LAIC Housing Study: Fewer Students, More Houses, Lake Home Growth

Last Wednesday, the Lake Area Improvement Corporation held a public forum to present information about the "much anticipated, final version" of the study it paid Community Partners Research to conduct of the housing situation in Madison and Lake County. So far, though, the LAIC has not posted any of that information online.

While we wait for the LAIC to get the study up on its website (and other communities who have worked with Community Partners research have done a bang-up job of that: see, for example, Itasca County, MN, and Morris, MN), the Madville Times has managed to get hold of an executive summary of the study (posted in simple HTML format for your easy downloading pleasure). A summary of the summary:

1. Madison's population is down; Lake County's is up. More households, fewer people per household.
2. CPR contends Census data undercounts: expect more population and household growth than available projections.
3. DSU overall enrollment is up, but mostly in distance students: the number of students taking classes on campus is down from 1,461 in 2000 to 1,236 in fall 2007.
   
4. Lake County median income in 2007: $41,232. Median income in 2000: $34,176.
   
5. Madison median income in 2007: $34,227. Median income in 2000: $30,441.
6. Median home-buying power in Lake County: $120,500. That means half of us can afford a home more expensive than that, half of us can afford only less.
7. CPR's "target affordable rent level": $606 per month.

CPR recommends an affordable housing development strategy "largely developed by the Greater Minnesota Housing Fund." The executive summary does not outline what goes into that strategy, but GMHF provides information on its Building Better Neighborhoods program and the Minnesota Green Communities Initiative. Read up, and let's see how many of the recommendations of those programs make it into our own housing strategy.