Place to call home

Jessie Farnes grew up in Whitefish and left for college and a career, then when she and her husband began having a family they wanted to move to a place that felt like home.

Whitefish was a clear choice. They found jobs. Their children eventually enrolled in school.

“We would come back and visit family once a year and nothing felt like home the way Whitefish had,” she said. “It’s the town, it’s the mountains, it’s the community that was so supportive.”

But finding a place to live — that’s been an ongoing challenge.

“We can’t afford a $500,000 house,” she said. “It’s a struggle for me. We want to make our lives in this town, but we’re not in a position to pay for anything that’s available.”

Farnes is the manager at Montana Coffee Traders downtown cafe, and her husband, Zach is the head roaster for Coffee Traders. They have two children, ages 4 and 18 months. The Farnes lived in San Francisco and Portland, among other stops, before coming to Montana and they also found purchasing a home in those cities to be outside their budget.

Right now the family of four is renting from a family member, and Jesse says that’s really the only reason they’re able to afford rent here. But the Farneses would like to purchase a place they could call home for years to come.

Farnes says being a part of a community is one of the reasons she wanted to move back to Whitefish. She wanted to run into her children’s classmates at the park, bump into friends on the bike path or see neighbors at the grocery store. For the last two years that’s been a part of their lives, but if they’ll be able to continue living in Whitefish that’s a constant worry.

“I hope my children get to grow up here and be a part of the community,” she said.

As a manager of a business, Farnes also sees her employees struggle to find housing or struggle when a roommate leaves. She’s quick to note that Coffee Traders is a good employer, the issue comes down to the cost of housing in Whitefish.

“The perception is that these are young, entry level employees,” she said. “But many are in their late 20s or 30s and they want to create lives for themselves here. They are people who are part of the community.”

She knows having quality employees who live in the town they work in is important. She’s seen other resort communities where the employees working in the retail stores and cafes didn’t live there.

“It felt empty in the sense that it didn’t have character,” she said. “The establishments become an empty shell and that’s a loss for the community.”

She enjoys being in Coffee Traders during the hustle and bustle of summer tourism season when the lines are long. She enjoys talking with visitors who plan their year around coming to Whitefish for a few weeks. But she equally enjoys watching one of her baristas high five their friends who just finished a favorite hike or had a great day of catching fish.

“They recognize the faces standing in line and not just from the cafe — from family, from church, from the gym,” she said. “It creates a warm environment.”

“That’s the magic that keeps us afloat financially as a town,” she said.

The Farneses’ story isn’t all that unique in Whitefish. It’s a trend that Whitefish community leaders have continued to be concerned about and in more recent years a lack of affordable workforce housing has been termed a “crisis” within the community.

The Whitefish Strategic Housing Plan — developed in a partnership between the city of Whitefish and the Whitefish Chamber of Commerce — was recently released and sets a goal of implementing its top strategies in the next three years to provide solutions.

An assessment completed last year showed Whitefish needs to add 605 units at more affordable prices than supplied by the market to meet the full range of needs of the local workforce by 2020 to make up for a current shortage of housing and plan for the future. The same assessment showed that the affordable range for the workforce is homes priced between $160,000 and $310,000 for households earning between $40,000 and $75,000 per year.

Newer homes for sale are not targeting the local workforce, the study found. About 80 percent of local buyers search for homes priced under $300,000, but the median asking price of condominiums is about $400,000 and the median price of newer single family and townhomes is about $450,000.

A look at recent classified ads in the Pilot gives a glimpse at what’s available for those looking to rent. A two bedroom, two bath townhouse near downtown was recently listed at just over $1,000 per month, while something for a family looking to rent, a four bed, three bathroom home was listed at $1,850 per month.

An affordable mortgage or rent payment is calculated by taking 30 percent of a household’s income, according to Melanie Rees, the housing consultant hired by the city and chamber to conduct the initial housing study and create the strategic housing plan.

“It doesn’t matter how much you make,” she said. “It’s 30 percent of your income to make it affordable.”

Based on that calculation, a construction worker making $17 an hour could afford a monthly payment of $850, while a registered nurse making $28 an hour could afford a payment of $1,400.

The housing plan looks to target creating rentals with a payment of less than or at $1,000 per month. While houses for purchase should be less than or equal to $310,000.

Rees said while low income housing is included in the housing plan, it is not the main target intended to be created by the plan.

“This extends way beyond low income housing into moderate and middle income ranges in this community,” she said. “Workforce housing is not synonymous with seasonal worker housing, this is about your labor force.”

The Whitefish Housing Authority provides a number of assistance programs to help those looking for housing, though the strategic housing plan looks to build upon those programs. They offer rental and homeownership assistance programs, and also provide elderly and disabled housing at the Mountain View Manor.

More than a decade ago Michelle Howke was facing an impossible situation. She owned a mobile home in the Greenwood Trailer Park on Highway 93, where tenants were being evicted because the owner planned to sell.

She couldn’t find another location in Whitefish for her mobile home, and even if she could the cost to move it was prohibitive. Howke, who is now the City Clerk for the city of Whitefish, grew up in Whitefish and has now spent close to two decades working for the city. Relocating to another town, even in the Flathead Valley, just didn’t seem like an option.

“I wanted to stay in Whitefish because it’s my home,” she said recently.

At the time the city’s then finance director Mike Eve suggested Howke look into the Whitefish Housing Authority. She eventually got assistance from the housing authority in purchasing a townhouse.

“I was lucky enough to have somebody tell me about the program,” she said. “It’s been 12 years later and I still look at it and say ‘this is my home.’”

“I was 28 when I bought my home,” she adds. “That’s a pretty big deal. I still can’t believe it. It was great to know that I could afford to buy a home and not over spend.”

Sarina Hart rents a house from the housing authority and says finding a rental was “challenging.”

“I work downtown in the service industry and I can’t pay more than one paycheck for rent,” she said. “I’d had some bad roommates and when this came up it was a blessing in disguise.”

Hart, who has lived in Whitefish permanently since 2012, has been renting from the housing authority for more than a year. She works at Montana Coffee Traders, plays music with bands in the Flathead Valley and is active with the local theater scene. She wanted to stay in Whitefish and says at age 47 she wanted a place to herself.

“[Whitefish] is a beautiful, friendly community,” she said. “I have a job where I can totally appreciate that as people come in to Montana Coffee Traders. I’m involved in a number of creative music and theater projects. I didn’t want to have to give that up.”

Having a place to live in the same town where she works is important. She says it saves her a potentially dangerous drive, but she also knows that having a variety of residents adds to the community.

“Having a stable place to live in Whitefish is important,” she said. “When you’re not in survival mode you can give back. It’s important to make it so people can live here.”

LeaAnn Lundgren moved to Whitefish to be close to her daughter. The retired nurse spent three years on waiting lists and looking for a place to live before she was able to get an apartment at the housing authority’s Mountain View Manor.

“I know how lucky I am,” she said. “It’s not easy to find a place — there’s not a lot out there.”

Lundgren said the manor is home for many people just like her who are active and want to give back to the community. She was a hospice nurse in Gig Harbor, Washington, with a nice house before she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and her marriage ended.

“Most of us who live here have been homeless before and can’t make enough to live [in Whitefish],” she said.