seven other people. Despite the space shortage, he still pays $850 a month in rent.
Olda Deda, who has a student visa and is a native of Albania, has to work three jobs to pay her $900 monthly rent.
Deda works at a coffee shop and two restaurants to survive and said she is shocked by the high cost of living, which is at least three times higher. than you would expect to pay in Europe.
According to the commission’s housing report, there were 40 percent of Islanders earning less than $50,000 a year in 2012.
In 2022, that figure dropped to 23 percent, including people who earned incomes between $50,000 and $100,000, but those who earned more$100,000 nearly doubled to 46 percent.
Laura Silber, the island’s housing planner and author of the report, explained that the “shift” in income is one of the reasons the island is losing year-round residents.
‘We are losing our low and moderate income families. “We are losing our middle class because we do not have housing,” he stated.
An archive image of some of the charming homes on Martha’s Vineyard.
According to the report’s findings, $931 is the average nightly rate among more than 3,000 short-term rentals, while the median home price has more than doubled over the past 11 years to $2.3 million.
Nantucket Island, about a 40-mile ferry ride from Martha’s Vineyard, has a median home price valued at $3.55 million.
Earlier this month, Ed Augustus, the state’s secretary of housing and livable communities, traveled to Martha’s Vineyard to speak with residents.
Augustus explained that during this visit he learned about the workers who travel to the island every day.
“I’ve heard examples of people arriving by ferry every day, sometimes from Falmouth, sometimes from elsewhere on the cape, sometimes from outside the cape,” Augustus said.
He added that travel costs and travel time make it less desirable for workers to fill the jobs.
This month the state House passed a housing bill, first introduced by Democratic Gov. Maura Healey.
The bill has not yet been approved by the Senate, he explained that it will help create and renew affordable housing.
