Last year, Bellefonte and Kane, Pennsylvania, each hosted groups of remote workers for a few weeks through a program called “The Wilds are Working: A Remote Lifestyle Experience.” The project was created by the PA Wilds Center for Entrepreneurship, and other partners. Abbi Peters, the Chief Operations Officer at the Center, and Kate Kennedy, the Director of the Kane Area Development Center, talked with WPSU’s Emily Reddy about the project.
Here's their conversation:
Emily Reddy
Abbi and Kate, thanks for talking with me.
Abbi Peters
Oh, thanks for having us.
Emily Reddy
So Abbi, the Pennsylvania Wilds is 13 mostly rural counties in the north central part of the state. It's an area that's mostly losing population. So what's the goal of this remote worker project, that they'll come in to the beautiful nature, the friendly people and say, "Hey, I can work anywhere. I'm gonna move there."
Abbi Peters
Yeah, that's one of the key points. And you kind of hit on one of the assets of the Pennsylvania Wilds as a region. As you said, we're 13 counties. We actually make up 25% of Pennsylvania's geography, but we only have 4% of the population. So within that geography, though, we have the state's only national forest, two wild and scenic rivers, one of the largest elk herds in the northeast, internationally certified dark skies, and tons of other outdoor rec assets, including more than 2 million acres of public lands, which is larger than Yellowstone National Park. So the thought was, you know, how can we make a connection and have the communities be able to host these workers for this experience? And also take a look at, you know, how they are at welcoming people in general? You know, as new people move into the area and these small towns, do they have an approach to be able to find out who those people are and connect them to the resources and the assets? And how can we help to carry on some of those activities beyond the experience and use it as a way to help either retain people that are already there, connect the business communities or attract new people to the area?
Emily Reddy
You set participants up with a free place to live. What else did you give them to try and make this experience a success?
Abbi Peters
So each community had a community partner that led those efforts. And so they found different short term rentals. And then each participant received a $1,500 gift card stipend that could be used either in that community or across the Pennsylvania Wilds at any participating business. They also had access to some welcoming events.
Emily Reddy
And Kate, you're with the Kane Area Development Center. So you helped with the Kane project. Kane's population is about 3,600. You had participants from Philadelphia and Arlington, Virginia. Why did they say they wanted to try this out?
Kate Kennedy
I definitely thinks it takes a certain kind of personality to engage in something like this. And they all definitely had that adventurous spirit. We had a variety of careers represented from what I typically thought of as remote work, which would be more of like the IT or tech piece, writers, and even a therapist that was able to do work online.
Emily Reddy
And we hear a lot about the problem of a lack of access to broadband internet as an issue in rural areas. And, of course, that would be a vital thing for a remote worker. Were they able to get the Internet access that they needed to work?
Kate Kennedy
The specific areas where we housed them, we have pretty strong internet access. But what we found was the level of internet access that some of these remote workers, who this was their full time job doing these things, some of the places that they were put didn't support the internet as much as I would have expected. Thankfully, we were able to quickly accommodate and get them set up in spaces where they could easily do their work.
Emily Reddy
Yeah, Abbi, how big of a consideration is that the internet is actually
Abbi Peters
It's a large consideration. And so as we're in the process, right now, of finding two more communities for the summer of 2023, part of the process is to check what their access is to run the different download speeds. We don't want it to be something to inhibit, you know, because some communities can't control that yet. There are different efforts to strengthen broadband, but you know, they could be at different stages of it. So really, what it's about is understanding where they're at and what capabilities they have and matching them with the right needs on the applicant side.
Emily Reddy
What did you hear about other aspects of living and working in came from participants? What they liked or didn't like?
Kate Kennedy
I think, overwhelmingly, we heard that they felt very welcomed. And that was really exciting to hear. The outdoor rec...we did our pilot in the fall, and Bellefonte did theirs in the summer. And so one thing I never even thought of, that was a great reason why this is a pilot, is that the daylight gets shorter in the fall. And so there's not as much time after work hours to do things outside. And I think, surprisingly -- because I'm of the mindset that anyone would love moving here, like why wouldn't they like as soon as they come here, they're gonna want to move here -- and I realized through this program that as much as we welcome people as much as we show them, how awesome this community is, they can appreciate that and still maybe decide that a city is what they prefer. And that's okay. I mean, I think that's a great thing. And now this is a good place to come on a vacation. But I think it was a good opportunity for us to learn on both ends like, this is a great place to live, it's a great place to work. And it's not always for everyone. And so for them to get a chance to test that out beforehand is a valuable experience. And for me, personally, as somebody who does community development, to recognize, oh, no matter what we do, not every single person in the whole world might want to move here was also pretty eye opening. So it was a valuable experience for me as well.
Emily Reddy
Abbi, if this only moves, you know, a handful of workers around, you know, it's not a lot. Even if everyone who did the program moved to The Wilds, it's not a ton of people. Is there a sort of a bigger goal of publicity and sort of making the wilds a cool place to live?
Abbi Peters
Like you said, we're not going to get droves of people coming in through this program who were able to participate. It does build awareness. We had more than 100 people apply from across the world. We had an application come in from South Africa. I think it also helps to raise awareness of the communities when they're working on economic development or retention, or attracting people to the communities that we do have this quality of life. And it's really something they can use as a draw to get people to look at the positions. Because we do have... I mean, we have some really great employment opportunities already happening here. Also a community looking and saying, you know, okay, are we ready to welcome people in? What can we do better? Are we addressing people that are already here? How can we get around this effort together? And then how can we have some of these tools to help beyond this opportunity?
Kate Kennedy
And I would say that was definitely another piece for me that was really valuable was we talked a lot about putting together a welcome kit. Or, you know, engaging the community and new people to our community, an event that would bring them together. But we'd never done it. We talked about it, but we just had, you know, it's one of those things that kind of is on the list, but we just never quite got there. And so this was what we needed to make those things happen. And at our welcome party, we really sought out people who are already here doing remote work, people who moved here since 2020, during the COVID pandemic that hadn't gotten to know more people, and specifically invited them to the welcome party we were having for these remote workers. And so it did help us move along in some of those goals that we've had for years. And we're going to continue to build on now as a result of this program.
Emily Reddy
Abbi and Kate, thanks for talking with me.
Abbi Peters & Kate Kennedy
Thank you so much.
