Results of a recent study conducted by a Kenyon College senior economics major confirm a plan the Knox County Area Development Foundation (ADF) released in 2019 that reported the county has a housing shortage.
Knox County ADF, a nonprofit corporation that in part supports livable communities which attract workers, was presented the new study during its annual meeting on Jan. 25, a post on the foundation’s Facebook page said.
Kenyon College senior Brian Sellers, who interned at Knox County ADF, found in his study conducted last year that demand for homes in the county has outpaced supply.
“The county’s projected population growth lags behind neighboring counties, and there’s a need for improved housing stock at all income levels,” the post said. “The Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission projects that 73,000 residents will call Knox County home in 2040. That’s up from 61,000 estimated in 2018.”
The foundation’s Economic Development Plan 2019 reported that in recent decades Knox County has experienced industrial-site closings, a decline in housing stock and an overall loss in the number of young people.
“Put simply, Knox County has experienced little population growth and a relative decline in the quality and/or availability of its middle-income housing stock,” the plan said. “At the same time, employers continue to demand large numbers of qualified workers. If our proverbial site selector comes into town to locate a 200-job factory operation, from where would we source the workers? Where in our community would they live?”
New residents lured to the community by better housing options will add to the county’s economy, the report said. Managers and professionals are living in Granville, New Albany and Delaware and commuting into Knox County for work because the county lacks high-end housing.
The new Danbury Senior Living community development in Mount Vernon is an example of “infilling” that Knox County ADF promotes, Mount Vernon Mayor Matthew Starr said in a video about the project.
“It’s going to be providing 81 units and 93 beds inside the city limits,” Starr said. “As seniors leave their homes in the city limits and move to one of either the villas or the main unit here, that opens up their home in the city limits for people to move into. It’s called ‘infilling.’ We like that because it hits one of the main points of our Knox County comprehensive plan, which is to do infilling rather than gobble up cornfield after cornfield with development after development.”
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