Almost heaven, West Virginia? Maine faces cash competition for out-of-state workers

courtesy / west virginia tourism office No, this tourist attraction isn't a Maine lighthouse. It's a beacon on Summersville Lake, West Virginia, and is the landlocked state's only one.

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By William Hall

Maine isn’t the only state leveraging the pandemic to lure out-of-state workers — and one of the competitors is sweetening its attraction with cash.

West Virginia last week began offering $12,000 to any eligible remote worker who moves to the Mountain State. The incentive program, Ascend WV, "will allow adventurers to enjoy world-class recreation, uncrowded spaces, and a low cost of living while staying fully connected to their jobs,” according to the Ascend WV website.

The $12,000 is spread over two years, with a series of $8,300 payments for the first 12 months and $2,000 paid at the end of the second year. If you move early, you keep the money you've earned.

You also get a year-long package of outdoor recreation perks, like ski passes and camping gear rentals, which bring the total value to $20,000, the program says. Applicants must be 18 or older with a full-time remote job at a company located outside of West Virginia.

Ascend WV is targeting certain locations within the state, beginning with Morgantown, where over 2,000 people have applied for 50 of the relocation payments, according to a local TV station.

Pre-pandemic, Vermont offered offered a similar program, a "remote worker grant" of $10,000. And there are some other such programs around the country.

In the Pine Tree State, the Live+Work in Maine initiative has been trying to attract workers via selling points geared to the pandemic: remote access to work, outdoor recreation, and sparsely populated, relatively COVID-safe open spaces.

While the state isn’t offering a cash incentive, Maine has other draws that stand out in the grab for new residents, according to the business-led campaign.

“Without any extra financial incentives, talent from around the country flocked to Maine in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Live+Work in Maine Executive Director Nate Wildes told Mainebiz on Monday.

“Our world-class quality of life is an attractant for nearly 40 million tourists every year, and it's been one of our chief goals to convert some of those folks from a short-term vacation mindset into one which brings them here full-time. COVID accelerated about a decade of that work into a single year.”

Still, Maine and West Virginia each has its charm, says a Mainebiz staffer who's lived in both.

Andrea Tetzlaff, director of advertising sales, is a native of Gorham who moved to Morgantown as a teenager and lived in West Virginia for 14 years before returning to her home state.

Both states are “amazing” and similar in some ways, including the vibrancy of their rural regions and their natural beauty, she said.

There are some key differences, however. West Virginia has seen over 149,000 cases of COVID-19, and nearly 2,800 deaths. Maine has a population roughly three-quarters the size of West Virginia's, but a case count less than 40% of its total. As of Monday, 765 Mainers had died of COVID-19.

Maine's unemployment rate has also been tracking substantially lower, and was 4.8% in March compared to the West Virginia rate of 5.9%.

Tetzlaff said, “I love both states, and West Virginia has a lot to offer job-seekers, but you just can't get a good lobster roll in Morgantown.”