A time for evolution
We hear considerable talk from politicians and so-called experts about the need to ‘grow our economy.’ Call us contrarian but more than grow, we believe our Valley’s economy needs to evolve.
Growing the same wine/tourism industry that is putting unsustainable pressure on our environment and quality of life is not a sensible path to prosperity. For reasons of water alone, our treasured natural environment cannot tolerate much more such growth.
Residents are beginning to appreciate that, making their views known through very vocal resistance to more wineries, vineyards and hotels. Their voices become even more shrill with the realization that the low-paying jobs that dominate our current economy cannot sustain the cost of living here for the very workforce that makes it all possible.
Unless it evolves and diversifies rather than simply grows, ours will essentially remain a plantation economy, where the crops are wine and tourists, nurtured by workers who must commute great distances from affordable housing elsewhere. Local quality of life should be measured by the well-being of a vibrant resident community and its families, not determined by well-connected business interests seemingly detached from the economic realities and aspirations of ordinary people.
That detachment was inadvertently evidenced by our Chamber of Commerce, Visitors Bureau and a local newspaper that have all recently filled locally rare and well-compensated management positions with talent from Texas, Palm Springs and Marin. Apparently, none of the 45,000 Valley residents were sufficiently qualified or knowledgeable about Sonoma Valley.
We begrudge no one their good fortune, but a 21st century Valley economy must create wealth, income and hope for the majority of people who live here and who devote their time and talent to make it all possible.
Much-needed Evolution could begin with the creation of a blue ribbon Valley committee charged with actively seeking new and sustainable businesses with good-paying jobs to set up shop in the Valley. And by ‘sustainable,’ we don’t just mean more green-washing.
That Evolution is possible. Recently, a business called Social Finance, Inc., opened an office on the plaza — in Healdsburg — and is expected to provide scores of good-paying jobs. Google “Social Finance, Inc.,” to see what Evolution might look like, without tasting rooms.
Further improving education for our young people is also important. However, without jobs that require it, education it can only take our economy so far. Local schools and colleges are educating kids for good jobs that don’t exist here; while the available work is honorable, it takes little education to swab tourists’ toilets, pick grapes or wait tables, and local paychecks reflect that.
At present, many of our graduates take their skills and knowledge elsewhere to find work more rewarding than catering to tourists from places with brighter futures. Because of a shortage of 21st century jobs, we are effectively shortchanging our educated young people.
Unless local business, government and community leaders are willing to be a catalyst for evolving our economy, the dominant wine/tourism industry will continue to keep things 19th century quaint, providing low-wage jobs that sustain the status quo of widening income disparity while exporting our brightest young people elsewhere, along with millions of wine bottles full of our scarce water.
One need not be a Nobel Laureate to appreciate that unless it evolves, the growth of such an economy is not sustainable.
— Sun Editorial Board
