John Braun: Legislators have unique opportunity to help prepare for the ‘silver tsunami’
Friday, February 7, 2025
Between 2010 and 2023, the 65-and-older population in Washington increased by more than 40%. In 18 of our 39 counties, at least 25% of the population was at least 65 when the 2020 census was taken; in one-third of those, at least one third of residents were 65 and older.
This growing wave of older Americans is nicknamed the “silver tsunami.” It presents special challenges for state governments because older people have their own special needs, particularly in the health-care category.
Our state doesn’t have the providers and skilled workforce to meet the coming demand for senior-oriented health care. While we aren’t unique in that respect, our Legislature is in a unique position to make major progress this year on this public-policy challenge.
Bipartisan legislation before the Senate’s Higher Education and Workforce Development Committee would create, within the public higher-education system, a campus dedicated to instruction in health sciences. This would include behavioral health, dental, nursing and more.
If creating a campus meant starting with a patch of bare land, it might be harder to win support for Senate Bill 5424. But the state already owns the ideal location, which isn’t being used to its full potential.
It’s the main campus of The Evergreen State College (TESC), outside Olympia.
If SB 5424 is passed, it would mean the end of Evergreen. The institution would essentially be transferred to the control of the University of Washington, and designated as the UW health sciences campus.
The bill says the college would be “abolished,” but “retired” might be a more accurate term for a campus that appears to be well past its most productive years.
TESC is located where it is because state lawmakers recognized southwest Washington residents were farther removed than many in our state from a public four-year college. The enabling legislation they passed in 1967 even specified that the campus of what it called the “Southwestern Washington State College” be sited within a 10-mile radius of Olympia.
It’s no wonder, then, that many people have taken advantage of that proximity — while many others have appreciated TESC’s unique and unconventional approach to higher education. As it’s human nature for college graduates to be proud of and protective of their alma mater, the introduction of SB 5424 has understandably evoked some strong feelings.
Still, the numbers just don’t support the idea that taxpayers should continue to settle for the return they get on the sizable investment made to keep TESC going.
That’s especially true considering our state and its aging population have such a great need for the intermediate-level health-care providers that would be the focus of a new health-sciences campus: nurses, physician’s assistants, nurse practitioners, physical therapists, mental-health professionals, paramedics and so on.
TESC’s full-time enrollment peaked at 4,835 in 2009, then sank steadily through 2021 — the college’s 50th anniversary. There’s no blaming the pandemic, either, because enrollment had already dropped well below 2,900 as of 2019.
To put it in a 20th District context, Evergreen’s total 2024 enrollment of 2,386 is almost identical to the current enrollment in the Woodland School District, about 10% more than Rochester, and much less than Centralia or Chehalis.
Its in-state enrollment was on par with Olympia High School, or Centralia and W.F. West (Chehalis) high schools combined.
While the 2024 enrollment is also Evergreen’s highest since 2019, it’s still less than half of the record set 15 years ago. What’s maybe more telling is that Evergreen had exactly as many students in 2024 as in 1982, and only three more students than in 1973, when the college was just three years old.
In that sense, there should be plenty of space to train the healthcare workforce our state needs.
The lack of enrollment seems to be at least partly self-inflicted. Evergreen’s unconventional educational approach is acting as a roadblock for would-be transfer students, such as those from the popular community college just a few highway exits away, because it doesn’t allow them to plan their course loads – and path to completing their degrees – several quarters in advance.
It’s also possible that a majority of today’s prospective students are just less attracted in general to TESC’s educational approach – and there is no reason to think the college will alter its approach accordingly.
Under SB 5424, the mission of the proposed University of Washington health-sciences campus would be to provide baccalaureate and graduate degrees that are “integral to supporting the health care system and meeting the health needs of Washingtonians.”
Such a special-purpose campus would not be new to our state. Each of the regional universities in Bellingham, Ellensburg and Cheney began as a “normal school,” authorized by legislators more than 120 years ago to meet the demand for schoolteachers in Washington communities.
Also, this is a good time to make such a bold move. I say that because in mid-2024, the state’s new Center for Behavioral Health and Learning, also operated by the UW, came online in the Northgate area of Seattle.
Legislators had authorized that project in 2019, obviously having no idea there would soon be a pandemic and a failed drug-decriminalization experiment that greatly highlighted the need for behavioral-health services.
It was a huge undertaking at the time, but knowing what we know now, it’s a good thing we didn’t wait on moving ahead with that facility.
The same is true for dealing with the silver tsunami. By 2030, every person in the baby-boom generation will be at least 65 years old.
Compared to the time and money it took to get the UW behavioral-health center up and running, repurposing the Evergreen campus should be relatively straightforward.
There is no question Evergreen has occupied a unique place in our state’s history. But the real question is this: Should Washington taxpayers be expected to continue supporting a state-owned facility that is underperforming, or should legislators plot a new course that makes better use of a unique asset in a way that could benefit more Washingtonians?
A dedicated health-sciences campus, as proposed in SB 5424, will make our state better.
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Sen. John Braun of Centralia serves the 20th Legislative District, which spans parts of four counties from Yelm to Vancouver. He became Senate Republican leader in 2020.