Sonoma County, like the rest of California, is losing residents to other states

People kept warning Chris Davies about alligators.

He would tell folks that he and his family were moving from Cotati to Florida, and they would say, “Watch out for the gators.”

So far, reptiles haven’t been a problem.

“It’s the bears,” said Davies, a marketing consultant. “No one tells you about the bears.”

He’s kidding, kind of. Black bears are a nuisance in Seminole County, where he and his wife, Renee, and their three young children moved earlier this month. They now live in a suburb 15 miles north of Orlando.

“They’re out there, but they’re not hurting anyone,” said Davies, referring to the bears, not his offspring. “They’re kind of like big cats.”

By pulling up stakes, the Davies became part of a larger exodus that has the full attention of demographers. According to state-to-state migration data recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau, some 343,000 people left California for other states from 2021 to 2022. No state had more people move away.

Downward trend

Texas was the most popular relocation spot for Californians, with nearly 102,000 of them adopting the Lone Star State. Some 74,000 Californians crossed the state line to live in Arizona, while nearly 51,000 crossed the country to take up residence in Florida.

(20 reasons Press Democrat readers gave for moving to Texas from Sonoma County)

While slightly lower than the net loss of people incurred by California the year before, that 343,000 number underscored an eye-opening trend. In the last few years, after more than a century of robust expansion, the nation’s most populous state is officially shrinking — a watershed moment ushered in by COVID-19.

The pandemic has resulted in 104,436 confirmed deaths in California, a state with an already aging population, noted Hans Johnson, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California. “So we’ve naturally been having increased numbers of deaths.”

Add to that mix declining birthrates and “large domestic flows” out of the Golden State, he said, and you’ve got “a kind of perfect demographic storm” that explains California’s population decline.

Travel restrictions during the pandemic led to a sharp decline in international immigration, but those strictures have been lifted: if not for the 126,000 international migrants who arrived in California from 2021 to 2022, the state’s net drop in population would have been bigger still.

Even before the pandemic, Johnson pointed out, “we observed that there were substantially more people moving out of California to live in other states” than the other way around. That net out-migration, “was concentrated among less educated Californians, those without a bachelor's degree; and among middle- and lower income people.”

Since COVID, however, flows out of state “have increased substantially,” said Johnson, co-author of a recent Public Policy Institute “explainer” examining the state’s recent population declines. Those bailing on California have lately included larger numbers of “more educated people.”

Increased opportunities for remote work, especially for the highly educated, “allowed many to keep their jobs in California, which tend to be relatively well-paying, and find housing in another, lower cost state.”

California’s high cost of housing was the primary driver people cited for leaving.

‘An exodus, for sure’

That downward trend has been mirrored in Sonoma County, which now has a population of 478,174. That’s down about 25,000 since the October fires of 2017.

Because the Census Bureau doesn’t break its numbers down by county, it’s difficult to pinpoint how many people in Sonoma County left the state between 2021 and 2022, and to determine where they ended up.

U-Haul provided some clues. Over the last year, according to Andrea Batchelor, a senior media specialist for the company, the top 10 non-California destinations for one-way customers originating in Santa Rosa were: Las Vegas; Bend, Oregon; Vancouver, Washington; Tucson, Arizona; Reno, Nevada; Portland, Oregon; Phoenix; Sparks, Nevada; Seattle; and Nampa, Idaho.

“I’d say Texas, Arizona, Idaho, Washington,” said a woman working at one of Santa Rosa’s three locations, when asked where customers are moving. “And we just had two go to Maine. And one to Mississippi. It’s all over the map.”

In U-Haul’s most recent “Growth Index migration” rankings — which measure the net gain of one-way U-Haul trucks arriving in a state, versus the number leaving — Texas came in first. California came in 50th.

“It’s an exodus, for sure,” said a man who answered the phone at one of Petaluma’s three U-Haul locations. Like the woman in the Santa Rosa U-Haul office, he would not allow his name to be used.

The man said he’d recently worked with clients moving to Tennessee, and to Texas. He cited a couple that moved to Alabama because they got tired of “dipping into their retirement to pay their property taxes.

“Now they’ve got a spread about three times as big, with their own lake.”

People on their way out the door tell him, “We love it here,” he recounted, “but the cost of living is really high.”

“That’s [California Gov. Gavin] Newsom for you. He’ll tax everything.”

He shared a joke that’s oft-told, he said, in California U-Haul circles:

“Our Salesman of the Year, for two years running, is Gavin Newsom.”

Kind neighbors, mutual misconceptions

Yes, the cost of living in Sonoma County was getting onerous, says Davies, the marketing consultant who moved from Cotati to central Florida. But that’s not the only reason they relocated. Both he and Renee grew up in San Rafael and had spent much of their lives in the same area.

“We wanted to experience a different part of the country,” Davies explained. Five or six times a year, the family would make the eight-hour trek from Cotati to Disneyland in Anaheim. Now they’ve got Walt Disney World a half-hour away.

“It’s a big draw,” Chris said.

Seminole County is more liberal than they expected — 50.7% of its voters chose Joe Biden in the last presidential election.

Florida has no individual income tax, but sales tax there is considerably higher than in California, they report. More roads require tolls. “The government is going to collect its money, one way or the other,” Chris said.

They really like their neighbors, and it seems to be mutual. One brought chairs over, “because we didn’t have any furniture,” Renee said. One brought a coffee cake. Another brought a list of names and numbers for services — lawn care, plumbing, that sort of thing.

“It’s been an interesting experience,” Chris said. The Floridians he’s met “have a lot of misconceptions about California, just as a lot of Californians have misconceptions about Florida.”

Many destinations, few regrets

After 35 years in Healdsburg, Lou Gwendolyn and her husband, both teachers, put Sonoma County in their rearview mirror in April 2021. “It was not an easy decision,” she said.

They’d long “reveled in the beauty of Sonoma County,” hiking, cycling, visiting the coast, enjoying the wineries and restaurants, and “hanging out at the river with our dogs.”

But the town finally tipped too far in the direction of “pandering to tourists,” she wrote in an email, “making it inhospitable to locals.

Affluent out-of-towners smitten with Healdsburg bought second properties there, which had the double-barreled effect of driving up already stratospheric home prices and siphoning character from neighborhoods with houses that often sat unoccupied.

The second factor forcing them out was fire. While their home didn’t burn, they were evacuated three times, and decided “living repeatedly with the stresses of fire season was something we did not want to do for the rest of our lives.”

After much research, they chose to settle in Eugene, Oregon, where their son and daughter-in-law are organic farmers. While she misses much about Sonoma County — Lou singles out Parkpoint Health Club, Vedanta Women’s Retreat in Olema and the Santa Rosa Unitarian Congregation, in particular — they “adore” Eugene.

(15 things Press Democrat readers say they miss the most about Sonoma County after moving away)

“There are parks, beaches, mountains, rivers, a major university nearby which offers cultural and athletic opportunities,” she wrote. “The residents are super-friendly, and they don't drive like maniacs.”

Ex-Santa Rosan Anna Huut boiled it down to this: “Oregon is kinder, cheaper, less populated.”

‘A beautiful place to live, till it wasn’t.’

“Love the area, but jobs weren’t paying enough to cover our living costs,” emailed Kaitlyn Nichols. She and her husband were paying $2,100 a month for a Rincon Valley apartment that was less than 800 square feet. They now live in Colorado.

Jackie Stone grew up in Napa, and spent two decades working for a wine marketing company. They paid very well, “for the Valley,” she recalled. “But I still was never able to get ahead or purchase a home.”

Four years ago she moved to Las Vegas, and is now able to “live life, travel and own a home!”

Not everyone who leaves stays away. One woman moved from Santa Rosa to New Jersey a year and a half ago. Gas was cheaper, and rent was a tad lower. “But life was harder,” said the woman, who asked for anonymity. She ended up homeless, and spent nine months in a shelter with her baby daughter.

It was difficult to get services from New Jersey agencies that seemed “overwhelmed and overcrowded.”

“It was just a really difficult time.”

She returned to California this week. “I applied for welfare in California, and they called me back that day.”

But most respondents to a Press Democrat survey asking people if they’d left the North Bay for another state, and why, had very few regrets about their decision. None were more emphatic than Karen Bates, formerly of Sonoma County.

“We left due to the crime, drugs, ridiculous cost of living, taxes, homeless problem. We moved to Wasilla, Alaska. So much happier here!”

She echoed points made by Stacy Lambertz, who moved to Texas four months ago after 60 years in Sonoma County, and wrote of her old stomping ground:

“It was a beautiful place to live, till it wasn’t.”

You can reach Staff Writer Austin Murphy at austin.murphy@pressdemocrat.com or on Twitter @ausmurph88.