MJP — THE VILLAGES, Florida —
One of the biggest retirement communities in the world, The Villages is located in central Florida. It’s famous for its infinite golf courses, the oldest median age in the US, and during campaign season, its traffic-stopping golf-cart parades, which often support a Republican candidate.
Children, though, are not its strong suit.
Still, this decade has seen the fastest-growing metro area in the United States for young children in the region surrounding The Villages.
In the Wildwood-The Villages metro area, the number of children aged 14 and under has increased by 18.4% during the past decade. According to population estimates issued this summer by the U.S. Census Bureau, the working-age population has climbed by 19.1%, making it the fastest-growing metro area in the U.S. for that age group this decade. This is the main reason behind the rapid growth.
“Someone has to provide services to that growing population of retirees and many of these workers will be young adults with children who live in the county,” said Stefan Rayer of the University of Florida’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research in Gainesville, who is also its head of population programs.
Workers in this retirement community range from those specializing in lawn care and electrical work to those specializing in real estate, roofing, physical therapy, financial advisors, nurses, construction, and more. The community has experienced phenomenal growth since the 1990s, making it one of the fastest-growing areas in the United States.
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With an increase from 130,000 in 2020 to over 151,500 in 2017, the majority of whom are retirees, make up the Wildwood-The Villages metro area.
Raising a family here isn’t easy due to the population makeup.
Due to a lack of local appointments, 31-year-old Morgan Philion must travel to a nearby central Florida county to see her obstetrician or take her 2-year-old son to a pediatric dentist. Driving southwest along Interstate 75 to Tampa, they go 80 miles (128 kilometers) to visit a children’s museum.
For Philion and other young families in the Wildwood-The Villages metro area, “Storytime” at the local public library has become a vital resource.
“Giving kids something to do is challenging, and this is the only activity they provide,” Philion remarked.
Librarians like Anita Stevenson take part in weekday reading programs with groups of toddlers, where they sing reading songs, blow bubbles with a handheld device, and listen to stories with catchy titles like “Betty Goes Bananas” and “Cock-a-Doodle Quack! Quack!”
“There are a lot of new families moving in,” Stevenson added, gesturing toward the apartment complexes down the street that were newly constructed.
The 28-year-old Eldresah St. Fleurant and her husband and two young girls were among the families who found housing in the library apartments after struggling to find a place to call their own in the neighborhood, where many communities catered exclusively to individuals 55 and above.
According to St. Fleurant, there are pros and cons to raising children in the area.
There are a lot of new jobs and stores popping up thanks to the rapid development, but there aren’t enough family-friendly services, like a children’s urgent care center, in the county. One exception is the “Storytime” program at the library.
She warned that young families wouldn’t be seen patrolling the area unless they came to an event like this one.
Her son, who is three years old, uses hearing aids. All the medical services in the Wildwood-The Villages area “are geared toward the older generation,” she added, making it “a nightmare” to find an audiologist who sees youngsters. To go to Orlando for those appointments, you’ll need to drive ninety-six kilometers (60 miles) on the Florida Turnpike. They had a hard time locating a church that offered activities for young people.
However, since relocating from St. Petersburg, Florida, to Wildwood a little over a year ago, the 40-year-old has thoroughly enjoyed his time here.
“There is less congestion. Feeney, who is also a mother to a 5-month-old child, told me it was easier and more bearable.
The Villages has a strict age requirement of 19 for residents and 55 for all households. Wildwood and Oxford, two small villages immediately outside of The Villages, have seen a boom of young families due to the age restriction.
The Villages has opened Middleton, a master-planned community for retirees and their families, in response to the influx of young people.
The Villages’ elder inhabitants, like Chris Stanley, 60, welcome the new families with open arms, but many are concerned about the rising cost of housing and the strain on already-crowded schools. With 9,400 students, the school system is served by thirteen different schools. Kids who aren’t employees can’t attend the well-regarded Villages Charter School.
Our tenure will end when we die. He made a joke about how we’re frogs. We require someone to manage this massive infrastructure that we have constructed here. There will be serious issues if there aren’t enough young people here with children to cover housing, daycare, and other living expenses.
The median age in Wildwood-The Villages was 68 last year, the oldest in the country. However, due to the influx of young people, it has decreased from 68.4 at the beginning of the decade. In the meantime, this decade saw a gradual increase in the median age of Americans, from 38.5 to 39.1.
In comparison to the national average of over 21%, children still make up a relatively small portion of Sumter County’s population (7.2% as of last year). But it’s increasing; a decade ago, it was 6%.
This increase stands in sharp contrast to the national trend, as the number of children in the United States who are 14 years old or younger has decreased by 3.3% over the past decade. Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City have lost 614,000 children between them since 2020.
Andrew Bilardello, the current commissioner of Sumter County, has lived in the neighborhood long enough to recall a time when there was only one traffic light. When the 1980s rolled around, high school seniors had a few options: enlist, attend college, or relocate to nearby cities like Tampa, Orlando, or Jacksonville in search of employment.
According to Bilardello, the town is home to some of America’s oldest residents, so he is pleased to see an influx of children and working-age adults this decade.
He emphasized the need to retain young people. “Our future lies in that.”
