Rural Gentrification: It’s Just Empty Land

By DON ROLLINS

“They’re growing houses in the fields between the towns/And the Starlight drive-in movie’s closing down/The road is gone to the way it was before/And the spaces won’t be spaces anymore” — John Gorka, “Houses in the Fields”

Manifest Destiny is alive and well here in the Appalachian foothills. Otherwise known as rural gentrification, it’s a worldview in which “empty” land is there for the taking. Some by speculators and developers, some by would-be homeowners with enough resources to build large single-family houses on large tracts.

This is of course nothing particular to these times or this place. America as we know it is one massive parcel of stolen land, lock, stock and genocide.

The ensuing colonial capitalism - with its heavy reliance on land entitlement, land ownership and land leveraging - is as prevalent here as Fifth Avenue. The hills are not a buffer from unchecked profiteering: It’s right there on the for sale signs..

Gentrification, rural, urban or otherwise, may be the purest form of asset-building this side of generational wealth and hostile market takeovers: Financially stable parties displace financially unstable residents; put capital into marketable updates, and; take up residence, lease or flip the property. Secure buyers get a deal, residents are left to their own resources.

All the above apply to rural gentrification, just in different ways. A 2015 report done by Housing Assistance Council, “They Paved Paradise: Gentrification in Rural Areas,” captures some of those differences, one less measurable but no less real: “Beyond the loss of farmland and open space, beyond the transformation of an economy from agriculture to services, beyond increased population density and suburban sprawl, is the concern that gentrification will result in the transformation or loss of rural cultures and values.”

The report (based on research done in three locations experiencing rapid rural gentrification) is in line with more recent studies as it gives three primary causes:

• Suburban sprawl, nearly evenly divided between new residential and commercial use;

• Amenity-driven migration — rural gentrification near natural landscapes (bodies of water, mountains, forests) including vacation properties;

• Retirement-driven migration, targeted mostly but not entirely at Sunbelt states.

The research is likewise accurate when describing what rural gentrification looks like in contrast with its urban stripe:

• Whole towns and regions, not just neighboorhoods are affected;

• Disparities between incoming and resident populations are more likely to involve class than race;

• Sprawl often extends to farm and grazing lands, diminishing or eliminating food sources.

What we also know about rural gentrification is it kills. Related data indicate those displaced without adequate resources and support are at higher risk for poverty, health complications and substance misuse.

More broadly, the social network is further strained as some displaced from rural areas turn to social services, public assistance and health care for their children and themselves: Rural displacement is costly for everybody, save those who are doing the straining.

Fixing rural gentrification is vexing, but the consistently best strategies call for community involvement in regional planning, support for local businesses, lobbying on behalf of affordable and subsidized housing, and creating public land trusts.

The incoming regime will undoubtedly preserve and extend policies favoring the wealthy, which means phasing out the USDA’s rural programs. There will be even more incentives to displace rural Americans. And more houses in the fields.

Postscript: At least one nonprofit agency is focused on rural housing and related issues, the aforementioned Housing Assistance Council.

Don Rollins is a retired Unitarian Universalist minister in Jackson, Ohio. Email donaldlrollins@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, December 15, 2024

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