Millennials are flocking to the Mile High City, but it isn\u2019t the nearby ski slopes, microbreweries or urban hiking trails that are attracting them: It\u2019s the jobs.<\/p>\n
A shared office space called Industry, in the popular River North Art District, stands as an example of the entrepreneurial forces that are luring a flood of young professionals here.
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Formerly a depot for the truckloads of produce that rolled into Denver from Colorado\u2019s farmland, the firm\u2019s 155,000-square-foot warehouse is now an open-air maze of workspaces for everything from ride-sharing company Uber to CirrusMD, which connects doctors and patients virtually.
\n\u201cYou don\u2019t move just because some place is cool,\u201d said\u00a0Aaron Duke,\u00a0a 39-year-old San Francisco transplant and CirrusMD employee. \u201cYou\u2019ve also got to be able to earn a buck.\u201d
\nWhile the new arrivals are transforming the city\u2019s landscape and economy, they also are generating tensions among locals, who complain they are driving up rents and fueling a building boom that is marring some mountain views.<\/p>\n
The metro area, which has a population of about 2.7 million, received more than 100,000 out-of-state residents from 2010 through 2014, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That is the fifth-largest influx of domestic migrants in the country, surpassing cities such as Seattle and Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
Some 3,200 new firms have opened their doors in Denver during the past four years, according to city estimates, contributing to more than 165,000 new jobs in the broader metro area and helping drive the unemployment rate to 4.1% in May, among the lowest for big metros in the nation.<\/p>\n
Public improvements to lure millennials, such as building bike paths and revitalizing neighborhoods, can result in a nicer place to live, economists say, but for an economy to thrive, more fundamental investments are needed, including a well-connected airport, universities to train workers and a business base that attracts people from around the region, they note.<\/p>\n
Those advantages are helping to power Denver\u2019s growth.<\/p>\n
\u201cA city like Denver from the beginning was a central place,\u201d said\u00a0Mario Pol\u00e8se,\u00a0an urban economics professor at the Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique in Montreal. \u201cIt was destined to grow.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Denver has long been a regional hub, with established industries such as oil and telecommunications that leaders have built upon to create thriving sectors such as energy information technology and digital health care.<\/p>\n
While Denver is benefiting from a booming economy, residents are dealing with big-city problems such as traffic and skyrocketing rents.<\/p>\n
Though rents remain well below New York and San Francisco, they jumped 7.8% last year to an average $986, the second highest increase among U.S. metros, behind San Jose, Calif., according to Reis, a real-estate research firm.\u00a0 Some critics also are concerned that newcomers are out-competing Coloradans, who tend to be less educated than the recent transplants.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not growing our own talent fast enough,\u201d said\u00a0J.B. Holston,dean of the University of Denver\u2019s engineering and computer science school and founder of the Blackstone Entrepreneurs Network, which focuses on scaling up Colorado\u2019s promising companies.<\/p>\n
Paul Washington,\u00a0head of Denver\u2019s Office of Economic Development, says officials are committed to spreading the city\u2019s prosperity, building affordable housing and educating residents in disenfranchised neighborhoods.\u00a0 They\u2019re not giving up, however, on the millennial generation\u2014those born roughly between 1980 and 2000.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe influx of millennials is extremely important,\u201d said Mr. Washington, adding they \u201cbring energy and enthusiasm and optimism.\u201d<\/p>\n
Craftsy, an online learning firm co-founded by former Bay Area residents, has gone from five employees in 2010 to 270.\u00a0John Levisay,one of the company\u2019s founders, said it made sense for the firm to settle in Denver because of the city\u2019s lower operating costs, its big pool of engineers and growing interest from tech investors.<\/p>\n
At IMA Financial Group, an insurance provider, young jeans-clad recruits are helping develop tech products. Since the company moved its headquarters near Union Station, a trendy transit hub, it is getting three times more applicants for every job it posts, says chief executive\u00a0Rob Cohen.\u00a0 New development, however, also is pushing some locals out. In Jefferson Park, a century-old residential neighborhood, 11 homes have been replaced with 65 townhouses on just one street.<\/p>\n
Rafael Espinoza,\u00a0who lives there and recently was elected to the Denver City Council after expressing concerns about gentrification, complains that the townhouses are unsightly and are making the area unaffordable.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou shouldn\u2019t be so fixated on bringing in the new revenue and the new warm bodies at the expense of having a diverse population,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
In the River North Art District,\u00a0Jim Mills,\u00a0co-founder of an organic-produce cannery, has seen the former industrial strip transformed into a gathering spot for flip-flop-wearing hipsters and young entrepreneurs. It is the kind of customer Mr. Mills is targeting with his live-fermented Sriracha sauce and rosemary pears. As breweries and lofts sprawl closer to his warehouse, however, he worries he will no longer be able to afford to stay.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been both exciting and a little unnerving to see,\u201d said Mr. Mills, an out-of-state migrant himself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Millennials are flocking to the Mile High City, but it isn\u2019t the nearby ski slopes, microbreweries or urban hiking trails that are attracting them: It\u2019s the jobs. A shared office space called Industry, in the popular River North Art District, stands as an example of the entrepreneurial forces that are luring a flood of young […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2276,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[375],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-post","topic-dei","topic-human-resources"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n