Building Earthships

IT’S A DELICIOUS, IF TORTUROUS, CYCLE WITH ME: just when I’m on the brink of throwing up my hands and writing all humanity off as a wretched lot of uberconsumerist, plastic-mongering jackasses who deserve to suffocate in the ozone-depleted bed we’ve made for ourselves — lo and behold, some brightly shining soul or earth-conscious initiative …

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Salida’s Housing Crunch: A Firsthand Look

By Jessica Wierzbinski

It can’t really be that hard to find a place to house your family, right? Not even in a little mountain town that has in recent years become a veritable Mecca for mountain biking, river sporting, alternatively medicating, retiring and any number of other activities folks come here for. Even amid this influx, one can always cover the basics like housing, right?

I can say from personal experience what the recently published housing needs assessment reports in numbers: families have it hard here, and many are being forced to move away.

Beginning in January, 2015, I spent well over a year proactively scouring the housing market in Salida – both the rental and the sale markets – for a way to house myself and my sons. Having lived in our beloved S-Town for over five years, we’d already thrown down roots. Good, deep roots. We didn’t want to leave. But who knew simply staying put would prove so tooth-and-nail difficult? 

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