“If you don’t have between $600,000 and $800,000, you’re not buying a house out there,” Reese said. “Las Vegas has a lot of opportunity, and it was affordable in 2006, but it’s become unaffordable. We quit our jobs and moved across the country. We’re hoping this is the right decision for us.”

Reese and her family are unpacking at her parents’ Youngstown home, a temporary stop until she and her husband, who was a casino worker in Las Vegas, can find jobs and a house of their own with their young daughter. Youngstown is one of the last two metro areas in the country where a household with nearly any income should be able to find a single-family home they can afford to buy, according to an analysis of April data by the National Association of Realtors.

Before the pandemic, there were 20 states that were considered affordable as a whole under the group’s definition, including the presidential election swing states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. As of this year, there is none. Even the states with the closest match between income and home prices — Iowa, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Michigan — didn’t make the cut.

Since the pandemic, two states, Montana and Idaho, have surpassed California as the most unaffordable states for local homebuyers, according to the analysis. Hawaii and Oregon round out the list of the five least affordable states.

The Realtors’ analysis assigns affordability scores to states and large metro areas on a scale of 0 to 2. A score of 0 means that no household can afford any home on the market.

A score of 1 means that homes on the market are affordable to households in proportion to their position on the income ladder — in other words, 100% of families can afford at least some homes on the market. And a score of 2 would mean that all households can afford all homes on the market, but no state or metropolitan area even reached a 1.

The least affordable metro area was Los Angeles, which scored only 0.3, while the metro areas of Youngstown (0.97) and Akron (0.95) in Ohio were rated most affordable.

According to the latest estimates from July by real estate company Redfin, median single-family home sale prices were $175,000 in Youngstown and $239,500 in Akron. That compared with $487,000 in Las Vegas, $490,000 in Boise and $1 million in the Los Angeles area.

The Las Vegas area, where the Reese family had lived for 18 years, had a score of 0.5 on the Realtors’ scale. No state earned an overall score of 1, though Iowa, West Virginia and Ohio came close, at nearly 0.9. The least affordable states, Montana, Idaho, California, Hawaii and Oregon, all had scores around 0.4.

Nationwide, home affordability has evaporated over the past three years as interest rates have gone up, according to a monitoring index maintained by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. It measures affordability more simply than the Realtors’ analysis, focusing solely on the ability of a homebuyer with the median household income to buy the median-priced house.

By that measure, the national affordability percentage was above 100% between January 2019 and April 2021. But it fell as low as 67% last year and remained below 70% in June, meaning a homebuyer with the median income had only two-thirds of the earnings needed to buy the median-priced house.

Home prices have increased by 47% nationwide just since 2020, according to a June report by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. A major factor is that there aren’t many homes for sale: Many current homeowners are reluctant to sell because they’re locked into historically low interest rates. Meanwhile, investors have gobbled up single-family starter homes, reducing the supply.

Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, said there are signs of more houses coming up for sale. For example, there was a 20% increase in houses and condos for sale in July compared with July 2023, according to the association.

“We are still short on inventory, but I think the worst is over,” Yun said. “We have seen mortgage rates begin to decline, so it’s less of a big financial penalty to move and give up a low interest rate. And the second factor is just the passage of time — life-changing events always occur, a death, a divorce, a new child or just job relocation, and that means changing residence.”

Along with high prices and interest rates, home buyers are getting slammed by higher property taxes and insurance costs, according to the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Home prices in northeast Ohio might be lower because the area has a stable population, curbing competition and bidding wars, said Alison Goebel, executive director of the Greater Ohio Policy Center, a Columbus nonprofit aimed at revitalizing Ohio cities.

“Our population numbers have remained fairly steady in the last several decades, so we don’t have egregious demand and supply issues like you see on the West Coast and other rapidly growing areas,” Goebel said.

Montana and Idaho are the least affordable states: Housing prices are exploding in both, as deep-pocketed newcomers — many of them white-collar employees working in high-wage jobs based out of state — have driven up prices beyond what longtime residents can afford.

The city of Boise scored 0.4 on the Realtors’ affordability scale, on par with the New York City area. Like Montana, Idaho has natural beauty that is attracting people who are cashing out of more expensive areas, said Nicki Hellenkamp, Boise’s director of housing and homelessness policy.

“It’s one of the Zoom boom towns, where it’s beautiful but the wages are low, and the cost of living is low. If you sell your house in Los Angeles and buy two houses here, as my uncle did, then you can have a very different standard of living,” Hellenkamp said.

It’s not just home prices — rents are up 40% in Boise since the pandemic began, she added.

“Obviously wages didn’t go up 40%, so some people have been displaced,” Hellenkamp said.

The city is working on modest proposals to help with down payments and to create more affordable apartments, she said, but building more affordable housing will mean state and federal cooperation to help solve labor shortages and soaring material costs.

“We can’t do this alone as a city. This issue is a big one,” Hellenkamp said.

A state housing task force in Montana made recommendations in June to streamline construction of houses and apartments statewide and create incentives for cities to loosen zoning and allow denser housing.

A member of the task force, Kendall Cotton, said he personally found it impossible to buy a house in Montana, but was happy to recently purchase half a duplex for his growing family.

“We were thrilled to have that as an option, just to get our foot in the door and start on our journey to homeownership,” Cotton said. “Montana is an in-demand place. We’ve been kind of discovered in the last couple of years.”

Republicans and Democrats have come together to support fighting restrictive zoning, said Cotton, director of the Frontier Institute, a nonprofit policy and educational organization.

“We’re a free-market organization that tends to lead from right of center, but when I was at the governor’s press conference to support these issues, I was standing shoulder to shoulder with a Democratic socialist city council member and we were all united on this,” Cotton said.

Shallon Lester, a YouTube influencer who moved from New York to Montana and paid $1 million for a five-bedroom house in Bozeman in 2022, said she likes both the lower cost of living and the lifestyle there. Locals tend to think she’s an outsider “invading” the area, she said, but “people like me take nothing from this economy — we only give. We spend and spend.”

“People who are remote workers are sick of the cost of living in cities,” Lester added. “There’s a mass return to the concept of the simple life.”

Even in the Youngstown metro area, which includes a slice of Pennsylvania, housing can be a challenge for residents with low incomes. A forthcoming regional housing study has found a 4,000-unit shortage for households making less than $25,000 a year; 7,500 people are on a waiting list for subsidized housing. Black and Hispanic residents are more likely to struggle with housing costs, as are older people, young singles and families with young children, according to preliminary conclusions discussed in April.

But for many, Youngstown is a rare island of affordability. Jim Johnston, 40, a digital account executive at media company Nexstar in Youngstown, said many of his high school classmates from the area, who now live in places such as Montana, Illinois and Maryland, envy his decision to stay there and buy a $250,000 house in 2022 when interest rates were lower.

“One of them has a mortgage payment three times mine for the same size house, and a child care bill that’s bigger than my mortgage,” said Johnston. “They could put an extra $50,000 or $60,000 a year in their pockets. Remote work has opened up new possibilities for them, and they’re considering this very seriously.”

City Council unanimously voted Tuesday night to allow what’s called accessory dwelling units within all zoning districts in which single-family dwellings are permitted. It’s designed to provide more affordable housing options and increase the city’s housing stock.

Accessory dwelling units are small, with their own living, bathroom and kitchen spaces. They can include carriage houses or garages turned into apartments for rental or used as an in-law suite.

Mayor Phillip Jones said that Newport News is “essentially built out” and that the council sought options that “encourage pro-housing growth in the city.”

“These are pro-growth policies, and we here at Newport News are looking at innovative ways to ensure that housing is a priority for everyone,” he said.

The council’s vote included regulations to ensure that the overall character of neighborhoods wouldn’t drastically change, including size and height limitations and ensuring that the units have a similar architectural style as the primary structure. Furthermore, the property owner will be required to occupy either the principal dwelling or the accessory dwelling as their primary residence.

Newport News residents won’t be allowed to use accessory dwelling units for short-term rentals, such as Airbnb. And if an accessory dwelling is leased, the lease term is not permitted to be less than 30 consecutive days.

Councilwoman Tina Vick said “there’s a housing crisis and housing issues throughout America” and that she was glad to be part of a city that has “some solutions.”

The General Assembly earlier this year considered legislation, Senate Bill 304, requiring localities to allow accessory dwelling units in single-family residential zoning districts without needing a special use permit, but the House’s Counties, Cities and Towns Committee ultimately decided to continue the legislation to 2025.

The North Virginia Beach Civic League and Virginia Beach’s zoning officials opposed the legislation, believing it took authority away from the local government to determine where accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, could be permitted by right.

However, Grayson Orsini,  a lead with YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) Hampton Roads, said his group supports efforts to increase the supply of affordable housing in Hampton Roads — including allowing accessory dwelling units.

“We are big fans of it because it enables a neighborhood to kind of keep its character, while also allowing more people to move in,” he said. “So one of the big arguments here from NIMBYs, people that are saying, ‘not in my backyard’ is, ‘oh well, this new housing is going to ruin neighborhood character.’ Enabling ADUs helps prevent that. Because what you’re having is another structure that is adjacent to the house, or accessory to the house. But that house still stands.”

Orsini said that by increasing the housing supply, the cost of housing should go down. He added that accessory dwelling units also allow the people of a neighborhood “to remain in the neighborhood.”

“We’ve been approached time and time again by people who say, ‘Oh I have an elderly parent, grandparent. I even have a kid that might need a little bit more supervision but still kind of wants that independence from the parents — and ADUs are the housing solution for us,” he said.

The ordinances passed Tuesday night will go into effect on Oct. 1.

Josh Janney, joshua.janney@virginiamedia.com

The latest executive director of the Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority was also drawn to the organization’s sizable portfolio that touches more than 9,000 households, the opportunities to partner with a wealth of industries and the chance to make a difference in people’s lives.

Founded in 1940, NRHA’s work focuses on providing safe and affordable housing for low-income families within the city. It manages public housing developments, plans large-scale residential redevelopment projects and offers support programs.

Modernization and upgrade efforts continue in Diggs Town, Oakleaf Forest and Young Terrace, Simms said. The final phase in the transformation in the St. Paul’s community should be completed toward the end of 2027, he said.

Simms came on board with the authority nine months ago, but his enthusiasm and commitment are already apparent. He said he started three weeks early so he could meet with and listen to various stakeholders, authority board members and team members, residents, resident leaders, City Council and Mayor Kenny Alexander.

“I wanted to see what their expectations were, what worked and what didn’t work, in their viewpoint, in terms of working with NRHA,” Simms said. “I got a lot of feedback and insight into what people wanted to see — and it aligned with what I saw as well.”

One commonality was that everyone wanted a more responsive housing authority when it came to understanding the need for expanded affordable housing opportunities in Norfolk.

Acknowledging that everyone defines affordability differently, and in traditional and non-traditional ways, Simms said his work includes addressing the city’s aging portfolio and maintaining strong relationships, mending others and forging new ones.

He said the authority wants to lay out its vision for the renovation and redevelopment of communities, strategies surrounding that vision and engaging residents.

“We want to make sure that we have the type of housing that people can grow in, but also age in as well,” he said.

Residents seek better communication, transparency, responsiveness and, ultimately, the ability to be seen and heard, Simms said. Since he has taken on his role, Simms has listened to residents voice their concerns about transportation needs, access to fresh and healthy food and recreational activities.

“They’re not necessarily housing-related, but they impact their day-to-day lives,” he said.

For example, Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority recently enlisted a shuttle service twice a week to four Norfolk communities to help residents with trips to the grocery store.

Another focus of Simms’ work is to help move residents forward in their economic mobility via the wealth of vocational and educational training and workforce opportunities in Hampton Roads.

“We serve a lot of people — from seniors to adults, young adults to children,” Simms said. “We want to make sure we are providing the services that help strengthen the household and help them move to a level of self-sufficiency.”

Ultimately, Simms said, the agency wants to help the people it serves achieve their dreams.

“I want people to have faith in the organization that deal with us every day,” Simms said. “We have a lot of work to do, but I think in a good way.”

Sandra J. Pennecke, 757-652-5836, sandra.pennecke@pilotonline.com

SAVANNAH, Ga. — Blocks from where tourists stroll along the cobblestoned riverfront in this racially divided city, Detraya Gilliard made her way down the dark, ruptured sidewalks of Yamacraw Village, looking for her missing 15-year-old daughter.

Like most other people living in one of the nation’s oldest public housing projects, Gilliard endured the boarded-up buildings and mold-filled apartments because it was the only place she could afford.

Without working streetlights in parts of Yamacraw, Gilliard relied on the crescent moon’s glow to search for her daughter Desaray in May 2022. She passed yards dotted with clotheslines and power lines, and a broken-down playground littered with juice boxes and red Solo cups.

“I happened to look down, and I knew it was her by her feet, by the shoes she had on,” Gilliard said. She was “barely hanging on and she was covered in blood.”

The year before Desaray died, President Joe Biden called for the federal government to spend tens of billions of dollars to fix dilapidated public housing that he said posed “critical life-safety concerns.” The repairs, Biden said, would mostly help people of color, single mothers like Gilliard who work in low-income jobs, and people with disabilities.

The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development estimates that $115 billion is needed to fund a backlog of public housing repairs. But, two years ago, money to fund those repairs became a casualty of negotiations between the Biden administration and congressional lawmakers over the Inflation Reduction Act. Republicans also have blocked efforts to lift 25-year-old legislation that effectively prohibits the construction of additional public housing, despite the catastrophic public health consequences.

Tenants living in derelict housing face conditions that contribute to higher rates of heart disease, diabetes, asthma, violence, and other life-threatening risks.

The federal government has a long history of discriminatory practices in public housing. In cities across the country after World War II, Black families were barred from many public housing complexes even as the government induced white people to leave them by offering single-family homes in the suburbs subsidized by the Federal Housing Administration. Starting with the Nixon administration, lawmakers slowed investing in new public housing as more Black families and other people of color became tenants.

Today “residents are facing really terrible choices, or terrible options about their future,” said Sarah Saadian, senior vice president of policy for the National Low Income Housing Coalition. “We got here from Congress really failing to live up to its responsibilities of ensuring that people have access to an affordable, stable home.”

In 2022, an art deco luxury apartment building opened down the street. But little has changed in Yamacraw, which is filled with Black families.

Current and former tenants say the Housing Authority of Savannah, the agency that oversees Yamacraw, has ignored the mold, rats, and roaches that infest the units and sicken residents, and the bullet holes in windows and gunshots that ring through the night. Now they fear the city is using the poor state of Yamacraw as justification to push residents out.

In April, an inspection of Yamacraw apartments conducted by HUD, which oversees taxpayer-supported public housing nationwide, found 29 “life-threatening” deficiencies that pose a high risk of death to residents, according to a preliminary report.

The inspection cited 28 deficiencies it called “severe,” meaning they present a high risk of permanent disability, serious injury, or illness. An additional 195 deficiencies were cited as “moderate” because they could cause temporary harm or prompt a visit to a doctor.

Research links structural racism and disinvestment to chronic gun violence, which has taken a heavy toll on Black neighborhoods and kids such as Desaray. A study of gun injuries in four large cities at the height of the covid-19 pandemic found that Black children were 100 times as likely as white youths to suffer a firearm assault.

Study co-author Jonathan Jay, an assistant professor of community health sciences at Boston University, said most of the country’s gun violence stems from disputes in neighborhoods that lack investment in housing and other public services

“This is about white privilege,” Jay said. “The result is driven by racist policymaking.”

Desaray Gilliard was a high school freshman when she was killed. She loved clothes, music, dancing, and the color pink, her mother said. She planned to go to Italy with her art class. She was excited about learning to drive and getting a job. Desaray had her sights set on attending Ohio State University.

They’d lived in Yamacraw for seven years. The teen’s shooting death remains unsolved.

Gilliard has struggled with thoughts of self-harm, she said. She maintains a memorial with pictures, stuffed animals, and flowers near the spot where she found Desaray’s body.

“I have to remember this is for her,” she said of her middle child’s death, “because nobody else is doing these things for her to keep her memory alive.”

A Broken Promise?

Federally funded public housing must be kept in “decent, safe and sanitary” condition, according to HUD. In 2013, the agency’s then secretary, Shaun Donovan, visited Savannah to announce a program that could give the local housing authority millions of dollars to rehab four public housing complexes, including Yamacraw, which has been among the lowest-rated public housing complexes in Georgia.

The Rental Assistance Demonstration program touted by Donovan did not provide new public money. Instead, it loosened rules to allow local officials to work with private lenders and developers to pay for repairs, transforming public housing complexes into mixed-income developments with Section 8 project-based rental assistance.

Last year, a consultants’ report found a host of problems in Yamacraw, including water leaks and faulty wiring. “The Remaining Useful Life of the Property is estimated to be 0 years,” the consultants wrote. The housing authority wants to demolish Yamacraw and replace it with homes that are “healthier, more energy efficient and accessible,” the report said.

Yamacraw never saw the windfall Donovan promised, current and former tenants said. Even with a housing assistance waitlist of more than 3,000 families in Savannah, records show most of the 315 apartments in Yamacraw sit empty, many with boarded-up doors and windows. Some other public housing developments in the area have been repaired or rebuilt, but except for new roofing added in 2019, Yamacraw has not had a significant renovation in years, according to the consultants’ report.

Rather than repair the units, local officials started a process to tear down the complex, threatening to displace residents who have nowhere else to go in a city where the average two-bedroom apartment rents for more than $1,600 monthly.

Congress has provided less money than was needed over the past 20 years to fix Yamacraw and other public housing complexes nationwide, leaving local agencies in a tough spot, said Earline Davis, executive director of the Housing Authority of Savannah.

The housing authority still plans to demolish Yamacraw and redevelop the property with new affordable housing, she said. Residents fear that they will be pushed out, and that because of its prime location, the redevelopment plans would prioritize apartments that attract people who can afford higher rents.

“Anytime you want to do something to make money — go destroy the historic Black community,” said Georgia Benton, who grew up in Yamacraw. “But ain’t nobody hollerin’ ‘Stop.’”

She and her son LaRay Benton have been fighting the housing authority’s redevelopment plans, which they say could also disrupt the two-century-old First Bryan Baptist Church. Rev. Andrew Bryan, a former enslaved person and ordained minister, founded the church in 1788. He later bought his freedom.

The Bentons and three City Council members went door to door observing the condition of residents’ units. They said plumbing issues caused sewage overflows and leaky faucets, mold tracked across the ceilings, and there were insect and rodent infestations.

Many families said they developed respiratory problems, such as bronchitis and asthma, after they moved in. “It is an unhealthy situation,” LaRay Benton said.

About seven years ago, after his previous Savannah landlord raised the rent, Paris Snead, his wife, and two children found themselves homeless. A nonprofit helped them get into Yamacraw, where rent was $750 a month.

It’s been years since they left. Snead said he still takes a daily allergy pill because he believes he was exposed to mold in his unit, which caused allergy-like symptoms.

“The walls sweat like working men,” Snead said of his former apartment. “The walls will, literally, from the top to the bottom, leak water.”

“When you’re homeless, and you want to be able to have a place for your kids, I mean, you’ll make a home wherever you can,” he said.

Snead said he showed Yamacraw’s management the leaking walls, but they didn’t act.

“The management team there did more to evict people and cause problems than they did to help families and ensure they had a place to stay,” Snead said.

HUD, which conducts periodic inspections at public housing complexes, declined an interview request. The agency referred questions to the Housing Authority of Savannah.

The housing authority’s redevelopment plans have been delayed by HUD’s lengthy approval process, said Savannah Mayor Van R. Johnson II, who appoints people to a five-member board of commissioners that helps oversee the city’s public housing.

He said he met with HUD acting Secretary Adrianne Todman and other HUD officials about housing issues in Savannah.

“People don’t deserve to live like that,” Johnson said.

If Yamacraw is demolished and rebuilt, he said, current tenants will have a chance to return because the homes will be affordable to people with low incomes.

Nobody else is doing these things for her to keep her memory alive.

‘The Worst Experience of My Life’

Yamacraw’s struggles are rooted in century-old policies that have made it difficult for many Black neighborhoods to thrive.

In the 1930s, the federal government’s Home Owners’ Loan Corp. made color-coded maps for Savannah and 238 other cities and labeled redlined areas — usually places where Black people, Jews, immigrants, and Catholics lived — as undesirable for investment.

“The houses are occupied by the lowest class negro tenants,” a government surveyor wrote.

Yamacraw was opened in 1941 as segregated public housing for Black people. Today a health clinic occupies the original administrative building, designed to look like a plantation house.

Despite its problems, Johnson said, some of the city’s most prominent doctors, lawyers, and ministers grew up in Yamacraw.

Former and current tenants said the apartments slowly descended into disrepair.

Each year more than 10,000 public housing apartments across the U.S. become uninhabitable.

Some lawmakers have used the poor state of public housing as justification to refuse lifting a moratorium passed during the Clinton administration that prohibits the construction of additional units, even as the nation’s rental prices — and evictions — soar.

The argument that public housing “doesn’t work” is disingenuous, said Saadian, with the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

“The federal government really failed to invest in public housing, to keep it in good condition, and to keep those communities thriving,” Saadian said, “and in many cases, actively contributed to those communities declining.”

Instead of repairing public housing and building more high-quality units, federal lawmakers promised to provide housing vouchers, commonly known as Section 8, which helps people with low incomes rent privately owned homes. But most people who qualify for vouchers never receive them. Those who do often struggle to find landlords who will accept them, rendering them sometimes worthless.

Three years ago, LaTonya Atterbury was living in hotels north of Atlanta when she was offered a unit in Yamacraw for $511 a month. In August 2021, she moved in with her niece, now 29, and her niece’s son, now 8, relieved to have more stable housing.

But within the first week, she said, a neighbor’s son broke her window and the housing authority charged her $60 to fix it. She said her bathroom is covered in mold and mildew. One day, months after she moved in, Atterbury noticed a hole in her second-story window and saw a bullet on the floor, and realized there had been a shooting overnight. No one was injured, she said, but the bullet hole was only recently fixed — about 2½ years after the incident.

“It’s been the worst experience of my life,” Atterbury said. “Sitting here will make you very depressed.”

Atterbury said she and other residents remain in Yamacraw at least in part because the housing authority has promised vouchers to move elsewhere. Three years later, she is still waiting.

Demolishing and rebuilding Yamacraw could take years.

Davis, the housing authority’s executive director, said her agency has repeatedly told tenants they would be relocated to other public housing complexes or given a Section 8 voucher during construction if they have no lease violations. But residents say they routinely receive lease violations for harmless acts such as broken blinds. LaRay Benton said one resident was cited and fined $75 for leaving a stroller on her front porch while she took her baby inside.

A Mother’s Search

Researchers said that the presence of abandoned buildings can contribute to violent crime by making people feel unsafe and creating a sense of disorder. Studies suggest that razing abandoned buildings and improving green space can reduce it.

“No gun policy is going to work if we don’t fix social infrastructure,” said Jonathan Metzl, director of the Department of Medicine, Health, and Society at Vanderbilt University. “We need investments to make sure communities feel safe. This is not just a public health problem. This is a race problem. This is a democracy problem.”

In recent years, shooting victims or their relatives, including Desaray’s mother, have filed at least three lawsuits against the Housing Authority of Savannah. Those ongoing lawsuits allege the agency failed to take added security measures in its public housing complexes — some of which had fallen into disrepair — despite gun violence and other crimes.

“I don’t know how we can prevent shootings,” Davis said.

Davis declined to comment on the lawsuits. She would say only that her agency has installed cameras in Yamacraw, worked with police, and asked residents to report crime. The actions came after Desaray’s death.

Johnson, Savannah’s mayor, said police have investigated the Desaray Gilliard case, but there are people “who know what happened” and will not talk to officers.

Around 9 p.m. on a Friday night two years ago, Gilliard went looking for her daughter for the second time that night. Desaray missed an 8 p.m. curfew and wasn’t answering her phone.

Gilliard waited for about 30 minutes at a bench near a park in the middle of the complex, hoping Desaray would find her. Then she started to retrace her steps.

Gilliard called 911 after she saw her daughter’s body.

When the police arrived, they made their way through the darkened complex with flashlights, Gilliard said. An officer pulled up Desaray’s shirt and saw a bullet hole in her chest. Gilliard said she later learned from a funeral director that her daughter had been shot three times. She has yet to receive an autopsy report from the police.

Gilliard said “nothing has changed before, since, or after” her daughter’s death.

“It’s been very difficult,” she said. “Sometimes I wanted to give up. I even thought about committing suicide.”

About a month after Desaray died, Gilliard said someone tried to break into her apartment. A couple of weeks later, her request to move to a new complex was finally granted and Gilliard left Yamacraw.

(KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs of KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling and journalism.)

©2024 KFF Health News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

One woman has sent more than 400 emails to insurance adjusters. Another is starting from scratch with her 15th insurance adjuster.

And one homeowner remains astonished by the lowball figure his insurance company quoted to rebuild his $1.2 million house.

Almost 16 months after the EF-3 tornado — with winds up to 150 mph that decimated homes, demolished vehicles and downed mature trees in the Great Neck area — frustrated homeowners attended a town hall meeting organized by state Sen. Bill DeSteph.

“It’s time to get the commissioner involved, make a difference and change some things,” said DeSteph, a Virginia Beach Republican.

Scott White, the commissioner of Virginia State Corporation Commission’s Bureau of Insurance, accompanied DeSteph on a tour of the affected areas before the two-hour meeting.

“It was really painful to see — you could just tell the lives that had lived in that house that were no longer there,” White said of one particular home still in disrepair. “To me, that’s a real stark symbol of what shouldn’t happen. I don’t know the circumstances, but certainly something went wrong there.”

White and several of his team members listened intently as neighbors respectfully passed the microphone and shared details of their challenges since the storm.

“We have our ear to the ground and know the problems that are going on,” White said. The bureau has a number of tools to investigate and mediate consumers’ complaints and ensure insurance companies are complying with Virginia’s laws and regulations.

Dr. Kent Reifschneider joined mother-in-law Linda Carnazza at the meeting. She resides on Haversham Close in the Broad Bay Point Greens subdivision, but spent several months in a rental property while her house underwent repairs. She had to move back into her home due to insurance coverage, but continues to deal with issues.

“The true disaster was after the tornado hit,” Reifschneider said.

Educated by the aftermath of the disaster, Reifschneider was quick to suggest ideas to help others who may face similar experiences.

“We just pay our bill every month and think that we’re taken care of until we find out you’re not,” he said.

From price gouging on tree removal to underinsured policies to cancellations, victims of the tornado have been through it all.

Dusty Gray said it’s been an incredibly long process — one that included his first builder removing a structural support — but is thankful he received advice to have a public adjuster assist him.

Caroline Rawls awaits the final appraisal on her home that had more than 20 trees fall on it. Rawls has had the same insurance company for more than four decades.

“I feel like we’ve been the victim in this whole process,” she said. “It’s a natural disaster yet it’s up to us to provide the documentation. Is this how you treat somebody who has been a 43-year member?”

Ginny Sutton’s house was lifted off of its foundation and deemed a total loss. Along with her home of three years, Sutton lost two cars and three trees.

“This should wake everybody up,” Sutton said. “Check your homeowner’s insurance policy every year.”

Sandra J. Pennecke, 757-652-5836, sandra.pennecke@pilotonline.com

When pandemic-era tenant protections expired, rents immediately soared, and eviction filings surged last year more than 50% over pre-pandemic levels in some U.S. cities.

These filings can cast long shadows. Simply being named in an eviction complaint, regardless of the outcome, can severely limit future housing options and prolong housing insecurity, according to a recent University of Michigan study.

The situation underscores a growing debate across the country: Should eviction records be shielded from public access to offer tenants a cleaner shot at finding another home?

In recent years, more states are saying, “yes — at least in some cases.”

Eviction filings are public court records. Landlords and property owners can buy databases of the records to screen potential tenants.

Property owners argue that sealing data on eviction filings — most of which are for nonpayment of rent — eliminates crucial insights into rental history. Housing advocates, however, warn that any filing can unfairly block renters from future housing because the outcome may not be an eviction.

An eviction filing doesn’t provide enough information to determine a tenant’s ability to honor their next lease, said Katie Fallon, a principal policy associate with the Urban Institute, a research and advocacy think tank focusing on urban policies.

“Given the low quality of this eviction filing data and the lack of outcomes in the filings themselves, it is a very open question of how accurate these filings are and what information they really provide to landlords,” she said.

This year, Idaho, Maryland and Massachusetts enacted laws to seal certain eviction records from public scrutiny and from tenant screening companies.

Last year, Connecticut and Rhode Island also enacted laws that allow for the sealing of certain eviction cases. Arizona, meanwhile, enacted a law in 2022 requiring courts to seal eviction records if cases are dismissed, dropped or adjudicated in the tenant’s favor.

In total, 17 states and Washington, D.C., have measures sealing at least some eviction records, according to PolicyLink, a national research and advocacy group with a focus on housing.

Zafar Shah, assistant director of advocacy for Maryland Legal Aid, said lawmakers are starting to understand how eviction records can prevent tenants from finding another home.

“We have clients that know they will lose their eviction case, but they want us to shield the information so that the next potential housing provider is not going to use it against them,” said Shah.

“That has really been the impetus for shielding and sealing across the country. These filings don’t tell us a lot, but they carry so much weight in the search for housing.”

An eviction filing could be resolved in a number of ways: A case might be dismissed if the landlord and tenant reach an agreement. The judge might rule in favor of the tenant, allowing them to stay in their home. Or the judge could side with the landlord, evicting the tenant.

Regardless of the outcome, the records live on in online court databases.

Third-party tenant screening companies scan court records for eviction cases, then sell the data to landlords to use in their leasing decisions.

Housing advocates say the data is often inaccurate and misleading. In one state — Illinois — less than half of eviction filings led to actual evictions, according to a 2019 review by Housing Action Illinois, an advocacy group.

Alexandra Alvarado, director of education and marketing at the American Apartment Owners Association, a tenant screening provider, told Stateline that the group’s database only displays eviction records with a completed judgment that were filed within the past seven years, which is the time limit set by the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act.

“It can be a monetary or non-monetary judgment, but there must be a judgment. So, if an eviction case is filed, but the parties settled outside of court or the tenant won, then it wouldn’t show up in our reports, even though technically it is public record,” Alvarado said. “Our members are getting evictions that have merit and weren’t erroneously filed.”

A scarlet ‘E’

According to researchers at the Eviction Lab at Princeton University, of the 3.6 million eviction court records in the 12 states they tracked from 2011 to 2015, more than 1 in 5 eviction cases contained little information on the resolution of a case. Ambiguous data can also falsely represent a tenant’s eviction history, affecting both renters and scholarly researchers, according to a 2020 study by the group.

“While many people think an eviction filing is evidence of late rent payment, nonpayment of rent or a violation of the lease terms, this is not necessarily true,” said Fallon, of the Urban Institute. “Filings can include inaccurate data, such as the parties named in the eviction filing and inaccurate name spellings.”

Alvarado, of the American Apartment Owners Association, said landlords have mixed views about laws that allow courts to seal cases that have been dismissed or ruled in a tenant’s favor. What’s more important to landlords, she said, is that their screening process can look back the full seven years for problem evictions.

Laws that limit the lookback period — such as in Oregon, where tenants can request an expungement after five years — affect the tenant screening process more, she said.

The system is problematic, Eviction Lab found in a 2020 study of eviction cases filed between 2012 and 2016 in 39 states. In addition to inaccurate information, Black households are overrepresented in eviction filings, Eviction Lab found, as are women — especially Black and Latina women.

“When landlords say they need to use eviction filings, which we know aren’t the most reliable information, to make housing decisions, we need to push back on that,” said Jasmine Rangel, senior housing associate for PolicyLink.

She and other advocates want eviction court records to be sealed as soon as a landlord files an eviction notice. Otherwise, she said, “third-party services can still scrape that eviction record from online databases and into their tenant screening algorithms.”

Advocates point out that eviction records could be made public later if a judge rules in the landlord’s favor.

But Shuntera Brown, who lost her home in Phoenix in 2021, said in an interview that any eviction record hurts single moms like herself.

Brown, who has three children, has struggled to pay rent even with a full-time job. In December 2020, a bout of COVID-19 caused her to miss work shifts, a paycheck disruption that eventually put her over the edge months later.

“It’s a Scarlet ‘E.’ You have this record, you have this thing on your file of an eviction, but there’s no understanding of the context or circumstances behind it,” Brown said. “I remember pleading with the judge that I’ve usually paid on time and that my kids need a home, but he sided with the landlord in, like, seven minutes, and the eviction immediately was on my credit.”

Sealing the records

State by state, the laws differ on the details: Many states allow for eviction records to be sealed almost immediately if the case was dismissed or dropped, or if the tenant won the case. Other states have a waiting period, often several years, during which the tenant must demonstrate good behavior before a record is sealed.

Under Maryland’s new law, which takes effect in October, courts must shield records within 60 days of a resolution that doesn’t end in a tenant losing possession of their home. The state also will increase the eviction filing fee from $8 to $43.

Maryland landlords filed roughly 400,000 “failure to pay rent” cases in the state’s 2023 fiscal year, according to housing advocates who testified in favor of the new law. In some cases, landlords would file monthly failure to pay rent cases against tenants prematurely and tack on illegal fees on top of the back rent, according to a report from the Maryland-based advocacy group Public Justice Center.

“The low cost and low barrier to entry have driven the massive quantity of filings, with many cases simply being leveraged to get rent money out of tenants quickly,” said Shah, of Maryland Legal Aid. “I think that the court overall has become more receptive to shielding these cases, recognizing that if a case was dismissed or settled, there’s no reason to hold it against the renter.

“This attitude has shifted significantly over the past decade,” he said.

In California and Colorado, as in Maryland, an eviction lawsuit can be automatically sealed as soon as it’s been filed unless the landlord wins the case within 60 days. Indiana and Minnesota require a tenant to formally petition for sealing once a court reaches judgment.

Idaho’s new law shields dismissed eviction cases after three years. And in Massachusetts, tenants can request their case be sealed for a variety of reasons, no matter the outcome, after a period of time ranging from a few months to several years.

In Rhode Island, a tenant can only make a request once every five years.

Researchers at Eviction Lab told Stateline that state laws should still allow data access for scientists. The 2022 eviction-sealing law in Washington, D.C., for example, specifies that records can be unsealed for scholarly, educational, journalistic or governmental purposes.

“There is an important public right to know what is going on in the housing market, and this is one of our data points into the eviction crisis,” said Carl Gershenson, lab director at Eviction Lab. “There is a balance that can be achieved that is in the best interest of tenants and how these filings can be used as datapoints to understand the housing crisis.”

©2024 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

No state illustrates this year’s flurry of ballot measures to cut property taxes better than Colorado. There, the results of two likely voter questions could reduce funding for schools, roads, emergency responders and other local government services.

Colorado’s ballot measures are just two of nearly a dozen upcoming questions dealing with property taxes in states across the country, including in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, New Mexico, North Dakota, Virginia and Wyoming. While varying in scope, the measures all aim to reduce taxes for some or all property owners.

One Colorado question is already certified for the ballot, and another appears to have many more signatures than necessary to qualify. (A third Colorado property tax ballot question, which is less controversial than the others and has qualified for the ballot, would expand the amount of tax exclusion that can be claimed by disabled veterans.)

“Property taxes are a deeply unpopular, but a fairly efficient, tax,” said Jared Walczak, vice president of state projects at the Tax Foundation, a conservative tax analysis group that advocates for lower, more broadly based taxes. “So they have always pitted economists and policy wonks against ordinary homeowners who get very frustrated with their property taxes.”

Property taxes are generally assessed at the local level, and the money raised helps pay for schools, public safety, fire response and roads. The ballot measures being considered across the country could have significant effects on the money raised by those taxes — which could mean cuts in services or pressure on state lawmakers to make up the difference.

Local governments periodically assess the value of property and then set tax rates based on those assessments. Nationwide, home market values have increased about 50% since August 2019, according to Zillow, the real estate data company.

“(Many homeowners) are paying dramatically more for the same property, and they don’t feel they are getting better government,” Walczak said. “That’s driving the discontent that is showing up in ballot measures and pressure on state lawmakers to provide relief.”

Experts say that because property taxes often are paid in a large lump a couple or so times a year — as opposed to income taxes or sales taxes, which are paid in dribbles — they tend to leave a bigger impression on taxpayers.

In Colorado, one ballot initiative would cap annual state property tax revenue growth from residential and commercial properties at 4%.

Another, which also is expected to qualify for November’s ballot, would cut residential and commercial property tax assessment rates. Since that reduction would bring in fewer dollars, that initiative, if passed, would require the state to reimburse local governments for the revenue losses — an expected $3 billion.

In May, the Colorado Legislature passed a bill to lower property assessment rates, in a hard-fought $1.3 billion compromise. The new law includes short-term assessment rate cuts and long-term structural changes to the property tax code, and it prioritizes school funding over other government services. The law also caps revenue growth from property taxes at 5.5%.

But conservative groups wanted more, and they worked to get stricter property tax limits onto November’s ballot.

“The bill that passed was a good start,” said Sean Duffy, spokesperson for Advance Colorado, a conservative advocacy group and main proponent of the initiatives.

“But many Republicans and many taxpayers and people around the state were thinking it would be really important to do a more significant and permanent cut,” Duffy said.

The other organization backing the referendums is Colorado Concern, a conservative group begun by Larry Mizel, who founded one of the nation’s largest homebuilding companies and has been a key fundraiser for former President Donald Trump.

Duffy said voters still have concerns about property taxes despite the Legislature’s action.

“Home values in Colorado have gone up like a hockey stick,” Duffy said, a trend mirrored in many other states. “It’s not, ‘I don’t want to pay for my schools or fire department,’ it was just a huge bucket of water in the face.”

But Colorado Democratic state Rep. Chris deGruy Kennedy, who co-sponsored the bill that became law, said the ballot initiatives would go too far.

He said the proposed 4% increase cap on property tax revenue wouldn’t allow for inflation or regional variation — or new construction, which tends to reduce individual property within a jurisdiction.

DeGruy Kennedy, who is term-limited, this summer became president of the Bell Policy Center, a left-leaning research and advocacy nonprofit that backs upward mobility for middle- and lower-income individuals.

Florida, too, has a ballot measure that could save homeowners money while cutting local tax revenues. The initiative would allow an annual inflation adjustment to the homestead exemption for people whose properties are their primary residence. It’s backed by a group of Republican legislators but opposed by the state’s League of Cities.

In Arizona, a property tax ballot measure has more to do with the hot-button issues of homelessness and vagrancy, said Ryan Byrne, managing editor of the ballot measure project at Ballotpedia, a nonprofit that tracks every candidate and referendum across the country.

If approved, the measure would allow property owners to apply for a property tax refund if the municipality does not enforce laws against illegal camping, loitering, panhandling, public urination, public consumption of alcohol and possession of illegal substances. It was referred to the ballot by the Legislature on split votes, with Republicans in favor and Democrats opposed. The League of Cities also opposes this measure.

In North Dakota, former Republican state Rep. Rick Becker is leading a referendum drive to eliminate property taxes altogether.

“Do you really own your property if the government can take it away?” he said, referring to cases in which people who don’t pay their taxes might have their homes foreclosed upon.

“In North Dakota, not unlike many other states, people hate property taxes,” he said. He argued the Legislature has lots of other pots of money from which to replace the revenue.

A nonpartisan legislative research agency estimated that ditching the property tax in North Dakota would cost the state $1.3 billion per year.

Georgia’s ballot measure would allow localities to create a homestead exemption for homeowners whose property is their primary residence.

New Mexico’s and Virginia’s measures would extend more property tax breaks to veterans.

Wyoming’s ballot initiative would set up a new class of property for taxation, putting owner-occupied dwellings in a separate category from rental property.

Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a national nonprofit news organization focused on state policy.

©2024 States Newsroom. Visit at stateline.org. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

In June, the council revamped short-term rental rules by dividing the city into 51 zones and allowing only 1% of homes in each zone to operate as short-term rentals. On Wednesday, the council unanimously voted to create a new use called a “homestay rental” that only applies to residents who remain in their homes while renting a single room.

Homestay rentals are a separate category from short-term rentals and are not subject to the density and buffer requirements when a property owner rents out their entire home.

Council members had previously advocated for addressing homestay rentals separately from short-term rentals, saying they were too different to adhere to the same regulations.

Zoning Administrator Allison Jackura said homestays, which would be allowed in single-family dwellings, apply for guests living in a home for 30 days or less. Homestay rentals require a zoning administrator permit.

Homestay rental operators are required to live in the home as their primary residence and reside there during all guests’ stays. The operator is designated as a “responsible local person” and would be required to provide contact information for the city website in case of any issues, respond within one hour after being called by the city for any nuisance complaint and be on-site at all times between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. when overnight lodgers are present.

In addition, no events — including weddings, reunions or birthday parties — are allowed in homestay rentals.

The council also voted 6-1 to reduce the required buffer between short-term rentals. In June, the council approved a plan requiring that rentals be 500 feet apart unless they are side-by-side. On Wednesday, they reduced that requirement from 500 feet to 300 feet, with councilwoman Martha Mugler dissenting. She clarified after the meeting that she felt the previously approved 500-foot separation requirement was important to alleviate density.

“I still felt that the 500 feet was a better place to start,” she said.

Some residents who spoke Wednesday during a public hearing also voiced concerns about reducing the required separation between short-term rentals, saying increased density will harm the overall character of residential neighborhoods..

“A lot of times, there probably is a lot of lobbying done from a lot of people who are in the real estate business, but the people who are living here now have a right to have their property values maintained as well,” said Jill Rondeau.

Hampton’s various new short-term rental regulations, including the 51 zones, the 300-foot separation requirement and the creation of the homestay rental — all go into effect Sept. 1.

Josh Janney, joshua.janney@virginiamedia.com

Many homeowners have already jumped at the opportunity to lower their monthly payment, spurring a surge in mortgage refinancing applications.

And that was before the average rate on a 30-year mortgage fell this week to 6.47%, according to mortgage buyer Freddie Mac. As recently as May, the rate averaged 7.22%. It’s now at a 14-month low.

The rush to refinance makes sense, as even a slight drop in mortgage rates can translate into significant savings over the long run. For a home with the median U.S. listing price of $440,000, a buyer who makes a 20% down payment at today’s average mortgage rate would save over $300 a month compared to what it would have cost to buy the same home in October, when the average rate hit a 23-year high of 7.79%.

Still, there’s more to consider than the mortgage rate. It can cost thousands of dollars to refinance, and not all the fees can always be rolled into the new loan.

Breaking even on the costs of refinancing may take months or years, depending on the difference between your current rate and your new rate. So refinancing may not make sense if you’re planning to sell the home before that happens.

Here are some key factors to consider as you weigh whether now is the right time to refinance your home loan:

Are rates attractive enough to make refinancing worthwhile?

While mortgage rates have come down, the average rate on a 30-year home loan is still more than double what it was just three years ago.

Some 86% of all outstanding home mortgages have an interest rate below 6%, and more than three quarters have a rate 5% or lower, according to Realtor.com. If your mortgage rate falls within that range, you’ll want to make sure you can refinance to a significantly lower rate than you have now.

One rule of thumb to consider is whether you can reduce your rate by half to three-quarters of a percentage point, said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.

“That’s when it’s time to start thinking about it,” he said.

Someone with a 30-year mortgage at 7.5% or 8%, for example, should be looking for rates to be in the low 6% range.

Homeowners with an adjustable-rate mortgage, or ARM, that’s set to adjust to a higher rate may also want to consider refinancing while rates head lower.

How long will it take you to break even on the costs of refinancing?

The break-even period on a mortgage refinance will be shorter the more significant your savings are. For example, if you’re refinancing from a rate of 8% down to 6%, the break-even period is going to be far shorter than if you refinance from 6.75% down to 6.25%.

So, it’s important to factor in how long you plan to live in the home, to make sure you’re going to make up the cost of refinancing.

Consider the overall and upfront costs

Charges and fees can shortchange refinancers who are focused only on the potential savings. And just because you can typically roll over many or most of the costs into a new loan doesn’t mean that loan is free.

If you’re rolling over the costs into your new loan, you’re either taking on a larger balance or you’re paying a slightly higher rate to compensate for those costs.

And there may be fees that you have to pay at closing, including costs for an appraisal, title insurance, a survey fee or local taxes outside the lender’s control.

Should you wait for rates to ease further?

Mortgage rates are influenced by several factors, including how the bond market reacts to the Federal Reserve’s interest rate policy decisions. That can move the trajectory of the 10-year Treasury yield, which lenders use as a guide to pricing home loans.

The yield, which topped 4.7% in late April, slid briefly last week to around 3.7% as nervous investors sought out the safety of U.S. bonds following worse-than-expected labor market data. Yields fall as bond prices go up.

Beyond that, signs of waning inflation have raised expectations that the Fed will cut its benchmark interest rate next month for the first time in four years.

If bond yields continue to decline in anticipation of the Fed lowering rates this fall, that could lead mortgage rates to ease further, though most economists expect the average rate on a 30-year home loan to remain above 6% this year.

But an argument could be made that the bond market’s expectations of a Fed rate cut have already been priced in, which could mean rates don’t come down as much in coming months.

If you’re on the fence on whether to refinance now or hold out for lower rates, it’s good to at least get ready and speak with your lender or shop around, so that you can move quickly when you’re able to lock in an attractive rate.

“We are likely to see mortgage rates trend lower, but rates can move suddenly and it pays to jump on it when the opportunity arises,” McBride said.

On Tuesdays from June 11 until Aug. 20, the nonprofit Outreach Ministries OBX serves 75 to 90 students a free weekly dinner, donated by a local restaurant or church, in space provided by Dare County. The ministry organizes a group game and has a volunteer share their testimony.

David Daniels and wife Kay have led the ministry at various locations across the Outer Banks for about 20 years.

The students arriving represent a fraction of the likely over 1,000 participating in the U.S. Department of State’s “Summer Work Travel” on the Outer Banks.

In 2023, 1,152 students lived and worked on the Outer Banks with the temporary, nonimmigrant J-1 visas — nearly half the 2,381 student participants in North Carolina, according to the State Department’s J-1 visa website. Official numbers are not finalized until the following year, so it is unclear how many students are on the Outer Banks this summer.

The Virginian-Pilot conducted 23 interviews in June and July of students, employers and volunteers who work with the students, and found concerns surrounding transportation and housing.

On July 9, David Daniels used a van to transport some students to the dinner who live too far to bike, Kay said.

Bicycles are often the only transportation for local J-1 students, she said.

“It’s so unsafe, it scares me,” she said.

Hanson Lai, a student from Taiwan, said this is his second summer on the Outer Banks. Last year, he worked as a housekeeper for the Hilton Garden Inn Outer Banks/Kitty Hawk, and this summer he is a restaurant attendant at the Ramada Inn in Kill Devil Hills.

He wanted a more interactive job to practice his English, and his bike ride to work was also a factor. Last year’s ride took him 30 minutes; this year he has a 2-minute ride.

Jenny Fan, a Taiwanese student working at the Hilton this year, said her bike ride to work is 20-30 minutes; “it’s a little far.”

According to local J-1 students, employers and volunteers, students typically pay $100 to $150 a week — generally the higher end — for a single bed in a room shared by up to five students.

Up to 16 unrelated university students sometimes live in four-bedroom houses, according to several of them.

Hugo Mendoza, 27, of Peru, is studying at the College of the Albemarle on an F-1 visa. Last year, he came to the Outer Banks as a J-1 student and lived in housing secured by then-employer Captain George’s Seafood Restaurant.

“I used to live with three Dominican guys, one guy from Costa Rica,” he said of last summer’s room of five students.

While they were “so friendly, really good environment, the problem was we have different schedules, so that one work at 5 a.m.; another arrive at 2 a.m.”

The mix of cultures among the young adults can in some cases be challenging, according to some students.

“I like the host mom, but I think it’s too crowded,” Taiwanese student Pinky Li said of her living arrangements. Five students from three countries — Taiwan, Jamaica and Macedonia — share one room this summer, and “we only have one bathroom,” she said.

Li and Fan, both 19 and housekeepers at the Hilton this year, said they were surprised to learn they’d be in a room with a total of five students and described their living situations as “kind of hard” and “a little bit hard,” respectively.

This housing arrangement has apparently been a longstanding one, according to Jodie O’Sullivan, the Hilton’s human resources manager.

“We have one host family that, she will take five females every summer,” O’Sullivan said.

The Hilton has participated in the J-1 program since 2008 and owns a three-level, four-bedroom house a few hundred yards away specifically for employee housing, with typically two to four people sharing each bedroom.

“It’s got a pool; it’s a really, really nice spot for $150 a week,” O’Sullivan said. “Then we have established host parents within the community that have hosted J-1s over the course of the years.”

Meanwhile, two students working at Basnight’s Lone Cedar Café as prep cooks said they live in Manteo within walking distance to downtown. However, the imposing Washington Baum Bridge separates them from most other area J-1 students.

Computer science majors Emin Yusuf Ciceldemir of Turkey and Javon Laing of Jamaica didn’t know each other before they became roommates.

They said their housing has two rooms, with four single beds in each. They depend on a co-worker giving them a ride to work, and they lamented the lack of other students in their early 20s in Manteo.

“Manteo is small and boring for the students,” Ciceldemir said. The Tuesday dinner is “a very nice opportunity for us.”

Three students from different countries employed by Food Lion — which has multiple locations across the Outer Banks — spoke to The Pilot on the condition of anonymity.

They said their housing is adequate, but it’s too far from the store to bike. They must depend on a shuttle that Food Lion operates.

They described the shuttle as unreliable, which affects their paychecks, they said. For a shift starting on the hour, the shuttle will regularly drop them off 20 to 50 minutes late, and the company doesn’t let them make up missed hours.

“I am not going to make what I expected to make,” one student said disappointedly.

Though one student said they could earn the same money in their home country when company-limited work hours and local food and housing costs are factored in, “I don’t regret it.”

Roommates have become “new friends. I love them.”

About an hour north of Family Recreation Park, Pastor Jim Southern of Corolla Chapel leads a J-1 outreach program that he said is like Daniels’, providing a weekly meal and a place for 40 to 60 international students in Corolla to decompress and socialize.

Southern said Harris Teeter and Food Lion — the biggest Corolla employers of J-1 students — often put four students per room in houses, so there will be 16 students in a four-bedroom and 20 in a five-bedroom.

“I have been in some that are in real disrepair,” Southern said of the houses. “Most of them are, you know, adequate and safe, but they’re the older houses that are at the end of their rental life up here.”

In the past eight or nine years of his outreach, Southern has gone before the district attorney on behalf of three students after they’d lost jobs — and, therefore, their housing — in hopes their cases could be resolved through community service before their time in the country ended.

In all three cases, the students had been in the U.S. about a week and lost their grocery store jobs after accidentally selling alcohol to U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration undercover agents.

“So these students you know, it’s a second language, it’s the pressure of the line that’s behind them, it’s a number of things; and sometimes they just make mistakes,” Southern said.

The employer must follow protocol and dismiss them, but the students must find other jobs and housing, he said.

Neither Food Lion nor Harris Teeter spokespersons answered The Pilot’s questions about the living arrangements or shuttles for their J-1 students on the Outer Banks.

“Out of respect for privacy considerations and to protect proprietary information, we do not disclose specific details about their housing arrangements,” Harris Teeter Corporate Affairs Manager Paige Hamer said in an email. “Ensuring a comfortable and safe environment for all our associates remains our top priority.”

“Our associates are our number one priority, and we are connecting with them directly to learn more about these concerns and address their feedback,” Food Lion Communications Manager Leslie Rasimas said via email.

Food Lion has participated in the J-1 program for 17 years and employs 370 students in Currituck and Dare counties this summer.

Harris Teeter began participating in the J-1 program in 2006 and has 96 students at its Kitty Hawk, Kill Devil Hills and Corolla stores this year, from countries including the Dominican Republic, Thailand, Kosovo, Romania and Taiwan, according to Hamer.

“By participating in this program, we not only meet our staffing needs during our busiest season but also foster a diverse and inclusive environment that reflects the global community we serve,” Hamer said.

___

Housing crunch

Local J-1 numbers have not fully recovered from before the pandemic, and housing is a major factor, according to Jamie Banjak of the all-volunteer Outer Banks International Student Outreach Program.

“Pretty much the only people that are able to take part in the program are people that are able to offer housing to their participants,” Banjak said. “I don’t know that we’re ever going to be able to do that (get back to pre-pandemic numbers) with what’s happened to our housing market.”

Seasonal communities in other states have created dormitory-style workforce housing, but such proposed projects here have not been successful, she said.

“We have high-density vacation housing; we do not have high-density workforce housing,” Banjak said.

Patricia Pledger, who retired in 2019 from operating Pledger Palace Child Development Center in Southern Shores, said several corporate businesses approached her, seeking to use her building “illegally” for J-1 housing.

“I have always done things professionally, and I will continue to do things professionally,” Pledger said. She was willing to go through the proper channels to convert the use of her building to try to help solve a piece of the area’s workforce housing crisis — but was denied at every turn.

The Southern Shores Planning Board in a 4-1 vote and the Southern Shores Town Council in a 5-0 vote each denied her zoning text amendment application to allow “shared space-occupancy dwelling” in the Martin’s Point commercial district in May and June 2023, respectively, according to meeting minutes.

Dare County formally absorbed jurisdiction of the Martin’s Point commercial district, and then Pledger applied there.

The county planning board denied her text amendment submittals in March and May, Dare County Planning Director Noah Gillam told the Dare County Board of Commissioners at its June 3 meeting. The commissioners in a unanimous 7-0 vote denied her submittal that day.

Commissioner Danny Couch said the area was “not a suitable location” for such a project. “I don’t know what the answer is, but I don’t think Martin’s Point is.”

Commissioners Ervin Bateman and Rob Ross voiced concerns with eight students sharing a room.

“I’m trying to envision 56 unrelated, unknown folks to each other in seven rooms with eight people in each and on a piece of property about 3/4 of an acre … I have a great deal of discomfort with that,” Ross said.

Pledger later in June said the students would have access to a commercial kitchen and to several common areas within the building. Her plans included having an on-site residential supervisor. She noted that everything students would need is in a 5-mile radius, and multi-use paths make the area safe to access via bicycle.

“It is very important to me to set a standard,” Pledger said. “If I wouldn’t put my child in it, I wouldn’t put someone else’s child in (the proposed housing).”