County Manager: Seniors 65 and older make up quarter of Douglas population

More than a quarter of Douglas County’s population is over the age of 65 and is expected to climb from 26.4 to 38.7 percent in the near future.

That aging population has resulted in a nearly 20 percent decline in the number of students attending Douglas County schools over the last dozen years, Douglas County Manager Patrick Cates said at last week’s annual State of the Counties hosted by the Northern Nevada Development Authority.

According to Cates’ presentation, Douglas has seen a population growth of 5.3 percent over the past 12 years, slightly more than a third of the growth statewide.

In fiscal year 2021-22, Cates said property taxes remained the county’s largest source of revenue at 38 percent, with 21 percent of funding through intergovernmental shared revenues, 20 percent through room taxes and the rest through capital or operating grants or sales taxes.

At the beginning of this fiscal year, Douglas stopped receiving a guaranteed share of state sales tax based on population that so far is on track to raise an additional $1 million in new revenue.

“One of my goals is to increase the amount of federal funds we bring into the county,” he said, referring to projects such as the Carson Valley Medical Center, a 54,000-square-foot expansion now in progress, to assist an older population who might rely on such dollars to expand medical services and capital improvement opportunities.

Cates also referred to the Barton Health regional expansion at Stateline, transforming the former Lakeside Inn and Casino into a new hospital. He also said the American AVK Co. expansion for which the Nevada Governor’s Office of Economic Development has approved approximately $1 million in tax abatements in December would supply about 60 jobs for this 130,000-square-foot casting factory. The project would be operational in late spring 2024.

Cates said the Tahoe Blue Center, a planned 5,500 seat arena, is planned to open in July and will offer visitors meeting room and convention space as well as job opportunities.

Cates said he was excited about the Muller Parkway project, a collector road between South Gardnerville and North Minden to help ease congesting on the Highway 395 with the groundbreaking scheduled for later this year, as well as the Art in Public Places project.