Luxury Real Estate

Courtesy of Michael Saunders & Company

Southwest Florida is by no means unaccustomed to being singled-out in the national and international media for being (among so many other things) one of the world’s best places to live, work, play, retire and—above all—soak up as much culture as we do sunshine. But of all the accolades that have happily come our way in recent years, an article in last week’s USA Today offered the most powerful affirmation yet of why we need to use our considerable cultural and educational assets to re-engineer our local economy.

Ted Fishman, who—in his own words—has circled the globe to catch “a glimpse at a world population that is growing ever older,” concluded in an article entitled “Growing Old Gracefully” that few American communities outside of Sarasota offer a more invigorating venue in which to age well. In his estimation, Sarasota is doing everything exactly right to engage its aging demographic; in stark contrast to other communities which he says “often communicate to people in their 50’s and older that they are past their use-by dates.”

What set’s Sarasota apart, according to Fishman—who authored the new book “Shock of Gray,” a chronicle of the astounding economic and political ramifications of an aging world—is that the city is flush with a variety of not-for-profit organizations that don’t just cater magnificently to the lifestyles of active and engaged seniors, but also attract many of their most dedicated volunteers—and much of their financial life blood—from these very same patrons.

“There is so much going on in Sarasota to promote and profit from by keeping older people engaged, active and healthy that one local civic organization touts the region as a kind of Silicon Valley for aging,” Fishman remarks. “It sounds paradoxical, but Sarasota’s critical mass of firms serving the older market produce a steady stream of innovation—in business models, services and technology—all with the needs and desires of late-life consumers in mind. Firms that pioneer innovative senior housing in Sarasota, for example, replicate it elsewhere.”

No doubt the civic organization that Fishman alludes to is Sarasota County’s Economic Development Corporation, whose five-year Economic Development Plan includes a platform based on leveraging the County’s existing assets to attract businesses hoping to design, test and deliver cutting-edge new products and services to seniors everywhere. Obviously this goal is being realized on a significant scale when informed observers—such as Fishman—sit up, take notice and rave about what they’ve seen so far.

We say “so far” because we fully believe that much more can be done to effectively transform our region’s growing reputation as an important hub of creativity into one of its chief economic drivers. Could we not dramatically lessen our dependence on boom-and-bust industries by coordinating every facet of our extraordinary cultural and educational landscape into an effort to systematically attract way more than our fair share of the 80 million-plus baby boomers who will retire over the next few years? Moreover, would not retiring educators, musicians, artists, performers and devotees of the arts lead the migration into an area as famous for its existing breadth of cultural and intellectual treasures as for its spectacular climate, coastline and natural beauty? And would our cultural institutions not likewise benefit immeasurably from a major influx of new talent, ideas, financial support and leadership that such an in-migration of creative minds would continuously foster?

What if our local colleges and cultural institutions joined forces with the City and County Boards of Commissioners, the Sarasota Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, its Arts Alliance, the Chamber of Commerce and others to strategically position Sarasota to the worldwide arts and academic communities as a place where the highest levels of creativity and intellect are known to flourish in a breathtaking and supportive environment? Doesn’t it make infinitely more sense to leverage our two most enduring civic identities—as a welcoming haven for tourists and retirees and as Florida’s cultural capitol—to attract the very people and businesses that could finally break our dependence on building and development?

The cutting-edge products that baby boomers have traditionally favored require exactly the sort of research and design capabilities that institutions such as Ringling College of Art & Design and USF possess in profusion. What if by strategically uniting and promoting these assets, our community could become a social laboratory known throughout the world for developing the products and services that will help redefine aging? Will companies arrive on our doorstep eager to set up shop and find creative solutions for the challenges of growing old that will ultimately affect every one of us? We think they’d not only show up, but would be crazy not to.