Someone else realizes that an economy based solely on tourism is not in the best interest of all in Garrett County ..

Curious what else was out there on tourism in Garrett County I did a quick Yahoo! search on the topic and found this executive summary from Garrett County Community Action detailing some of the employment trends in the small town of Accident not far from Deep Creek Lake.

The following is a excerpt from this executive summary, in which I have highlighted a few keys points:

"In some regards, Accident's demographic and economic trends mirror those changes that are occurring in the county. There are some important trends in Accident that should be taken into consideration when planning for future development:

 The population increases in the community are a positive signal. However, growth appears to be occurring in the youngest and oldest segments of the population. Adults that are in their greatest income producing years have left the community.

 Household incomes have grown as they have in the county. However, Accident's median household income is well below that of the county and is only 60% of the national average.

 Economic trends indicate that Accident's job growth has occurred in those categories that support the county's growing tourism industry: construction, and entertainment/lodging/food service. The declines in mining and manufacturing jobs signal the loss of higher wage jobs that have more than likely been replaced by lower paying jobs."

So to summarize, Accident trends in many ways mirror the county as a whole. In Accident, many adults in their peak income years have left the area (not unlike myself and nearly all of those who I grew up with in Garrett County) and low paying tourism jobs have replaced higher wage jobs. Pretty much as I put it in my own posting on Garrett County tourism.

As I have said before, the leaders in Garrett County should not be fooled into focusing solely on tourism at the expense of other industries. And until someone proves otherwise I will remain convinced that more tourism equals more low paying jobs for the residents of Garrett County. Along those lines I am very happy to see that Sarah Moses of the Cumberland Times-News has reported that efforts are being made to improve local job training in the areas of "welding, machining, metal fabrication, HVAC, masonry, carpentry, CAD/CAM, metal finishing/painting and robotics." Careers in these specialty trades might require someone to get their hands dirty and might not be easy but based on the data shown previously they are certainly more likely to put food on the table than those low paying leisure and hospitality jobs.

I applaud the commissioners for their efforts as well and am glad to see that they are taking steps to provide real career opportunities for the residents of Garrett County. I can only hope that they continue to make more strides in that direction and hopefully begin to reverse some of those negative trends noted in the Community Action summary.

Don't forget to check back to Dan's Deep Creek Blog for future updates.