No progress, and yet the problems go on and on
It seems I was wrong.
When we started the Long Island Index, we had a guiding principle: Good information about our region would lead to effective action.
When it comes to Long Island’s calamitous brain drain, however, we have all the information we need, but hardly any action at all.
The Long Island Index revealed the mass flight of talented young people in its first issue, five years ago. Since then we’ve seen hundreds of articles, dozens of television and radio programs, and extensive Internet coverage on the subject.
By now 93 percent of Long Islanders rank the problem as at least “Somewhat Serious;” 79 percent call it “Very Serious” or “Extremely Serious.”
People understand the cause of the problem: high housing costs and taxes, and the lack of alternatives to big, single-family homes.
We understand the consequences: employers scrambling to fill entry-level jobs and the loss of our best and brightest young people to lower-cost regions.
We also know the solution: more housing that people can afford. More condos and rentals. Long Island has far less of both than other New York suburbs.
We even know where such housing belongs: in Long Island’s underperforming downtowns. Downtown growth is smart growth. Bringing residences and commerce together stimulates economic activity, minimizes infrastructure costs and taxes, reduces highway congestion and preserves open space.
Solid majorities support downtown development. Yet instead of building more of it, we’re actually building less. The share of permits issued for multifamily residences has dropped to 16 percent over the past three years. Rates in other New York suburbs are at 53 percent and rising.
To know what you have to do, and year after year not do it – that’s dysfunctional.
We need to learn from other regions that faced this problem and did something about it.
