Collier County is a wealthy county. According to data from the financial technology company SmartAsset, Collier County is the second wealthiest county in Florida, with a median income of more than $75,000, and according to Realtor.com’s current data a median home value at nearly $675,000.
And it’s an older county, with a median age of 51.5 years. The median age across the state of Florida is 42.7. And Collier County is growing, with nearly 400,000 residents as of 2022 with a projected population of 450,000 by the end of the decade.
But, alongside that wealth many country residents are struggling. According to the Collier County Community and Human Services Division nearly 53,000 people commute to work every day from outside the county. 35% of jobs in the county pay less than 35-thousand a year. 58% pay less than 45-thousand a year. All while in 2022 the median rental cost was $2230 a month. Based on that number, to spend 30% on housing — which is what’s recommended — you would need to make about $120,000 a year.
These are just some of the challenges that the Collier Community Foundation faces as it tries to raise money to help support nonprofits and other local causes. Collier County government does not use any tax dollars to give to any nonprofit issues, and so nonprofits in Collier County need to raise $402-million every single year and the community foundation does what it can to help.
To assess what the needs are, and how they have changed over time, the foundation conducts an assessment every five years, and they just released the 2022-23 Collier County Community Assessment (CCCA) report, in partnership with the Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation. It provides a snapshot of Collier County and the needs of its residents. You can read the full report here.
We sit down with Collier Community Foundation’s President & CEO, Eileen Connolly-Keesler, to go over some of the report’s highlights, and the set of challenges county residents are facing, and the challenges the community foundation faces in trying to support them. This conversation was recorded on Jan. 18, 2024.
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