Column: Unlocking the door to affordable living on Shelter Island

As we all know, housing on Shelter Island has become increasingly un-affordable. While some current homeowners may benefit from rising property values, the increasing un-affordability of housing here has left many residents, particularly renters and aspiring homeowners, struggling to find affordable options.

On the Island, a combination of high rental costs and a severe lack of affordable housing has left many inhabitants with no choice but to seek home ownership elsewhere. It’s time we recognize the urgency of this issue and work toward creating equitable solutions that ensure hard-working community members, who want to keep living on Shelter Island, have the opportunity to do so. To combat this problem the Island needs to build accessory dwelling units, which the town is moving toward. Everyone should applaud this initiative.

Shelter Island has a population of about 3,000, which triples during the summer due to tourism and second homeowners. More than half of the houses on Shelter Island are unoccupied in the winter and occupied in the summer.

There’s a large working population that can’t keep up with the skyrocketing prices in the housing market, forcing them to commute to the Island every day for work. People with lower incomes may be forced to live far away from their work, which can lead to longer commutes and higher transportation costs.

On the Island, we see this a lot with teachers and food service workers. It’s close to impossible for new hires at Shelter Island school or restaurant employees to find homes to purchase or rent. The staffing issue at the school is compounded by the long commutes that many teachers face.

Sean Brennan, a history teacher at Shelter Island School said, “My commute usually takes an hour and a half each way. It can be much longer when the ferry line is long in the spring.”

This creates a significant financial burden for non-residents, as ferry costs can quickly add up if you’re not a resident.

If the Shelter Island market remains un-affordable, it will continue to segregate the wealthy and the working class. If the workers become unable to sustain the commute, the absence of a dependable workforce here may cause difficulties for businesses in recruiting employees, resulting in a drop in the quality of their goods and services.

The influx of an elite class on the Island will also lead to the loss of our community culture and upset the social balance of our island.

While there are many wealthy residents on Shelter Island, it is also a place where working-class families have lived for generations. According to the Peconic Bay Region Community Housing Act, “Shelter Island’s median income is about $79,843. The median home price here now is $1,345,000. Home prices have increased on the Island by 74% in the last 10 years. An income of $350,080 is required to keep the price of a $1.345M home within 30% of your earnings.”

These numbers tell an important story. The working class cannot afford home ownership here. If only the wealthy can afford to buy/rent here, what will happen to our island culture? It will disappear.

The type of affordable housing that I recommend the Shelter Island community to consider is accessory dwelling units. This housing strategy includes “self-contained dwellings built either inside of or adjacent to a primary home”(“Accessory Dwellings,” 2018).

This approach is low-cost and adds diversity to housing types. If this were implemented, it would create and allow for more opportunities for low and moderate-income levels to have more mobility in that they can reincorporate themselves into their local community, rather than being treated as outside commuters.

Though wealthier residents may worry that this would undermine the aesthetics of the area, this low-cost model would still be beneficial to homeowners and create an extra source of income that would help them afford their ongoing housing costs.

The consequences of not bringing affordable housing to the Island could be drastic. Local small businesses on Shelter Island would be challenged to maintain a stable staff, and additionally, the school district could eventually be forced to close, as the enrollment from pre-K through 12th grade would drastically decrease.

Island residents cannot remain ignorant of the strain that it would put on the whole Island to keep functioning without having people who support and contribute to the region’s community services.

While many residents have already been forced to relocate because their homes have become too expensive to maintain, they are still trying to keep ties with the Island to help the overall functioning of the Island. If Shelter Island doesn’t do something about this affordable housing crisis, the Island will soon be reduced to a gated community for the wealthy and our Island culture will disappear.

Again, town government should be applauded for benefiting from a $2 million New York State grant secured for the Island by the Community Development Corporation of Long Island. Homeowners who meet financial and other criteria could get up to $125,000 toward the cost of work to create accessory dwelling units on their properties.

It’s time to keep the pressure on to make the dream of an affordable Shelter Island a reality.

Valeria Reyes, a graduate of Shelter Island School and currently attending Colgate University, had to relocate to Bohemia, N..Y. as a result of the high costs of living on the Island.