Tiffany Greenwaldt-Simon reports for Columbia-Greene Media that the local shortage of workers and affordable places to house them led the discussion at the Columbia-Greene Economic State of the Counties roundtable Nov. 3 at Columbia-Greene Community College. Chris Nardone, director of the Columbia-Greene Workforce, said there has been recent 6.5 percent growth in population in Greene and Columbia counties, and a 10 percent drop in the labor force. Nardone said, “We have a situation where the people that are coming to the counties, that are growing our populations and are not people who are participating in our labor force.... And to compound that, they’re also displacing working families that have been here that have traditionally filled those positions.” The median sale prices of homes in Greene County rose 81 percent last year, from $179,000 in 2018 to $325,000 in 2022, according to data from a Greene County Workforce Attainability report. So workers are being priced out of the area. No local towns are building affordable housing locally, as developers only concentrate on high-end construction. James Hannahs, executive director of the Greene County Economic Development Corporation, said at the meeting, “There are no examples of new construction housing across Greene County.... Lay everything on the table, we have to be able to attract developers and build workforce housing.” Earlier this year, Gov. Kathy Hochul promoted a plan to build 800,000 affordable units throughout the state over the next decade, but it failed in the legislature. Officials in Hudson have discussed building new housing, but nothing has been constructed. Otherwise, there is almost no action in the Hudson Valley to build new affordable housing recently. Read more about this story at HudsonValley360.com.