PORT TOWNSEND — Jefferson County has seen an upward trend in its economic growth over the past five years but still struggles with an aging population and the need to create jobs that would cater to younger workers and families, according to Brian Kuh, the deputy director of the Jefferson County Economic Development Council.
Kuh presented an overview of the state of Jefferson County’s economy at the Economic Development Summit in Port Townsend on Friday.
The summit brought together business representatives and officials from the local government, schools and other public entities to provide input for the revision of the Community Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) for Jefferson and Clallam counties.
The strategy helps counties set measurable economic goals for the next five years and identify what makes their county a competitive economic power in the state, according to Kate Dean, the regional director for the North Olympic Peninsula Resource Conservation & Development Council.
Having this can help in attaining state and federal funding and grants, which are important for the growth of rural counties such as Jefferson, according to Dean, who also is running in the Nov. 8 general election against Tim Thomas for a Jefferson County commissioner seat.
A public hearing on the rewrite of the CEDS will be scheduled sometime in October and public comment will be welcome, officials said.
Kuh presented an overview of Jefferson County to give everyone in attendance a look at the county’s successes and struggles.
Jefferson County has seen steady population growth since the 1970s, he said.
Between 2000 and 2015, the county grew from roughly 26,400 to just over 30,400, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
While the county has seen growth, population growth is not an express goal of the county moving forward.
“There’s an assumption of growth, but it’s not necessarily a goal,” said Peter Quinn, the director of the Economic Development Council Team Jefferson.
However, there is a goal to grow certain sections of the population, according to Kuh.
“A lot of our young people leave for school and just never return,” Kuh said.
“We need to look for ways to entice people to come back to their hometowns. Jefferson County has an entrepreneurial spirit, but we’re also looking to create jobs that people can come back for and raise their family on.”
Currently, 55 percent of Jefferson County’s population is made up of people from age 20 to 65, a section of the population that is generally seen in the workforce. This isn’t far from the percentages seen throughout the U.S. or across the state; however, in Jefferson County, the percentage of citizens younger than 18 has dropped by over 1 percent since 2010, while the percentage of the population older than 65 has increased by 8 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
“It’s something seen across the state,” Quinn said. “We’re just aging a little faster than everyone else.”
Despite an aging workforce, the county has seen economic growth.
Job growth continues to rise, but it slowed considerably between 2010 and 2014, according to Kuh.
The median household income increased by 2.5 percent between 2010 and 2014, only 0.5 percentage points off the national growth rate of 3 percent.
Unemployment is down from 10.3 percent in 2010 to 7.1 percent in 2015, and the average job in the county pays roughly $36,000 per year.
While that is lower than the state average, according to Kuh, if you don’t count major urban areas like King County, Jefferson County is in good standing.
“If you remove those urban areas, we’re tracking right along with rural America and rural Washington state,” Kuh said.
Based on these statistics, the CEDS for Jefferson will likely focus on job growth for young professionals, but things are trending upward for the county as a whole, according to Kuh.
“Overall, the trends are positive in population growth and economic growth,” he said. “I think where our challenges lay is in targeted population growth of young workers and families.”
________
Jefferson County Editor/Reporter Cydney McFarland can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 5550, or at cmcfarland@peninsuladailynews.com.