Study: Over 25% of North Bay households not making ends meet

For Andrew Gapelii, it takes more than one job to make ends meet in Sonoma County — where according to a report released this week, a quarter of households (38,828) fail to make enough.

The Real Cost Measure 2023 study conducted by the United Ways of California indicates a family of four with two adults, a pre-schooler and one school-aged child needs $97,028 annually to pay for basic household expenses in Sonoma County. The cost equation is dominated by housing but also consists of food, health care, child care, transportation, miscellaneous expenses and taxes.

Here's how that breaks down for a Sonoma County family of four with two young children:

• $23,952 for housing
• $11,868 for food
• $9,852 for health care
• $19,092 for childcare
• $10,728 for transportation
• $7,548 for miscellaneous
• $13,988 for taxes

A single adult, like Gapelii, requires $36,572 to get by — $15,428 less than the median household income in this North Bay county. Almost all (96%) of the households below the “real cost measure” has one working adult under the roof.

“I quickly realized I needed two jobs to make it,” he said.

Therefore, the budding fashion hound from Santa Rosa added on more income streams.

Starting in 2018, Gapelii spent three years holding down two jobs at the Healdsburg Center for the Arts and the Best Western Dry Creek Inn. And on top of that, he launched his sportswear clothing line — Gapelii Brand — in 2019, so he could rely on his own business income later in life as he entered his 30s.

“I was trying to make ends meet, working seven days a week. My goal was to pay off my credit card. I was living to work. My sleep was limited,” he said. “I was working weekends too, at a time when you want to let your hair down.”

Gapelii isn’t alone in his quest and challenge while paying about $2,000 a month for his apartment.

“I know of a family of four staying in a one-bedroom (unit) in my building, fighting to make it work,” he said.

After business picked up for his fashion line and he went to work for Sonoma County’s health department, Gapelii’s situation improved. He has currently positioned his solo household above the real-cost threshold, but he’s aware the situation is tenuous for many experiencing financial hardships — especially those that fall into a certain demographic, citizenship and living situations.

Across the North Bay and beyond to Northern California, clusters of neighborhood households are failing to meet basic living standards, according to the real-cost report.

In Napa County, the report shows 29% of residents in households numbering 11,554 are not making ends meet. The statistic is in line with Marin County’s 28% of households with residents not living up to the basic standards.

Farther east, Solano County — a center for projected Bay Area population growth through 2050 — 31% don’t meet the standards among 38,897 households.

While in sparsely populated Lake and Mendocino counties, 30% of households (12,921) fall below the threshold. The two counties are considered together in the report.

Statewide, 7 in 10 single mothers, numbering 576,000 households, are unable to afford the basic necessities, according to the study. And, 57% of U.S. non-citizens in the state struggle to make ends meet.

While families and individual households of all races face financial challenges, those led by people of color — Gapelii included — are disproportionately impacted.

Among the 31% (3.7 million) of households in California living below the cost threshold, 45% identify as Black; 51% Latino and 44% Native American or Alaskan Native. Whites unable to afford basic necessities amount to about half these percentages.

Gapelii, a Black man, said he’s “not at all” surprised by the findings.

“I know people in that situation. I would be looking at a similar thing without so many jobs. People have had to rent out rooms,” he said.

Gapelii said that he knows several people clawing to get out of an unsustainable life. He emphasized that education is key, an assumption supported by the study declaring that seven in 10 households led by a person without a high school diploma fall below the real cost measure.

“The majority of the demographic is still stuck in the ‘hood, looking for an opportunity to get out, but it’s often either the grave or jail,” he said.

In the competitive job market, Gapelli explained, systemic racism exacerbates the problem, failing to provide opportunities to pay enough to live on.

And anyone in any town of any race may experience a monumental setback.

“One single disaster can wipe out a bank account,” he said.

The up-close-and-personal observation was not lost on United Way of the Wine Country’s chief executive. Lisa Carreno told attendees on a conference call announcing the pending release of the report that her region has suffered at least a handful of climate change–fueled disasters in the last decade. Also, a devastating medical condition may hit a family hard.

“Here in our region, the real-cost measure has gone up significantly since 2021. Most are struggling because of housing costs,” Carreno said.

In 2020–2021 rental costs have gone up 20%, Carreno indicated. And that only accounts for what exists. The county is notoriously low on housing inventory, short 38,000 units. Beyond losing some units to wildfire rampages, overall building in Sonoma County has declined over the last decade.

“We need to ask ourselves, ‘Why did that happen, and how can we reverse the trend?’” she said.

Statewide, 4.3 million Californians pay at least 30% of their income on housing, a statistic the nonprofit’s study pointed to as likely contributing to the 34% of California households (3.7 million) prone to living above annual living standards estimated at $93,691.

In addition to other United Ways officials across the state on the video conference call were state Sen. Steve Padilla, D-San Diego, and Assemblyman Miguel Santiago, D-Los Angeles.

“The real cost measure work is so essential in broadening possibilities for all of California,” said Padilla, who admitted that costs in his home district in San Diego have skyrocketed.

Santiago shared a dire assessment of Los Angeles. The metropolitan area has a community with the state’s highest rate of households below the real-cost measure (76%), according to the report: East Vernon, located in southeast Los Angeles. The state’s lowest rate of struggling households lies in the East Bay region of Walnut Creek, Lafayette, Orinda and Moraga in Contra Costa County.

“People are hurting. The federal measure and standards don’t do the trick anymore. Our (state) budget needs to reflect our values,” Santiago said. “If we really mean and take this to heart, then we have a lot of work to do.”

For the most part, both lawmakers listened on to a dialogue that included both the Golden State’s challenges and silver linings.

United Ways of California President Pete Manzo responded to a question from the North Bay Business Journal about what is working to close the living-cost gap.

Manzo pointed to a young-child state tax credit. And on the national level, he also noted the $1 billion in cash handed out as stimulus for households earning under $30,000 a year — the federal poverty level for a family of four. For individuals, it’s almost half that.

Nearly 38 million Americans live in poverty, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

“The reason we do it is because the federal poverty level is too low,” Manzo said about the reason for the real-cost report. “It only tells you how much money you don’t have.”

Manzo reminded the group the real-cost measure is updated as a tool to guide communities “in what to do about this,” by way of programs and policies.

“Working is not enough,” he said, adding that guaranteed-income pilot programs work. “They just have to work to scale.”

Carreno noted one pilot project that also works in the Wine Country: the First 5 Sonoma County guaranteed-income program launched at the beginning of 2023. The program, which runs for two years, offers $500 a month to 305 local families. The program is designed to provide financial stability to those in need of a leg up.

Susan Wood covers law, cannabis, production, tech, energy, transportation, agriculture as well as banking and finance. She can be reached at 530-545-8662 or susan.wood@busjrnl.com