Truckee’s cost of living has increased over the course of the pandemic. Much of the local workforce can’t qualify for affordable housing units established over the past year. The Below Market Rate Housing Program seeks to change that.

Winter has belatedly arrived at Tahoe, on the California-Nevada border, with roughly six feet of glorious snow, and ski resorts have finally opened after a very dry November. But this year, a warming climate isn’t the only challenge resorts will face. At California’s Sugar Bowl, a workforce shortage is creating problems.On December 12, season pass-holders received an email with the subject line “This Winter: Operations Update.” In it, they found a letter from Sugar Bowl CEO and president Greg Dallas breaking the news that the resort was cutting back on some guest services over the holidays because it simply doesn’t have enough staff. 

Give Back Tahoe, the end-of-year giving campaign hosted by the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation, returns for the eighth year with 60 organizations participating. Since 2014, Give Back Tahoe has raised more than $2.5 million in unrestricted funds for nonprofits serving the Tahoe Truckee area.

Last Tuesday, 1,675 people visited the website GiveBackTahoe.org, clicked a “Donate“ button, and gave money to more than 60 participating Lake Tahoe nonprofits. In that one day, Give Back Tahoe raised over $214,000. Some of these folks clicked a “Fundraise” button and created, in just a few minutes, their own campaign, which they could deploy to their friends via email, Facebook, Instagram, etc. The inclusion of this social media functionality is meant to turn this web portal into a “collective giving engine.”

Workforce housing at Lake Tahoe: It’s hard to find, it’s way too expensive, and it sometimes leaves 30 somethings stuffed together with a bunch of roommates like they are back in college.  Long term rental housing has been a problem for those who live and work in Tahoe for decades, but it was exasperated by Covid, and the subsequent real estate boom was caused when many Bay Area folks moved to the mountains because they no longer had to work in the city.

There are currently 9,528 local workforce households that are inadequately housed. The Mountain Housing Council wants to change that. The council was formed to help different organizations within the region come together to collaborate on solutions. At its July meeting the Mountain Housing Council declared a housing emergency in the region in order to address the immediate needs of workforce and community housing.

The Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation this week provided a pair of updates on its summer efforts through the wildfire season, while also laying out plans moving ahead. Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation CEO Stacy Caldwell provided further details on the nonprofit’s recently announced three-year, $30 million Forest Futures Campaign, which aims to help prevent catastrophic forest fires in the region.

The Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation announced it has raised more than $1 million for the launch of Forest Futures, a multi-year campaign to stimulate the region’s economy, ensure a safer and more secure future for the Tahoe area, and create an actionable path forward to healthy forests everywhere.

Finding housing in the Truckee-Tahoe area has been a longstanding issue, but a number of local organizations are working to ease the burden of finding an affordable place to live in the region. Tuesday’s Good Morning Truckee session featured four speakers from various organizations. They discussed what they’re doing to help find and create affordable housing for the area’s workforce.

The Lake Tahoe region has reached a housing and real estate crisis, as more and more workers are having to leave the tourist spot, unable to afford to live there. For more, KCBS Radio news anchors Dan Mitchinson and Holly Quan spoke with Stacy Caldwell, who is CEO of the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation.

The Lake Tahoe region is in crisis. Historic real estate prices and a lack of housing options are forcing local sheriff’s deputies and firefighters to commute an hour or more into the basin, threatening response times to emergencies.Restaurants and resorts that drive the region’s economy have had to scale back services. The hospitality industry, which lost droves of workers during the pandemic, is struggling to find workers who can afford to live there. Most businesses along Tahoe City’s main thoroughfare, North Lake Boulevard, have “Help Wanted” signs hanging in windows, some promising season ski passes to prospective employees.

What does it take to keep our forests healthy? After a century of fire suppression, Tahoe forests are immensely overgrown. The 800,000 piles of biomass (dead trees and dry brush) on the forest floor surrounding our community are a growing problem, but restoration projects are costly and the Forest Service only has so much bandwidth to execute. Last year was the worst fire season on record and, unfortunately, we are in worse shape this year with our fire season beginning 60 days earlier due to drought conditions. However, with increased awareness, new commitments and greater funding from the federal and state level to protect our forests, there is momentum for positive change.

There are two narratives unfolding in Tahoe’s real estate and housing arena. On one hand, the real estate market continues to boom as a new wave of people settle in Lake Tahoe. In the past year, median home prices in Truckee have risen almost 30% to scratch just below the million dollar mark, according to Redfin, and real estate sales continue to be competitive.

Take a look at any issue facing Lake Tahoe communities from lack of affordable housing to parking nightmares, from crowded trailheads to an increase in litter, and you will find angry locals responding to the problem by lambasting out-of-towners suggesting they pack it up and go back to where they came from.

Long before the pandemic hit, it was clear philanthropy needed an overhaul. But the health and economic crisis, combined with a national racial reckoning, forced grant makers’ hands. Foundations largely rose to the challenge by speeding up their grant making, increasing flexibility, and reducing funding restrictions.But now it appears those changes may be short lived. In the most recent of its Foundations Respond to Crisis reports, the Center for Effective Philanthropy found that “most foundations do not plan to undertake these new practices in the future to the degree they are doing so now.”

With a willingness to make a difference, Placer County prioritized helping its small businesses  and nonprofits make it through the pandemic. Through sharing emergency federal funding and partnering with nonprofit and private sectors, Placer was able to respond quickly to emerging needs.

The work this past year by the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation took center stage during this week’s Good Morning Truckee session. Since the outbreak of COVID-19 the foundation has overseen the distribution of roughly $5.6 million in funding during a record-breaking year, while also handing out more than 500,000 meals to those in need within the community.

“We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill

That advice from Sir Winston really hits the mark. We work hard to be successful. Our careers become our focus, but one thing I have learned is that in the end what really matters is relationships and family. What you do for others. And health.