Martin County’s Brain Drain Phenomenon

"Martin County’s Attempt to Plug Brain Drain Phenomenon Hinges on its Choice Between More Homes and More Jobs" by v. johns

Anyone who knows me knows that I am an ardent hoarder of newspapers and internet articles. I was shuffling through some old papers today (Mon. Aug 28) when I came across an article in the Palm Beach Post’s Inside Local Business section entitled “Martin seeks ways to attract, retain bright young talent” by Cara Fitzpatrick.

The Aug. 10 article, filed under “Treasure Coast Business” on page 2B (for you other newspaper hoarders out there), describes “brain drain” as “the flight of young, educated people from rural or small communities” and says that it’s a common problem throughout the country. Fitzpatrick reports that to assist in recruitment and retention of these talented young people, generally under age 40, the Business Development Board of Martin County and the Young Professionals of Martin County will be teaming up, this month, to conduct an online survey called “Next Leaders Survey 2009.”

Unfortunately, I failed to comment on this article in time to use a blog post as a bulletin of this survey, but I’m assuming the survey will be ongoing past the month of September. If not, then certainly the results will be well worth waiting for.

This “brain drain” phenomenon almost directly supports my conceptual construct of “the Regional Dilemma of Mobility” which states that “people are simply prone to mobility and will travel, near or far, whenever it is convenient, no matter how quaint the want or need to do so, and regardless of how desirable or convenient the amenities in their own city or town may be.” The lack of varied job and career choices, the lack of a diverse environment and, according to urban and regional planning expert Richard Florida, the lack of a thriving arts and entertainment scene that attracts creative types, only serves to worsen the “brain drain” problem. I believe that while Martin County doesn’t really lack and does possess small components of all of all-the-attributes-above, like much of South Florida, the overall environment of class warfare and income exclusivity detracts from the potential for a more varied and diverse setting that would be more attractive to hotshot young professionals.

While I applaud the Development Board and the Young Professionals in their efforts, I hope they will keep in mind the overall picture of retention and recruitment of homegrown talent on a regional level. A great deal of our young people are not simply, as the article implies, opting to move to larger areas within the region. They are bypassing the community, the region and the state altogether by attending colleges and landing jobs in other areas of the country. Some are simply moving from small communities in our county to similar communities in neighboring counties, south of here, to have access to big places like West Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Miami. While others who are determined to continue to reside in Martin, St. Lucie or Indian River are opting to commute to the larger areas of the southernmost portion of the region to work in their chosen field.

I think it’s a very good idea for Martin or any other community, for that matter, to want to retain young people to stay and help build their community into a better place and I believe that this survey will indeed reveal what these young people want and expect of their community… should they choose to stay. For the time being, however, Martin County’s continuing local government-enabled push toward obliterating it’s own well-planned urban services boundary - for the suspected purpose of more kicks for developers - only serves to worsen the minor, but changeable problem of retaining young talented professionals to live, work, study, play, relax and do business where they grew up. These young, talented professionals are not going to want to continue to reside here if the mechanisms by which they are enticed to want to reside here – namely good well-paying jobs; entertainment and dating; a hip, happening party scene; and a vast network of like-minded peers – are not present. So, instead of Martin County continuing to make the same stupid mistake most of South Florida has made in pinning its economy on residential development, shouldn’t job creation and business development be of prime concern now that it has been proven that the last decade of increased home ownership was a sham?

I agree with the Stuart News’s July 26 editorial “Focus efforts on job creation,” (different title online) that “Martin County needs more jobs unrelated to the boom-and-bust cycles of construction, agriculture, service.” I’m not against housing development because in attracting young professional talent to our community and retaining them, it would help if they had nice places to live, but in pushing residential development so heavily in a place that’s screaming for better jobs, where are we going to put these job centers if most of the land is gobbled up by disproportionate residential development?

So far Martin County has not only missed out on the opening bids for biotech research, that have gone primarily to Palm Beach and St. Lucie counties, but has also dropped the ball in attracting a digital media arts studio called Digital Domain which was fully supported and nabbed by St. Lucie County. This, once again, according to an editorial in the Stuart News (“Martin should learn from its failure to lure digital production studio”) printed this past Sunday (Sept. 27).

In conclusion: From here on out, Martin County is going to have to make some serious choices regarding the coming heavyweight matchups between job-based growth and growth for the sake of growth. With the possibility of the green and biotech sectors ushering in a completely new type of economy for the 21st century, Martin County, green as it is, by continuing to rely too heavily on “construction, agriculture (and) service,” may put us all at risk of losing out on all the possibilities that lie ahead…