May 21, 2025 • 59 mins
Ready to explore Flagstaff, Arizona? Today, we’re diving into why this mountain town is a fab spot for LGBTQ retirees. Our special guest, Nancy Sullivan, spills the tea on everything from the breathtaking nature to the welcoming vibe for our community. We chat about the outdoorsy lifestyle, the rising cost of living, and how the climate’s changing—spoiler alert: it’s getting warmer! Plus, we’ll dish on the arts, culture, and those delicious local eats that make Flagstaff a hidden gem. So grab your hiking boots, and let’s get ready to fall in love with Flagstaff!
Flagstaff, Arizona, is a hidden gem for LGBTQ retirees looking for a vibrant and welcoming community. With stunning natural beauty, outdoor adventures, and a climate that keeps things cool in the summer, it’s no wonder that people are flocking to this high-desert paradise. Nancy Sullivan, a music professor at Northern Arizona University, shares her journey of moving from Seattle to Flagstaff for a job opportunity, and she hasn’t looked back since. She describes the friendly atmosphere and liberal values that make Flagstaff feel like home, especially for those in the LGBTQ community. Retirees can enjoy a myriad of outdoor activities like hiking, biking, and even horseback riding right from their doorsteps, thanks to the abundance of trails and parks. Nancy's enthusiasm for her small ranch outside of town, where she lives with her wife and their animals, paints a picture of a life filled with adventure and tranquility.
The climate in Flagstaff is another standout feature, especially for retirees who prefer a cooler environment compared to the scorching heat of Phoenix. Nancy discusses the high-desert climate, the changes due to climate change, and how the elevation impacts the weather patterns. She stresses that while the winters can be snowy and cold, they also offer opportunities for winter sports, making it a year-round playground for outdoor enthusiasts. For those considering Flagstaff as a retirement destination, Nancy emphasizes the need to acclimatize to the elevation but reassures that the lifestyle is worth the adjustment. The community spirit and the beautiful landscapes are definite pros, making Flagstaff an attractive option for anyone looking to retire in a friendly and engaging environment.
Takeaways:
- Flagstaff is a stunning place filled with outdoor activities, perfect for nature lovers who want to stay active during retirement.
- The cost of living in Flagstaff can be a bit high, especially housing prices, so plan your budget accordingly.
- The LGBTQ community in Flagstaff is incredibly welcoming, making it a safe haven for retirees looking for inclusivity.
- Climate change is impacting Flagstaff, with hotter summers and less snowfall, so it's good to be aware of changing weather patterns.
- Wildfires are a real concern in Flagstaff, and retirees should have a solid emergency plan in place.
- Transportation options in Flagstaff are pretty good, with a decent public bus system and lots of bike-friendly routes available.
Links referenced in this episode:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Welcome to the Where Do GaysRetire? Podcast where we help you
in the LGBTQ community find asafe and affordable retirement place.
Join Mark Goldstein as heinterviews others who live in gay
friendly places around theglobe. Learn about the climate, cost
of living, health care, crimeand safety, and more. Now here's
(00:23):
your host, Mark Goldstein.
Have you ever wondered whatit's like living in Flagstaff, Arizona
today? We'll find out. We haveour special guest, Nancy Sullivan
and I'll tell you a little bitabout Nancy. Nancy is a teaching
(00:45):
professor of music and hasbeen teaching French horn and chamber
music at Northern ArizonaUniversity since 1994. She performs
as principal horn with theFlagstaff Symphony, is a member of
the Kokopelli and Eldon BrassFaculty Quintets, the NAU Faculty
(01:06):
Chamber Players, substitutehorn with the Phoenix and Tucson
Symphonies, co principal hornwith the San Juan Symphony in Durango,
Colorado, member of theFlagstaff Festival Orchestra, and
has performed in the ArizonaOperas Orchestra's production of
both Wagner's Ring Cycles.Nancy has also always been very involved
(01:31):
with animal advocacy and isthe past Flagstaff coordinator for
the Arizona PUG Rescue andAdoption Network while also being
a foster parent to manyhomeless pugs. Oh, I love pugs. They're
so cute. She is also an activevolunteer and member of Best Friends
Animal Sanctuary. Otherfavorite activities include trail
(01:53):
riding her three ponies,hiking, camping, running, biking.
I'm out of breath already.Enjoying her two kids and generally
exploring and enjoyingNorthern Arizona's outdoor beauty
on her small ranch outsideFlagstaff with her wife, Claire.
Welcome, Nancy. Thank you somuch for coming and joining us at
(02:17):
the podcast. We reallyappreciate it.
Thank you, Mark.
You're welcome. So we'll startoff. Nancy, can you tell us? Well,
I told the audience a littlebit about you, but why did you choose
Flagstaff, Arizona as yourplace to live?
So I was living in Seattle.When I chose to come to Flagstaff.
(02:38):
It was mostly a connection tonau, a performing musician in Seattle.
And there was a job openinghere at NAU in the music department
and I auditioned for it. Andwhen I came for the audition, it
just spoke to me. The beautyhere, the outdoors. I always was
a very outdoorsy person andthis just felt like the perfect niche
(02:59):
spot for me and justabsolutely gorgeous. So when I got
offered the job at nau, I tookit immediately because I was so excited
to live in the beauty ofFlagstaff and the climate here.
What would you tell somebodyconsidering Flagstaff as a retirement
destination? What comes to mind?
The very first thing thatcomes to mind for Me is always just
(03:21):
outdoorsy stuff. Nature. It isgorgeous. It's beautiful. Also I'm
an animal person. It's areally easy place to live with animals.
It's a very friendly place andwelcoming and it's very liberal here,
especially for Arizona. Butfor anywhere that I've lived, it
just, it, it feels verywelcoming and it has been very welcoming.
(03:44):
So the climate is wonderful.Changing a little bit. But when I
first came, very inviting.
You like the colder weather?
I do.
As opposed to Phoenix?
Yes.
Gotcha. How would you describeFlagstaff's climate? I know it's
cold and crisp, not what itwas years ago, but what's it like
(04:05):
to live at 7,000ft elevation?
So it's high desert here, it'sdry, but it's mountainous. You know,
it's cool. It tends to becool. Although the summers have really
started heating up, as havethe winters. Things are changing.
Certainly when I first camethere was easily 100 inches of snow
(04:27):
on average a year, every year.We counted on it. I love snow, I
love cross country ski and soyou know, a winter type a more a
colder climate. And I've movedto the east side of town now and
it's a little bit more desertyout there. It's warmer. We have a
(04:47):
longer growing season now, soit's definitely warmed up here. But
living at 7,000ft keeps thingscooler, especially for the state
of Arizona. Lots of peoplelike to come and visit Flagstaff
for that reason. Ourtemperatures in the summer don't
tend to get above the. We usedto say the 80s, now we say the 90s.
(05:08):
Though we did have our veryfirst hundred degree temperatures
last summer. I think so.Especially on the east side of town
where I live. So the climate,it, you know, it suits me because
I like cold weather. But it'sdefinitely getting warmer.
Yeah. And it's Phoenix getawayplace in the summer that we can just
go two hours and go toFlagstaffing, get some cooler refreshing
(05:32):
temperatures compared toPhoenix. Do you think the altitude
affects retirees? You know, asfar as higher elevations, is it.
Do you have to get used to itlike catching your breath?
Some people do. You definitelyhave to climatize for the elevation,
especially for people who areeven going up on snowball and higher
(05:55):
in the summer. My elderlyparents used to do fine here and
didn't struggle with that. Ittakes them a couple days just to
get used to it. But somepeople really struggle. Some people,
especially if you've got heartor breathing issues, it's definitely
a thing here. Some People haveto supplement their oxygen levels.
So if those are issues thataffect you, I'm not sure Flagstaff
(06:17):
is an easy place for you,though. I've certainly known people
who live here and bring theiroxygen tanks with them and stuff,
but, yeah, that. That can bean issue for people. It's also very
dry here, as is most ofArizona. But something about the
being high elevation and dry,I think can get to people. I've had
to just get used to it allthese years. I, being a performing
(06:38):
musician, I really have to becareful about. I can't have chapped
lips, etc. So I have to behydrated. Yeah.
So you mentioned it's gettingwarmer. Let's talk a little bit about
climate change and how it hasimpacted Flagstaff in recent years.
What noticeable changes intemperature? You said it did reach
(07:00):
100 last year. Yeah, lastyear. How about precipitation and
wildfires as well?
So I know climate is a hugeissue everywhere. It's a huge issue
here, and I feel like we'reseeing it right in front of our eyes
right now. Mostly, I would saythe first thing that comes to mind
is heat. We've had an increasein heat both in the summer and the
(07:21):
winter. So we do not have thesnowpack in the winter that we need
for our water reserves. Sothere's a drought issue that results
from that. But we also havehad this just much more heat in the
summer. Not only higher, like100 degree temperatures, but sustained
heat. So, you know, maybe wewould start getting hot in June and
(07:45):
it would last, you know, untilthe monsoons. Well, now, since we
barely seem to have monsoonsanymore, we have this heat that starts
in almost May now and goestill whether we get monsoons or not.
It may be through August, andthat's really changed things. Granted,
I live outside of town on theeast side, and it's, you know, a
(08:07):
little lower in elevation, soour growing season is longer. That's
the only thing I can think ofthat's good about it. If you're in
direct sun, it's very hot, andthe sun is a real issue. And then
in the winter, we don't havethe snowpack that we need for our
water. And of course, thethings that impacts are many. But
(08:28):
wildfire has been a veryserious problem here. I've lived
here for 30 years. I've beenevacuated five times now for fire
and once for flooding. So weget the wildfire danger. The Forest
Service seems reluctant toclose the forests when the winds
and the heat are bad andthere's lightning and or people are
(08:50):
using the forests for campingand making campfires. And fires have
gotten out of control andburned properties. Millions of acres
of ponderosa pine forest,which affects the climate as well.
It affects your view, all thethings. And being evacuated is a
very scary thing. So wildfirehas become a much bigger element
(09:14):
in my life than it used to be.I've always been a person who's tried
to live in that kind of urbanwildland interface area, and that's
what I loved about the placehere. So I wanted to live close to
the woods. Well, it's verydangerous now. And on top of that,
with wildfire, it's hard toget your home insured in the places
that I want to live. I triedto live in an off grid place a couple
(09:37):
years ago. I tried to buy anew place, and it's basically on
a forest service road.Couldn't find anyone who would insure
that space. And the peoplejust ended up not selling. So also
there are certain zip codeswhere insurance companies are dropping
people, you know, because ofthe terrible fires we had three years
(09:58):
ago and four years ago andfive years ago. So wildfire is a
real problem. The forestservice is trying to do prescribed
burns and get rid of a lot offuel litter on the bottom of the
forest floor, but all theyears of fire suppression have really
affected it. Of course, welove our. All of our really heavily
(10:19):
packed trees, but clearingthose out has become really necessary.
And then if you go out on theeast side of Flagstaff, where I live,
timberline area, Donee parkarea, you'll look up and it's just.
That side of the mountain isjust pretty much burned. So those
people, their views and theirhome values have gone down because
of the view is of a burnedmountain. So that's a real problem.
(10:43):
It's a real. It's a real scarything here. And when we get these
spring and early summer winds,the winds can really activate these
fires and make them veryscary. Owning three horses is also
a scary thing when you haveto. The last time I had to evacuate,
I was here at work and I hadto get home. There was kind of a
(11:04):
traffic jam trying to get hometo get my horses out. And when everything's
blowing around and you've gota big fire plume in the sky and your
horses are, you know, all the.Everything's elevated and it's. Sometimes
they don't want to go in thetrailer. So it's a very exciting,
not in a good way event. So,yeah, that's been a real issue for
(11:26):
Flagstaff in the last fewyears, and it's scary.
Besides the controlled burns,is the city doing anything to mitigate
climate change, whether it beflooding or wildfires?
Yes, the city's pretty activein this. We're trying to be carbon
neutral by 2030. And the cityruns mountain lion buses that are
(11:47):
run on natural gas nowswitching to electric. So they make
efforts. We've got a communityin town called Friends of Flagstaff's
Future. It's veryenvironmentally focused. And what
else did I note about that?We're building heat resilience in
town. There's quite a lot ofcooperative extension agents who
(12:09):
are giving seminars on growingfood, because that's actually the
one pro to this is that'sincreasing. We have a longer growing
season. Our growing season hasalways been so short because we've
been so cold. So that's reallythe only good thing I see about it,
is being able to grow morefood. But in terms of fire, prescribed
(12:31):
burns, and those sorts ofthings, that's more Forest Service.
It's more a nationalorganization. I mean, the city does
consult with the ForestService. I've been to several community
events organized by the cityto talk to forest agents about what's
happening with fire andevacuation procedures. The city has
(12:52):
a. An emergency system thatwe're all on that we get notified
of any kind of wildfire. Infact, I just got one this morning,
which seems crazy because itwas raining and snowing here, but
I was glad for that system ofnotification. And having been evacuated
so many times, I feel like theForest Service really has their act
together with that. So that'smostly handled by the Forest Service.
(13:14):
The forest is all around ushere in Flagstaff. We're surrounded
by it. So that nationalorganization plays a big role here.
And flooding could be just asworse or even worse because there's
no place for the water to go.What is the city doing, if anything,
for flooding?
Yes. So the city and thecounty are doing a lot for flooding.
(13:36):
I got flooded very badly twoyears ago, three years ago, and I
actually had to get out of myhouse because of flooding with my
animals as well. They werestanding up to their knees in water.
I did not get the kind offlooding that was a raging river.
I got what's called ponding.So my property became a lake. It
(13:57):
was very unpleasant. I gotwater in my garage. I had 3,000 sandbags.
The county came out with amitigation plan that was very good.
But they started out with, Ido not live in a floodplain. But
what was Burned. The tanksthat were burned up so high in the
inner basin were burned sobadly that the water just ran down
(14:18):
like a river. So the areathat's called Timberline was hit
very badly with, like, ragingflooding. And the county has built
infrastructure to have thatwater flow come down, but of course,
it can't contain all of it.And so that water definitely impacted
people's homes. But the countyhas applied for federal funds and
(14:40):
got a lot of federal funds forthat issue and did a great job. I
think they helped us withsandbags. They started out saying
that I needed a thousandsandbags, which I thought was really
overkill. By the time I wasall done with that whole process,
I had over 3,000 sandbags atmy house. And luckily for me, I did
that work because I would havehad water in my house had I not put
(15:03):
those sandbags out. So myproperty value went down in a day.
It's coming back now. Itlooked a little bit like Death Valley
for a day or so or for a yearor so, just, you know, silt and.
Yeah, it took everything away.So kind of got that handled now.
And the county has done agreat job of handling. Handling flood
(15:24):
mitigation. They have builtretention ponds. They have supplied
sandbags. They have put upconcrete barriers. I had eight concrete
barriers around my house for ayear, which was not fun, but saved
my home for sure. And I wasglad for that. The county provided
those, and then I requestedthrough a lot of forms to get them
(15:45):
taken away. So they're gonenow, and I'm glad for that, too.
I have regraded the road infront of my house, which is a dirt
road, privately maintained,and put some ditches on either sides,
and that has really helped. Sowe all have done a lot of work around
flooding for if this happensagain. The county has done so much
(16:05):
work that we're hoping andthinking we won't have nearly the
problem we had two years agoacross the east side of Flagstaff.
It was bad. And in town, theyhad some flooding as well on the
west side of town. And thecity really got on that quickly and
built a new retention pond onthe west side of town that is. Seemed
(16:26):
to handle things very well. Sothe city and county both did a great
job with the flooding. Thefire, I think the city and county
have much less say in it. Andso it's. We're up to the Forest Service
to call it. And I don't havequite as much confidence in that
after all these years.
Right. Looks like you're veryinvolved in Climate change yourself.
(16:51):
I am kind of a climateinformation geek aficionado and it
scares me some too. It'sactually why I know your podcast
a little bit, because afterbeing evacuated for the fourth or
fifth time, I can't remember,I started looking at, gosh, where
am I going to go? I don't knowthat I can do this anymore. In the
(17:11):
meantime, I think it'sstrengthened my love of the community
here. So it's a double edgedsword that. That topic. I see things
changing and I love mycommunity and my community is very
strong and resilient. And I'mone of those people who prob wants
to really dig my heels in hereand see what I can do for Flagstaff
to save us for the futureinstead of running away. But I'm
(17:34):
not sure I would call itrunning away when you've been evacuated
that many times. So nowgranted, I was living in the kind
of homes that you're going toget evacuated because you live near
the trees. I didn't live intown, so.
Right. Okay. Now that we tookcare of that, the ugly things.
Sorry. But yes, I love ithere. Fine.
(17:54):
It's part of what everybodyshould know. Yes, tell us about outdoor
activities and naturalattractions that make Flagstaff appealing
for retirees. What. What doesFlagstaff have to offer?
This is why it's all worth itto live here. There is so much hiking
and you don't have to drive togo hiking. You just, I mean, I just
(18:16):
go hiking from my housebecause I live close, but almost
everyone lives close. It's,you know, I have friends in Colorado
who are always talking abouthow they have to get in the car to
go hike somewhere. And I canride my bike, I can walk. There's
so many hikes here and sohiking is the main one for me. Birding.
I wrote down a huge listbecause there's so many. Biking.
(18:37):
I bike to work a lot as well.Mountain biking, kayaking on our
lakes here and rivers.Camping, climbing, cross country
skiing, downhill skiing,snowshoeing, you name it. Anything
that's outdoorsy. Trailriding. There's so many trail riding
folks here. Horse community.So anything outdoorsy is fun here.
(18:59):
Even for folks who enjoy likeATVs and stuff like that. We have
an ATV area that's separate todo that kind of thing. So I just.
Anything. Being outdoors iswonderful here and so easy to get
to. And Sedona is 30 minutesfrom us, so if it's cold here, you
just run down to Sedona andwarm up about 15, 20 degrees. That's
right. So it's wonderful. Andwe have the access to Grand Canyon,
(19:22):
Waupat Key, Walnut CanyonNational Monument, Sunset Crater
National Monument, PaintedDesert, Sedona. I mean, it's. The
north rim is three hours from us.
It's beautiful.
The outdoor opportunities arereally endless here. It's wonderful.
It's worth it.
Yeah. Whenever it gets reallyhot, we're like, oh, should we do
(19:45):
the Flagstaff thing?
Right.
Yeah. So that's great. Allright, let's. Let's get a little
bit into cost of living.
Yes.
What's the median cost of atwo bedroom, two bath, single family
home in Flagstaff?
So I had trouble finding that,but I went to several different sites
(20:05):
and what I did was I tookZillow, realtor.com and Redfin, and
I added them all up and justaveraged them. And I was surprised
at the cost. A medium medianand they don't give it for a two
bedroom. I'm assuming it's athree bedroom, two bath.
Okay.
But it's seven. $724,000 isthe median. That surprised me quite
(20:29):
a lot. That's pretty high. Ilive outside of town and it's less
expensive where I live, butthat's pretty high. And that's one
of the things about Flagstaffto know is the housing costs here
are high. It's. They just keeprising every year. We never seem
to stop, stay the same, or godown. So as a homeowner, I feel lucky
(20:51):
in that regard, unless I'mmoving to another home in Flagstaff.
Right.
Yeah. But owning here, I'veowned here for 30 years, so I. That's
been a huge investment.There's really low inventory here
for housing because we aresurrounded by national forests on
almost every side. So, youknow, finding an open lot to build
(21:15):
a house on is very difficultand there's a high demand. So housing
is our highest thing here forsure. We are 385 square foot is our
average. That's high, andthat's 45% higher than the national
average. These are all thingsI'm just learning. I knew it was
high, but I didn't realizethat we've gone up 13.6% housing
(21:39):
costs from last year. So it'sgreat for somebody who wants to sell
their home. Yeah, you want tosell and move from Flagstaff, you
make a lot of money. It's agood place to invest in a home because
you definitely make it back.But it's, it's, you know, it's a
deterrent to living here ifthat's an issue for you with owning
a home. Now, there are placesthat aren't in Flagstaff that are
(22:03):
close to town that are lessexpensive. Like the area community
I live in is called Doney parkon the east side of town, Timberline.
There's some places out on thewest side of town that are a little
bit less. And the south sideof town there are a little bit less
as well.
But saving grace to that isalso Arizona has a low property tax.
We do. Yes.
(22:23):
So compared to other states,like if you were to compare California
and Arizona, it's really.There's a big difference there.
Yeah. Even in spite of all thefire and flood, I think our property
tax is stay pretty low. Yeah,that's good.
Yes, it is. Okay. You learnsomething new every day.
(22:44):
That's right. Same.
How about renting? Do you knowwhat an average rent would be for
a home?
Yes, rentals are high here. Ilooked those up. And a two bedroom,
two bath averages between 750and 2,000amonth in town. Less outside
(23:05):
of town, but in town that's init. And I haven't rented in a very
long time, but that seemspretty high to me. Of course we have
a huge, you know, NAU has30,000 students, so we have a lot
of rentals near the universityand I think they can just charge
that kind of rent.
Compared to Phoenix, it's low.
It's low. Oh, okay.
(23:25):
Wow.
Okay.
I don't think you can get atwo bedroom, two bath in Phoenix
for less than, than I'm goingto think 2500.
Okay. Okay.
Well, it has exploded inPhoenix as well.
Yeah. Well, for a house out inmy neighborhood now, granted I have
(23:46):
two and a half acres. I havehorses, I have a beautiful view.
My house is not fancy. It'sabout 1500 square feet. But I could
rent my house for 2,500,$3,000 a month. But it's a three
bedroom, two bath with someacreage, so that's a little higher,
but. Okay. That's interestingto know.
Yeah. Okay. So what canretirees expect to pay for utilities?
(24:11):
Electric, water, heating.
Yeah, you know, I struggledlooking that one up a little bit
too. It's so variable here.Some people heat their homes with
a wood stove. There's a lot ofthat here. Kind of certainly us hippies
who like to do this sort ofthing or whatever. So that's a different
kind of cost. But I did comeup with some numbers where that is
(24:33):
here. So electricity wasaround 114amonth. Mine is significantly
less than That I have airconditioning, but I rarely use it
because I have built someshade. I built a porch on the back
of my house that really keepsmy house a lot cooler. So my electricity
bill is much lower than that.I have natural gas, and that's in
(24:56):
the $100 a month range aswell. Maybe averages out over the
year.
And that's for heating, right?
That's for heating and maybe alittle bit of cooling. Electricity.
I have some electricity in mybarn across my property, too. Water
is about fifty dollar range.And I have a pretty big garden. I
do rainwater collecting, so Iuse that in Arizona. I think you
(25:19):
got to do whatever you can, right?
Yeah.
It's not illegal here tocollect gray water, so a lot of us
do that who have gardens. AndI collect water for my horses as
well, so. So that one was alittle bit harder for me to. To,
you know, I tried to look itup online and I couldn't find anything
definitive. So I would sayit's probably. I didn't find anything.
(25:41):
That said it's way moreexpensive to live here. I would say
you're paying more for heatingcosts than you are for cooling costs
here.
Oh, yeah.
A lot of people don't have airconditioners here a lot. Now, where
I live on the east side oftown, where it's less expensive,
it's hotter. So we're maybe66,700ft as opposed to 7,000ft. And
that little bit of difference,plus being on the other side of the
(26:03):
mountain makes it warmer andsunnier, and so it's not quite as
cold. So.
Yeah. And compared to Phoenix,your cooling cost is low.
Wait. Yeah, we don't have alot of cooling.
Summer. We are in the 2000s inthe summer.
Yeah. I would say most of thepeople I know here in Flagstaff do
(26:24):
not have air conditioning. Ifpeople are building more recent homes
as things are heating up,people are putting in more air conditioning.
Now you see that on a Facebookpost every summer, people starting
to say where. Who are thepeople to look for to put in air
conditioning?
Air conditioning?
Yeah, that's a new thing here.So people don't have those costs
as much as more heating. Andthen a lot of people here use either
(26:45):
pellet stoves, wood stoves,some passive heating sources. Yeah.
Solar panels.
Yeah, we should have more of those.
Big environmental community here.
That's good. That's good toknow. How about groceries? Are you
online with the US Average,you think, or are you a little bit
more.
I think we're more. I'm Prettysure we're more. I looked it up but
(27:07):
didn't find anythingdefinitive and I just asked friends
and everyone thinks we'remore. Part of it is shipping it up
the hill from, you know,Phoenix area or wherever the products
are coming from. We are at theintersection of I40 and I17 so that
makes it easy. But coming fromanywhere it's going to be a trek
on a truck or something. Soour prices are higher. We don't have
(27:31):
a lot of Costco's, we don'thave any Costco here. We don't have
that type of store. We haveone Sam's Club, we have a Super Walmart
and then we have a Big Fry'sgrocery store and that's definitely.
Those are the least expensiveplaces to buy groceries. We have
community co ops and theFlagstaff Farmers Market for farm
(27:52):
fresh type locally sourcedproduce. And then we have the typical
Safeway and Bashessupermarkets which are more significantly
more expensive than fries orwe don't have a Costco. We don't
have a Trader Joe's yet. Wewant one very much. We have Sprouts.
I love shopping at Sprouts.It's expensive. We have natural grocers
(28:16):
and we have a Whole Foods. So.
So you have a. Have prettymuch what we have except for the
Costco, right? Yeah. So okay.And yeah, it's funny how a Safeway
or a Fries could havedifferent prices in different places.
Safeway, it is different herein California than it is back home
(28:39):
in Phoenix. It's a little bitmore here.
Oh yeah. And gas over there. Wow.
That's another thing. Howabout gas? That's an average gas.
Yeah, gas here is higher thanthe average for sure. My, my wife
lives part time in SouthCarolina and their costs are like
in the. She'll say oh, gas hasgotten up to 250 and I'm like oh
(29:01):
well it's four dollars here agallon. We're in the I think three
dollar a gallon now. Rightnow. So it's pretty low here but
we tend to be on the higherend because gas has to be trucked
up here. I when I'll travel toPhoenix to go to the airport sometimes
or whatever and I'll get alittle bit here and then I'll have
a big four wheel drive truck.So I'll tank up down there for sure.
(29:24):
And yeah.
All right. So a little bitmore than the national average or
Phoenix area. Yes, but that'skind of expected if they have to
make the truck up.
Right.
So okay, how abouttransportation? Do you have any transportation
(29:48):
other than your own vehicle?
Yes, we have some really goodoptions here. We have the Mountain
Lion Lion. Mountain lion bussystem. Originally was really forward
thinking. They were poweringthem with natural gas and now they're
switching over to electric.And we have lots of routes here in
town. It's very affordable. Ithink a one time thirty day pass
(30:12):
is around the thirty dollarrange. A one way ticket is $1.25
each way. So people, a lot ofpeople use the bus. It goes all over
town, all the way out towardsmy side of town, past the mall. NAU
students have free publictransportation on campus. There are
buses, NAU buses on campus. Soa lot of students use that. A lot
(30:34):
of students come here withoutcars. They use their one wheels or
their scooters. And a lot ofbiking here. We have very good dedicated
bike lanes all through townand people are respectful of that
here. I have tried to be abike commuter in other towns, very
unsuccessfully. Especiallywhen I moved back to Atlanta for
(30:55):
a little while, it was like,this is dangerous here. I ride my
bike as much as I can. I, nowthat I'm getting older, have an electric
bike. E bike.
That's what I'm getting.
Yes. Wonderful. Because mycommute is 15 miles one way. So I
used to ride my regular bike,but now I'm. Yeah. And it has bigger
tires for the snow. But wehave the mountain lion bus. I think
(31:17):
it's really quite good.They're changing to electric. I'm
very glad for that. And it's apretty walkable city if you're in
town. When I lived in town, Iused to ride my bike or walk pretty
much everywhere. And workinghere at nau, I would just ride my
bike here and then walk fromthere. So between the buses and walking
(31:38):
and biking, I think it's quiteeasy to get around in Flagstaff now.
If you live out of town likeme, it's more of an effort, but.
And sometimes even I'll put mybike on the rack, take it to where
the bike lane starts near themall and just ride from there. And
that's a great kind ofalternative. So the buses are convenient,
they're clean, they work well.The routes seem to go very smoothly,
(32:03):
so I have lots of friends whoride it.
So if you're in the city ofFlagstaff, can you walk like everywhere?
Pretty much.
Pretty much, yeah.
And how convenient is the airports?
Okay, so the airport, we haveone here in town. It's a small airport,
regional airport. And lots ofmy friends who have jobs, they have
(32:25):
to travel for use thatairport. Many of the rest of us don't
so much because it adds quitea lot of cost. My older family members
definitely want to fly intoFlagstaff, though. It's much more
convenient for obviousreasons. It's right here in town.
It's on the south side oftown. So that airport, they. We had
free parking until veryrecently. Free long term parking.
(32:48):
You could park there forever.So just now they started charging.
So people are kind of upsetabout that. We didn't even have charges
for downtown parking untillast five or ten years. I don't know,
recent. So people are allupset about that. But, but the airport
that, you know, our flightsget canceled some because of weather,
mostly in the winter. And it,you know, it takes virtually no time
(33:11):
to fly from Flagstaff toPhoenix, but it adds quite a bit
in. It depends on the tripyou're taking and how far in advance
you book it. We only haveAmerican Airlines here now. In the
past, we've had United, we'vehad different airlines in combinations,
but right now it's justAmerican. So many of us make the
(33:33):
trek to sky harbor in Phoenix,which is about two hours, two and
a half, two to two and a halfhours depending on traffic to get
down there and parking and allof that. But there's also a shuttle
that runs from Flagstaff tothe sky harbor airport. It's very
convenient. My wife is comingtomorrow and she's riding the shuttle.
And it saves us, you know, thedrive back and forth. It costs less
(33:58):
actually, and it's veryconvenient. It's, you know, it's
just very convenient. You cansleep on that shuttle and.
It let somebody else do the.
It's not door to door, butit's close. So the shuttle works
well. But the, the airporthere is. It's a good thing to have,
but it's expensive.
Yeah, I would assume. Okay,now let's get into some talk about
(34:22):
arts, culture and lifestyle,which is also one of your things,
I'm sure. How would youdescribe Flagstaff's arts and culture
scene that theaters,galleries, music venues, retirees
might enjoy?
So I know a lot about NAUbecause I've worked here for 30 years
and I'm in the School ofMusic, so we have a very active performance
(34:45):
series. The faculty here atthe School of Music is always doing
concerts. Very, you know, wehave a very active schedule during
the school year. In thesummers, it's less active here on
campus, but there's stillthings going on in town. In town
we have Flagstaff Symphony,which I Play in. Very active. We
have a concert tonight,Valentine's Day concert. And the
(35:09):
orchestra stays really busy.Across Northern Arizona, we do less
run outs than we used to do.We used to go up on the Navajo Nation,
we used to go to Sedona. Westick closer to town, but we still
do serve our regionalcommunity here. We also have an orchestra,
Northern Arizona, which is acommunity orchestra that performs.
We have the FlagstaffCommunity Band, performs all over
(35:32):
the place. Very active withthem. Lots of music here. Downtown
Coconino center for the Arts,the Orpheum Theater has. I saw Brandy
Carlisle there, wonderfulintimate venue. And Indigo Girls,
I saw them there. We also hadthe Pepsi Amphitheater, which is
our outdoor amphitheater inthe summer and wonderful space to
(35:53):
perform. I've performed theremany times and then watch people
perform. It's a beautifulspace. And so there's lots of music
going on downtown at private,not private venues, but restaurants
and smaller venues as well.Lots of live music going on. And
for art galleries, we havequite a few on campus that are active.
I have one right upstairs fromme, from my office. And in town we
(36:16):
have the first Friday art walkevery month. That's a lot of fun.
A lot of times they'll havemusic going at those events. Everybody
walks around to the differentgalleries, looking at things and
enjoying that scene here. It'snot quite the scene that you get
in a similar place like SantaFe, but it's. There's definitely
an art scene here. Yes. And wehave a lot of participation from
(36:41):
our native community here, sothat's really interesting as well.
So theater, we have FlagShakespeare Company that has collaborated
with the symphony. We havedance groups, we have modern dance
groups. Human Nature DanceCompany. I have gone and seen some
really interesting things wayout in the woods, way out in the
(37:01):
desert that have been put onby these very interesting performance
art companies and or dancecompanies. So a lot going on here
for the arts and culture insuch a small town. There's a lot
of intersection with naturehere. Try to get outside and play.
I've played at the Observatorymany times. Played out in the woods
before and had lots of peoplecome. So, yeah, that's kind of a
(37:25):
neat thing that we do here.It's in the realm of performance
art, I guess, but it justfeels like celebrating nature. So
it's pretty fun. And then wehave some festivals related to the
arts and culture here. You'veprobably heard about our Picking
in the Pines. It's thebluegrass festival that happens every
fall. I always miss it becauseit's the first week that NAU starts
(37:46):
back. We have a big countyfair. We have a huge county here
in Coffee, Coconino County.And the fair is wonderful. Lots to
look at there and see lots ofanimal stuff and art stuff, food
stuff, all kinds of things. Wehave our folk festival that happens
every year. We have a wool andfiber festival, which often there's
music at that folks come offthe nation and they bring their sheep,
(38:11):
and there's all kinds ofshearing demonstrations that go on.
There's often music anddifferent cultural things happening
at that event as well. It's areally neat event. We have had classical
music festivals in the past.We don't have one this year yet.
I think that's beingreformatted. There's a Horizon series
in the summer that happens,that brings in national artists from
(38:34):
all genres, not justclassical. And then, you know, things
spring up here and there thathappen. In fact, we had a lot of
outdoors activities here,including running events. And at
the running events, we had aBeethoven 5K. So, you know, some
of us went and played forthat. Played. And I ran at the. Oh,
I'm trying to think of whatit's called, the Prayer Run on one
(38:56):
of the observatory trailshere. And they had Hopi artists out
playing their instruments outon the trails while we were doing
the run. And that was really great.
Well, no wonder why you'rethere for. You're living there for
30 years.
That's right. Hopefully I livea long time because of this. Yes,
it's true.
Yeah, you will. It's great.That is wonderful. So how about the
(39:19):
dining scene? Flagstaff hassome good restaurants.
We really do. And I wrote somethings down, so I'm going to turn
to that. We are kind of knownfor our Mexican food, and there's
lots of really good places. Wehave a lot of craft beer here. Several,
you know, several breweries. Imean, really good beers that have
(39:40):
won a lot of international andnational awards. We have gourmet
burger places here. We havelocal food places here. So I guess
I'll just name off some of theplaces that I asked my friends about
when I was preparing for this.So the Tinderbox is wonderful. It's
a wonderful place to eat.Shift is another one downtown. These
are so far. These are allgoing to be downtown. So Soba is
(40:03):
a ramen place. Martin's is avery famous Mexican place. We have
a vegan place called RedCurry. Josephine's is a wonderful,
more fine dining place. It's areally quaint house. It's an old
historic home and it has allthese little nooks and crannies of
places to eat. It's wonderful.We have the Himalayan Cafe, which
(40:26):
is Himalayan food. There's aplace called the Tourist Home, which
is very good on the south sideof town. And then the Beaver Street
Brewery and LumberyardBrewery, both wonderful. There's
many other breweries. MotherRoad is another one to mention. My
favorite pizza place is calledPizzicletta. It's connected to Mother
Road Brewing. There's anotherrestaurant called Proper, which is
(40:49):
very good, locally sourcedmeats. Satchmo's is a New Orleans
style restaurant place.
Wow.
We have a very historic placecalled Macy's Coffee House, which
is wonderful. It's a Europeanstyle coffee house. I always take.
Anyone who comes to town, Itake to Macy's. It's wonderful. We
have Salsa. Bravo. Which is akind of a famous Mexican place. It
(41:11):
was featured on that. The showabout divey restaurants. I forget
exactly what it's called. Itwas featured on there. That's it.
That's it. It was featured onthere. It is good. And it's not very
expensive. And then we havethe Gourmet Diablo Burger. It's a
gourmet burger kind of aplace. We have some sort of finer
restaurants. The Atria is oneof them. We have all different things.
(41:32):
And then a lot of people fromhere, if they really want to go have
something really historic andfine dining, we'll head up to the
El Tovar restaurant at GrandCanyon and have a nice lunch up there
with a view of the GrandCanyon. It's wonderful.
It sounds great.
Yeah.
Sounds like. Yeah. There's noshortage of restaurants.
There's such great restaurantsfor such a small town.
(41:53):
Yeah, it sounds wonderful.Awesome. Okay, so let's get into
the LGBTQ community. Howwelcoming is Flagstaff now? I know.
I believe on the HRC MunicipalEquality Index, they scored 100 if
I'm not mistaken. So does thecity have a reputation for inclusivity?
(42:18):
Absolutely. I feel the mostsafe living here of anywhere I've
ever lived. I lived inMadison, Wisconsin. I lived in Boston.
Now, granted, that was morethan 30 years ago, but Seattle, very
inclusive community. Some ofthat might be due to the fact that
I work at nau. It's a verysafe space here on campus. Even now
(42:39):
in our kind of challengingtimes, we have a lot of support here.
And so we have an LGBTQcommission here on campus. And we
talk about community issuesall over Flagstaff, but especially
related to nau. So I feel verysafe Here in this town, I always
have. I raised my two childrenhere with my ex wife and never had
(43:00):
a spot of a problem with ourkids. Our kids never had issues.
When we would go home to visitrelatives in the Atlanta area, something
would always come up when wewere there. Now, granted, we were
visiting there too, so maybepeople just got cut to the chase
and asked us questions or askthe kids questions. But there were
issues when we went there, andmy kids would always be like, wow,
(43:22):
we didn't realize. So here. Ifeel like it's extremely inclusive.
The city of Flagstaff makes areal effort with our Pride festival
here. You know, I know it'snot allowed anymore to fly trans
or LGBTQIA plus flags, butdefinitely the city of Flagstaff
always flew those flags, andit felt just extraordinarily welcoming.
(43:46):
Lots of city officials andpolice involved in our Pride Festival.
And the Friends of Flagstafffuture takes those issues into account
with our community resilience.So I think it feels very safe to
me here, for sure.
Is there an LGBTQ community center?
(44:06):
There is not. We havestruggled with that for a long time.
A lot of us were trying tokind of get something going in town,
and it seems to be reallyfocused on the NAU campus, and that's
where it seems to be. Youknow, we have an inclusive. What
do they call it, the IMQcenter here on campus, and I guess
(44:26):
we just sort of gravitate tothat, but there isn't one here in
town.
Okay, how about a seniorcenter? Is there a senior center?
There is a senior center. Ihave never been to it. Not quite
there yet. Maybe not quiteyet. I feel like when sometimes,
yeah, there's a senior center.I don't know too much about that,
actually. I have. Do havefriends who take part in the activities
(44:48):
there. So we have a communityrecreation center that has senior
things that happen there aswell, our aquaplex. And I know friends
who go and do things there.
So, yeah, as far as the LGBTQcenter, it doesn't surprise me at
all. Especially a small town.Usually it's center around the. The
college and the university. Sothat's great. All right. Is there.
(45:15):
So Flagstaff is the size wherethere wouldn't be any type of gayborhood,
so to speak. Correct.
We really don't have a gayborhood.
Everything is integrated.
Yeah, I. I think there's alot. I know a lot of women who live
outside of town more rurally.Maybe it goes along with the culture.
(45:36):
More of my gay male friendslive in town and they have their
Community. It isn't like it'sseparate, but it's.
What do you think that is? I'malways curious. My lesbian friends
always prefer to live in therural area.
Right.
And the gay guys want to livein the city.
That's right. They have nice.They have nicer interior barriers
(45:58):
than we have in their homes.
I'm like, what's up with that?
Right. It does seem to be thatway here, for sure. It just seems
to be a stereotype about us.That's true. So, yeah, we're kind
of crunchy. I don't know. Iknow lots of women who live out in
town. Out of town and live inthe country. Of course, I know plenty
of folks who live in town too.So there's no gayborhood. Really,
(46:23):
though. But it's all friendlyhere, as far as I know. In fact,
I live in a rural communityoutside of town. Been more challenging
for me with kind of. I mean,honestly, kind of rednecky people
and. But people have beenaccepting of me, and I've been. I
don't hide. But it's harderfor me out in this rural community
that I live in than when Ilived on the west side of Flagstaff
(46:46):
rurally. And it was moreinclusive there, for sure.
Okay. All right. Is there anythis. So there's no kind of gay bars?
There aren't. But almost everybar downtown is gay friendly. We
definitely go throughdifferent stages of bars. We had
a gay bar here a few yearsago. It closed very suddenly. It
(47:07):
was very packed all the time.Every time I ever went there. Drag
shows, everything. It was somuch fun. Really well done. I don't
know what happened. It was acafe and a gay bar, and it was just
great. And then it just closedall of a sudden, so we loved that.
There's quite a few placesdowntown where you go in. It's just
no big deal. And it's verycelebrated, so. But nothing specifically
(47:30):
dedicated. We do have dragshows at the Orpheum. We have drag
shows related to NAU events.We have dance parties, LGBTQBTQIA
dance parties. We have allkinds of events that are. Some of
them more sober events andsome that are at bars and clubs downtown.
(47:51):
How do you get invited to orhow do you get. How do you know what
gay events or LGBTQ events aregoing on in town?
So for me, it's usuallythrough friends, but there's also
Facebook. Quite a bit oftraffic on Facebook groups. There's
some new folks who are doingsome things. There's a new event
(48:14):
called Stitch and Bitch atBookman's. And it's just a place
like some people do crossstitching or they do some kind of
craft, and they inviteeverybody to come to Bookman's. And
you just hang out in theevening on a Tuesday night or something.
And it's supposed to be awonderful event. I really want to
go to it. I haven't been yet.You can do a puzzle. You can just
(48:36):
sit and talk to people andhave a cup of coffee. They have a
cafe there, so that's great.And I found out about that through
wondering if it's calledQueers of Northern Arizona, something
along those lines on Facebook.For sure. There is a meetup group
here. I'm not involved withthat, but I know of it and I find
out things through our LGBTQgroup here on campus. They send out,
(49:00):
you know, event announcements,so it's mostly online. I'll hear
about it. I'm in the Flagstafffront runners as well, which is a
running. A queer runninggroup. I know you guys have that
in Phoenix, too. Yeah, I'vebeen pretty involved in that. I hurt
my back very badly and thencouldn't go. But sometimes I would
just show up and walk with mydogs. And in the summers, you know,
there can be 15, 20 peoplethere. So for Flagstaff, that's a
(49:23):
big group. And we do differenttrails, and it's great. And their
allies show up as well. It'sreally. That's been kind of my social.
Biggest social group I've donein the last few years. But there's
more things that involve justgoing out at night. And for younger
folks, for sure.
Sounds good. How about let'sget into crime and safety?
(49:46):
Okay.
So I'm assuming Flagstaff is avery safe place.
It's a very safe place. And Ilooked up. I'm going to turn back
on my page here to look upwhere I found the crime statistics.
So we have quite a bit lesscrime than a lot of folks across
the country. We are at 59 per1000 residents is our number for
(50:08):
crime, so that's a very lownumber. We do have some issues with
homelessness, which I'm notnecessarily saying is related to
crime, but they. In the crimereport, they include that. So I guess
I'm including it here. Ourcity and county have done really
great job dealing with thehomeless issue here by housing people.
(50:29):
They've been renovating hotelson Route 66, on old Route 66, these
old retro hotels that they'rejust fixing up and housing people
in there. And it's Wonderful.Because, you know, too, people can
freeze out of weather here forsure, living out in the forest or
start fires.
Yeah, it's the same as. Idon't know how they do it here in
(50:49):
Phoenix in the summer. I'lltell you. I've seen people just laying
on the streets and sure, I'vegiven them water and a little baggie
of goodies.
Right.
Just so they could survive.
Yeah. The heat related deathsare going up. So, yeah, we have a,
an organization calledFlagstaff Shelter Services and they're
(51:10):
really been spearheading thisissue with renovating old sort of
rundown hotels and reallyfixing them up and having people.
And I think it's just been.That's wonderful for community. Yeah.
So we've had a lot ofassistance in that regard. And so
our crime is really quite low.We have a little bit of gang activity
in an area called Sunnyside.It's kind of on the east side of
(51:32):
town. It's kind of central tothat area. I've never seen anything
related to that. I haven'tseen a lot of graffiti here. None
of that sort of thing. I don't.
I would assume there's verylittle violent crime as opposed to,
you know, like.
Very little violent crimehere. I'm terrible. Nobody knows
(51:53):
where I live. That's good.Half of us don't lock our doors and
I didn't lock my car door tillin the last five years. I mean, literally
here on campus. I mean, that'sterrible. That was dumb of me. Nothing
ever happened. But inFlagstaff, there's so many people
who are just like, oh, yeah,we just do the Flagstaff thing. We
just. And people never used tolock their bikes. I mean, just. I
(52:16):
do now, but, you know. Yeah,we don't. We just. It isn't. It just
especially rurally, it isn'treally like that. You worry about
like maybe a baby bear comingthrough your doggy door or something
like that, but I worry aboutcoyotes in my yard. No, there isn't
a lot of violent crime at allhere. In fact, you probably heard
about our, the situation lastsummer where a fellow killed his
(52:39):
wife and it was national news.It was a big deal in Arizona and
nobody could believe ithappened here. So, yeah, we don't
have a lot of that.
Yeah, that's good. That'sgood. Everybody loves to retire to
a safe place.
Yes.
Do you know the crime rate asin comparison to the national average?
(53:00):
Oh, you did mention the statistics.
It was 59 per 1,000 perthousand. Yeah.
Okay. So, yeah, that is prettylow. Yep. Are there any other specific
safety concerns retireesshould consider? Consider when moving?
I guess, just make sure youdon't get attacked by a bear.
Right. I would say fire is thebiggest thing, really. And that's
(53:24):
not even in the just having aplan, knowing how you're going to
deal with that issue as asafety concern. Otherwise, it's an
extremely safe place to live.I hike by myself all the time. I
mean, my mother worries aboutme, but I have had some wild animal
encounters and I've loved themall, but they haven't felt really
dangerous, so. So they'reusually afraid of us, including the
(53:46):
mountain lion that I ran into.So lucky.
That's great. Mountain lion,right. I'm a city boy. I'm like,
the most I see is squirrels.
Right.
Okay, very good. So some finalthoughts. If somebody is considering
retiring to Flagstaff, whatwould you say are the biggest pros
(54:07):
and the biggest cons?
I would say that by far thebiggest pro is nature here, outdoors,
staying active, being active,being around a lot of active people.
As an example, when I wasstill able to run, I did a lot of
like semi competitive runninghere. And there's always a group
(54:30):
for 70 and then 80 year olds.Like you'd have 80 year olds out
running the race and doingpretty well. They've lifted a whole
lot. I mean, just stayingreally active. You know, when I was
in the Atlanta area, the, youknow, we'd have an over 50 and that
would be it. But in Flagstaff,you get a lot of really active older
people. So if you enjoy thatkind of thing, you're going to fit
in here. Just nature and beingable to be in proximity to outdoors.
(54:55):
So many different kinds ofoutdoor spaces. So I would say that's
the biggest pro to here. Andthe climate, even though it's changing,
is very pleasant. It's beenvery pleasant in the summers, for
sure. In Arizona, I would sayit's the place to be. Be to be summer.
Yeah.
We always try to get away, youknow, and everybody says in Phoenix,
(55:16):
oh, you want to go to Flagstaff.
That's right.
It's so much cooler. It couldbe 30 degrees cooler.
That's right, yeah. And Iwould say the negative would be the
cost of housing. It's just themain thing here. While it's a big
investment, if you plan to buyand then sell and maybe go somewhere
a little less expensive, it'sa great. Real estate is a great investment
(55:41):
here, but it's expensive toget in. So, you know, and if you
want to rent it Sounds likeit's not that bad, is what you were
saying. I had heard frompeople it was expensive, so I would
say just the cost of livinghere and the cost of housing, but,
you know, what we get for itmakes up for it in my right.
You get what you pay for.
Yeah, you do.
What's the one thing thatwould surprise people the most about
(56:05):
Flagstaff after they moved?
You know, it surprised me whenI moved here that how much I go other
places when I'm tired of theweather. So say I'm tired of the
cold. I go down to Phoenix fora day and. Or I just go to Sedona.
I mean, Sedona is 30 to 45minutes away, depending on where
(56:27):
you live in flag. And it's 15to 20 degrees cooler, and it can
be fairly miserable here. Andyou go have a pretty nice day down
there. So that was surprisingto me. And all the cool things around
Arizona there are to do thatare within a short drive. Phoenix
is two hours, you know, northof Phoenix, Cave Creek, that whole
(56:48):
area. I know that pretty well.
Yeah.
That's less than two hours forme to get to. And I run down there,
and then I come back in thesame day. So it's. And all the camping
I do here, I've gone so manycool places that are just completely
different. So in the winter,you have all these places you can
go when it's cold and snowy uphere. And in the summer, up here
is great. And then there's theWhite Mountains. You can go enjoy
(57:11):
cool weather out that way, andit's not crowded at all, and so it's
wonderful. I love that aboutArizona. I never. I didn't know that
about that before I came here.
So, yeah, it is surprisingthat there's so much to do and there's
so many different places andmicroclimates. So if you can give
(57:31):
one piece of advice to ourLGBTQ retirees thinking about moving
to Flagstaff, what would it be?
If you like being out in abeautiful climate with a beautiful
view, almost everywhere youare here is a beautiful view. It's
the largest contiguousponderosa pine forest in the country.
You'll love it here.
(57:51):
And it's a college town, soyou have.
Your culture is very liberal.There's lots of queer people here.
And I, you know, when Ithought about. I got on your podcast
and started looking around andseeing how much cost of living was
less other places. Thecommunity here is just. It wins out
for me. And it's just thepeople and the way the people fit
(58:14):
into the landscape.
It's sounds like you foundyour forever home.
Yeah, it's pretty great.
Yeah.
So.
Well, thank you, Nancy. Andthank you so much for joining us
and coming to the podcast.It's really been educational. I love
speaking to you. I think wekind of hit it off and I, I look
(58:35):
forward to speaking to yousometime very soon.
Same. I hope you'll come visit.
I will.
Call me up.
Okay, I will. Thank you.
Take care. Okay. You too.
Bye. Bye. Bye.
Thank you for listening to theWhere Do Gays Retire? Podcast. If
you enjoyed today's episode,please subscribe to our podcast and
(58:56):
consider making a donation byclicking the coffee cup on any page
at www.wheredogaysretire.com.each cup of coffee that you buy costs
$5 and goes towards helping uscontinue the podcast. Thank you for
your continued.
Welcome to the Where Do GaysRetire? Podcast where we help you
in the LGBTQ community find asafe and affordable retirement place.
Join Mark Goldstein as heinterviews others who live in gay
friendly places around theglobe. Learn about the climate, cost
of living, health care, crimeand safety, and more. Now here's
(00:23):
your host, Mark Goldstein.
Have you ever wondered whatit's like living in Flagstaff, Arizona
today? We'll find out. We haveour special guest, Nancy Sullivan
and I'll tell you a little bitabout Nancy. Nancy is a teaching
(00:45):
professor of music and hasbeen teaching French horn and chamber
music at Northern ArizonaUniversity since 1994. She performs
as principal horn with theFlagstaff Symphony, is a member of
the Kokopelli and Eldon BrassFaculty Quintets, the NAU Faculty
(01:06):
Chamber Players, substitutehorn with the Phoenix and Tucson
Symphonies, co principal hornwith the San Juan Symphony in Durango,
Colorado, member of theFlagstaff Festival Orchestra, and
has performed in the ArizonaOperas Orchestra's production of
both Wagner's Ring Cycles.Nancy has also always been very involved
(01:31):
with animal advocacy and isthe past Flagstaff coordinator for
the Arizona PUG Rescue andAdoption Network while also being
a foster parent to manyhomeless pugs. Oh, I love pugs. They're
so cute. She is also an activevolunteer and member of Best Friends
Animal Sanctuary. Otherfavorite activities include trail
(01:53):
riding her three ponies,hiking, camping, running, biking.
I'm out of breath already.Enjoying her two kids and generally
exploring and enjoyingNorthern Arizona's outdoor beauty
on her small ranch outsideFlagstaff with her wife, Claire.
Welcome, Nancy. Thank you somuch for coming and joining us at
(02:17):
the podcast. We reallyappreciate it.
Thank you, Mark.
You're welcome. So we'll startoff. Nancy, can you tell us? Well,
I told the audience a littlebit about you, but why did you choose
Flagstaff, Arizona as yourplace to live?
So I was living in Seattle.When I chose to come to Flagstaff.
(02:38):
It was mostly a connection tonau, a performing musician in Seattle.
And there was a job openinghere at NAU in the music department
and I auditioned for it. Andwhen I came for the audition, it
just spoke to me. The beautyhere, the outdoors. I always was
a very outdoorsy person andthis just felt like the perfect niche
(02:59):
spot for me and justabsolutely gorgeous. So when I got
offered the job at nau, I tookit immediately because I was so excited
to live in the beauty ofFlagstaff and the climate here.
What would you tell somebodyconsidering Flagstaff as a retirement
destination? What comes to mind?
The very first thing thatcomes to mind for Me is always just
(03:21):
outdoorsy stuff. Nature. It isgorgeous. It's beautiful. Also I'm
an animal person. It's areally easy place to live with animals.
It's a very friendly place andwelcoming and it's very liberal here,
especially for Arizona. Butfor anywhere that I've lived, it
just, it, it feels verywelcoming and it has been very welcoming.
(03:44):
So the climate is wonderful.Changing a little bit. But when I
first came, very inviting.
You like the colder weather?
I do.
As opposed to Phoenix?
Yes.
Gotcha. How would you describeFlagstaff's climate? I know it's
cold and crisp, not what itwas years ago, but what's it like
(04:05):
to live at 7,000ft elevation?
So it's high desert here, it'sdry, but it's mountainous. You know,
it's cool. It tends to becool. Although the summers have really
started heating up, as havethe winters. Things are changing.
Certainly when I first camethere was easily 100 inches of snow
(04:27):
on average a year, every year.We counted on it. I love snow, I
love cross country ski and soyou know, a winter type a more a
colder climate. And I've movedto the east side of town now and
it's a little bit more desertyout there. It's warmer. We have a
(04:47):
longer growing season now, soit's definitely warmed up here. But
living at 7,000ft keeps thingscooler, especially for the state
of Arizona. Lots of peoplelike to come and visit Flagstaff
for that reason. Ourtemperatures in the summer don't
tend to get above the. We usedto say the 80s, now we say the 90s.
(05:08):
Though we did have our veryfirst hundred degree temperatures
last summer. I think so.Especially on the east side of town
where I live. So the climate,it, you know, it suits me because
I like cold weather. But it'sdefinitely getting warmer.
Yeah. And it's Phoenix getawayplace in the summer that we can just
go two hours and go toFlagstaffing, get some cooler refreshing
(05:32):
temperatures compared toPhoenix. Do you think the altitude
affects retirees? You know, asfar as higher elevations, is it.
Do you have to get used to itlike catching your breath?
Some people do. You definitelyhave to climatize for the elevation,
especially for people who areeven going up on snowball and higher
(05:55):
in the summer. My elderlyparents used to do fine here and
didn't struggle with that. Ittakes them a couple days just to
get used to it. But somepeople really struggle. Some people,
especially if you've got heartor breathing issues, it's definitely
a thing here. Some People haveto supplement their oxygen levels.
So if those are issues thataffect you, I'm not sure Flagstaff
(06:17):
is an easy place for you,though. I've certainly known people
who live here and bring theiroxygen tanks with them and stuff,
but, yeah, that. That can bean issue for people. It's also very
dry here, as is most ofArizona. But something about the
being high elevation and dry,I think can get to people. I've had
to just get used to it allthese years. I, being a performing
(06:38):
musician, I really have to becareful about. I can't have chapped
lips, etc. So I have to behydrated. Yeah.
So you mentioned it's gettingwarmer. Let's talk a little bit about
climate change and how it hasimpacted Flagstaff in recent years.
What noticeable changes intemperature? You said it did reach
(07:00):
100 last year. Yeah, lastyear. How about precipitation and
wildfires as well?
So I know climate is a hugeissue everywhere. It's a huge issue
here, and I feel like we'reseeing it right in front of our eyes
right now. Mostly, I would saythe first thing that comes to mind
is heat. We've had an increasein heat both in the summer and the
(07:21):
winter. So we do not have thesnowpack in the winter that we need
for our water reserves. Sothere's a drought issue that results
from that. But we also havehad this just much more heat in the
summer. Not only higher, like100 degree temperatures, but sustained
heat. So, you know, maybe wewould start getting hot in June and
(07:45):
it would last, you know, untilthe monsoons. Well, now, since we
barely seem to have monsoonsanymore, we have this heat that starts
in almost May now and goestill whether we get monsoons or not.
It may be through August, andthat's really changed things. Granted,
I live outside of town on theeast side, and it's, you know, a
(08:07):
little lower in elevation, soour growing season is longer. That's
the only thing I can think ofthat's good about it. If you're in
direct sun, it's very hot, andthe sun is a real issue. And then
in the winter, we don't havethe snowpack that we need for our
water. And of course, thethings that impacts are many. But
(08:28):
wildfire has been a veryserious problem here. I've lived
here for 30 years. I've beenevacuated five times now for fire
and once for flooding. So weget the wildfire danger. The Forest
Service seems reluctant toclose the forests when the winds
and the heat are bad andthere's lightning and or people are
(08:50):
using the forests for campingand making campfires. And fires have
gotten out of control andburned properties. Millions of acres
of ponderosa pine forest,which affects the climate as well.
It affects your view, all thethings. And being evacuated is a
very scary thing. So wildfirehas become a much bigger element
(09:14):
in my life than it used to be.I've always been a person who's tried
to live in that kind of urbanwildland interface area, and that's
what I loved about the placehere. So I wanted to live close to
the woods. Well, it's verydangerous now. And on top of that,
with wildfire, it's hard toget your home insured in the places
that I want to live. I triedto live in an off grid place a couple
(09:37):
years ago. I tried to buy anew place, and it's basically on
a forest service road.Couldn't find anyone who would insure
that space. And the peoplejust ended up not selling. So also
there are certain zip codeswhere insurance companies are dropping
people, you know, because ofthe terrible fires we had three years
(09:58):
ago and four years ago andfive years ago. So wildfire is a
real problem. The forestservice is trying to do prescribed
burns and get rid of a lot offuel litter on the bottom of the
forest floor, but all theyears of fire suppression have really
affected it. Of course, welove our. All of our really heavily
(10:19):
packed trees, but clearingthose out has become really necessary.
And then if you go out on theeast side of Flagstaff, where I live,
timberline area, Donee parkarea, you'll look up and it's just.
That side of the mountain isjust pretty much burned. So those
people, their views and theirhome values have gone down because
of the view is of a burnedmountain. So that's a real problem.
(10:43):
It's a real. It's a real scarything here. And when we get these
spring and early summer winds,the winds can really activate these
fires and make them veryscary. Owning three horses is also
a scary thing when you haveto. The last time I had to evacuate,
I was here at work and I hadto get home. There was kind of a
(11:04):
traffic jam trying to get hometo get my horses out. And when everything's
blowing around and you've gota big fire plume in the sky and your
horses are, you know, all the.Everything's elevated and it's. Sometimes
they don't want to go in thetrailer. So it's a very exciting,
not in a good way event. So,yeah, that's been a real issue for
(11:26):
Flagstaff in the last fewyears, and it's scary.
Besides the controlled burns,is the city doing anything to mitigate
climate change, whether it beflooding or wildfires?
Yes, the city's pretty activein this. We're trying to be carbon
neutral by 2030. And the cityruns mountain lion buses that are
(11:47):
run on natural gas nowswitching to electric. So they make
efforts. We've got a communityin town called Friends of Flagstaff's
Future. It's veryenvironmentally focused. And what
else did I note about that?We're building heat resilience in
town. There's quite a lot ofcooperative extension agents who
(12:09):
are giving seminars on growingfood, because that's actually the
one pro to this is that'sincreasing. We have a longer growing
season. Our growing season hasalways been so short because we've
been so cold. So that's reallythe only good thing I see about it,
is being able to grow morefood. But in terms of fire, prescribed
(12:31):
burns, and those sorts ofthings, that's more Forest Service.
It's more a nationalorganization. I mean, the city does
consult with the ForestService. I've been to several community
events organized by the cityto talk to forest agents about what's
happening with fire andevacuation procedures. The city has
(12:52):
a. An emergency system thatwe're all on that we get notified
of any kind of wildfire. Infact, I just got one this morning,
which seems crazy because itwas raining and snowing here, but
I was glad for that system ofnotification. And having been evacuated
so many times, I feel like theForest Service really has their act
together with that. So that'smostly handled by the Forest Service.
(13:14):
The forest is all around ushere in Flagstaff. We're surrounded
by it. So that nationalorganization plays a big role here.
And flooding could be just asworse or even worse because there's
no place for the water to go.What is the city doing, if anything,
for flooding?
Yes. So the city and thecounty are doing a lot for flooding.
(13:36):
I got flooded very badly twoyears ago, three years ago, and I
actually had to get out of myhouse because of flooding with my
animals as well. They werestanding up to their knees in water.
I did not get the kind offlooding that was a raging river.
I got what's called ponding.So my property became a lake. It
(13:57):
was very unpleasant. I gotwater in my garage. I had 3,000 sandbags.
The county came out with amitigation plan that was very good.
But they started out with, Ido not live in a floodplain. But
what was Burned. The tanksthat were burned up so high in the
inner basin were burned sobadly that the water just ran down
(14:18):
like a river. So the areathat's called Timberline was hit
very badly with, like, ragingflooding. And the county has built
infrastructure to have thatwater flow come down, but of course,
it can't contain all of it.And so that water definitely impacted
people's homes. But the countyhas applied for federal funds and
(14:40):
got a lot of federal funds forthat issue and did a great job. I
think they helped us withsandbags. They started out saying
that I needed a thousandsandbags, which I thought was really
overkill. By the time I wasall done with that whole process,
I had over 3,000 sandbags atmy house. And luckily for me, I did
that work because I would havehad water in my house had I not put
(15:03):
those sandbags out. So myproperty value went down in a day.
It's coming back now. Itlooked a little bit like Death Valley
for a day or so or for a yearor so, just, you know, silt and.
Yeah, it took everything away.So kind of got that handled now.
And the county has done agreat job of handling. Handling flood
(15:24):
mitigation. They have builtretention ponds. They have supplied
sandbags. They have put upconcrete barriers. I had eight concrete
barriers around my house for ayear, which was not fun, but saved
my home for sure. And I wasglad for that. The county provided
those, and then I requestedthrough a lot of forms to get them
(15:45):
taken away. So they're gonenow, and I'm glad for that, too.
I have regraded the road infront of my house, which is a dirt
road, privately maintained,and put some ditches on either sides,
and that has really helped. Sowe all have done a lot of work around
flooding for if this happensagain. The county has done so much
(16:05):
work that we're hoping andthinking we won't have nearly the
problem we had two years agoacross the east side of Flagstaff.
It was bad. And in town, theyhad some flooding as well on the
west side of town. And thecity really got on that quickly and
built a new retention pond onthe west side of town that is. Seemed
(16:26):
to handle things very well. Sothe city and county both did a great
job with the flooding. Thefire, I think the city and county
have much less say in it. Andso it's. We're up to the Forest Service
to call it. And I don't havequite as much confidence in that
after all these years.
Right. Looks like you're veryinvolved in Climate change yourself.
(16:51):
I am kind of a climateinformation geek aficionado and it
scares me some too. It'sactually why I know your podcast
a little bit, because afterbeing evacuated for the fourth or
fifth time, I can't remember,I started looking at, gosh, where
am I going to go? I don't knowthat I can do this anymore. In the
(17:11):
meantime, I think it'sstrengthened my love of the community
here. So it's a double edgedsword that. That topic. I see things
changing and I love mycommunity and my community is very
strong and resilient. And I'mone of those people who prob wants
to really dig my heels in hereand see what I can do for Flagstaff
to save us for the futureinstead of running away. But I'm
(17:34):
not sure I would call itrunning away when you've been evacuated
that many times. So nowgranted, I was living in the kind
of homes that you're going toget evacuated because you live near
the trees. I didn't live intown, so.
Right. Okay. Now that we tookcare of that, the ugly things.
Sorry. But yes, I love ithere. Fine.
(17:54):
It's part of what everybodyshould know. Yes, tell us about outdoor
activities and naturalattractions that make Flagstaff appealing
for retirees. What. What doesFlagstaff have to offer?
This is why it's all worth itto live here. There is so much hiking
and you don't have to drive togo hiking. You just, I mean, I just
(18:16):
go hiking from my housebecause I live close, but almost
everyone lives close. It's,you know, I have friends in Colorado
who are always talking abouthow they have to get in the car to
go hike somewhere. And I canride my bike, I can walk. There's
so many hikes here and sohiking is the main one for me. Birding.
I wrote down a huge listbecause there's so many. Biking.
(18:37):
I bike to work a lot as well.Mountain biking, kayaking on our
lakes here and rivers.Camping, climbing, cross country
skiing, downhill skiing,snowshoeing, you name it. Anything
that's outdoorsy. Trailriding. There's so many trail riding
folks here. Horse community.So anything outdoorsy is fun here.
(18:59):
Even for folks who enjoy likeATVs and stuff like that. We have
an ATV area that's separate todo that kind of thing. So I just.
Anything. Being outdoors iswonderful here and so easy to get
to. And Sedona is 30 minutesfrom us, so if it's cold here, you
just run down to Sedona andwarm up about 15, 20 degrees. That's
right. So it's wonderful. Andwe have the access to Grand Canyon,
(19:22):
Waupat Key, Walnut CanyonNational Monument, Sunset Crater
National Monument, PaintedDesert, Sedona. I mean, it's. The
north rim is three hours from us.
It's beautiful.
The outdoor opportunities arereally endless here. It's wonderful.
It's worth it.
Yeah. Whenever it gets reallyhot, we're like, oh, should we do
(19:45):
the Flagstaff thing?
Right.
Yeah. So that's great. Allright, let's. Let's get a little
bit into cost of living.
Yes.
What's the median cost of atwo bedroom, two bath, single family
home in Flagstaff?
So I had trouble finding that,but I went to several different sites
(20:05):
and what I did was I tookZillow, realtor.com and Redfin, and
I added them all up and justaveraged them. And I was surprised
at the cost. A medium medianand they don't give it for a two
bedroom. I'm assuming it's athree bedroom, two bath.
Okay.
But it's seven. $724,000 isthe median. That surprised me quite
(20:29):
a lot. That's pretty high. Ilive outside of town and it's less
expensive where I live, butthat's pretty high. And that's one
of the things about Flagstaffto know is the housing costs here
are high. It's. They just keeprising every year. We never seem
to stop, stay the same, or godown. So as a homeowner, I feel lucky
(20:51):
in that regard, unless I'mmoving to another home in Flagstaff.
Right.
Yeah. But owning here, I'veowned here for 30 years, so I. That's
been a huge investment.There's really low inventory here
for housing because we aresurrounded by national forests on
almost every side. So, youknow, finding an open lot to build
(21:15):
a house on is very difficultand there's a high demand. So housing
is our highest thing here forsure. We are 385 square foot is our
average. That's high, andthat's 45% higher than the national
average. These are all thingsI'm just learning. I knew it was
high, but I didn't realizethat we've gone up 13.6% housing
(21:39):
costs from last year. So it'sgreat for somebody who wants to sell
their home. Yeah, you want tosell and move from Flagstaff, you
make a lot of money. It's agood place to invest in a home because
you definitely make it back.But it's, it's, you know, it's a
deterrent to living here ifthat's an issue for you with owning
a home. Now, there are placesthat aren't in Flagstaff that are
(22:03):
close to town that are lessexpensive. Like the area community
I live in is called Doney parkon the east side of town, Timberline.
There's some places out on thewest side of town that are a little
bit less. And the south sideof town there are a little bit less
as well.
But saving grace to that isalso Arizona has a low property tax.
We do. Yes.
(22:23):
So compared to other states,like if you were to compare California
and Arizona, it's really.There's a big difference there.
Yeah. Even in spite of all thefire and flood, I think our property
tax is stay pretty low. Yeah,that's good.
Yes, it is. Okay. You learnsomething new every day.
(22:44):
That's right. Same.
How about renting? Do you knowwhat an average rent would be for
a home?
Yes, rentals are high here. Ilooked those up. And a two bedroom,
two bath averages between 750and 2,000amonth in town. Less outside
(23:05):
of town, but in town that's init. And I haven't rented in a very
long time, but that seemspretty high to me. Of course we have
a huge, you know, NAU has30,000 students, so we have a lot
of rentals near the universityand I think they can just charge
that kind of rent.
Compared to Phoenix, it's low.
It's low. Oh, okay.
(23:25):
Wow.
Okay.
I don't think you can get atwo bedroom, two bath in Phoenix
for less than, than I'm goingto think 2500.
Okay. Okay.
Well, it has exploded inPhoenix as well.
Yeah. Well, for a house out inmy neighborhood now, granted I have
(23:46):
two and a half acres. I havehorses, I have a beautiful view.
My house is not fancy. It'sabout 1500 square feet. But I could
rent my house for 2,500,$3,000 a month. But it's a three
bedroom, two bath with someacreage, so that's a little higher,
but. Okay. That's interestingto know.
Yeah. Okay. So what canretirees expect to pay for utilities?
(24:11):
Electric, water, heating.
Yeah, you know, I struggledlooking that one up a little bit
too. It's so variable here.Some people heat their homes with
a wood stove. There's a lot ofthat here. Kind of certainly us hippies
who like to do this sort ofthing or whatever. So that's a different
kind of cost. But I did comeup with some numbers where that is
(24:33):
here. So electricity wasaround 114amonth. Mine is significantly
less than That I have airconditioning, but I rarely use it
because I have built someshade. I built a porch on the back
of my house that really keepsmy house a lot cooler. So my electricity
bill is much lower than that.I have natural gas, and that's in
(24:56):
the $100 a month range aswell. Maybe averages out over the
year.
And that's for heating, right?
That's for heating and maybe alittle bit of cooling. Electricity.
I have some electricity in mybarn across my property, too. Water
is about fifty dollar range.And I have a pretty big garden. I
do rainwater collecting, so Iuse that in Arizona. I think you
(25:19):
got to do whatever you can, right?
Yeah.
It's not illegal here tocollect gray water, so a lot of us
do that who have gardens. AndI collect water for my horses as
well, so. So that one was alittle bit harder for me to. To,
you know, I tried to look itup online and I couldn't find anything
definitive. So I would sayit's probably. I didn't find anything.
(25:41):
That said it's way moreexpensive to live here. I would say
you're paying more for heatingcosts than you are for cooling costs
here.
Oh, yeah.
A lot of people don't have airconditioners here a lot. Now, where
I live on the east side oftown, where it's less expensive,
it's hotter. So we're maybe66,700ft as opposed to 7,000ft. And
that little bit of difference,plus being on the other side of the
(26:03):
mountain makes it warmer andsunnier, and so it's not quite as
cold. So.
Yeah. And compared to Phoenix,your cooling cost is low.
Wait. Yeah, we don't have alot of cooling.
Summer. We are in the 2000s inthe summer.
Yeah. I would say most of thepeople I know here in Flagstaff do
(26:24):
not have air conditioning. Ifpeople are building more recent homes
as things are heating up,people are putting in more air conditioning.
Now you see that on a Facebookpost every summer, people starting
to say where. Who are thepeople to look for to put in air
conditioning?
Air conditioning?
Yeah, that's a new thing here.So people don't have those costs
as much as more heating. Andthen a lot of people here use either
(26:45):
pellet stoves, wood stoves,some passive heating sources. Yeah.
Solar panels.
Yeah, we should have more of those.
Big environmental community here.
That's good. That's good toknow. How about groceries? Are you
online with the US Average,you think, or are you a little bit
more.
I think we're more. I'm Prettysure we're more. I looked it up but
(27:07):
didn't find anythingdefinitive and I just asked friends
and everyone thinks we'remore. Part of it is shipping it up
the hill from, you know,Phoenix area or wherever the products
are coming from. We are at theintersection of I40 and I17 so that
makes it easy. But coming fromanywhere it's going to be a trek
on a truck or something. Soour prices are higher. We don't have
(27:31):
a lot of Costco's, we don'thave any Costco here. We don't have
that type of store. We haveone Sam's Club, we have a Super Walmart
and then we have a Big Fry'sgrocery store and that's definitely.
Those are the least expensiveplaces to buy groceries. We have
community co ops and theFlagstaff Farmers Market for farm
(27:52):
fresh type locally sourcedproduce. And then we have the typical
Safeway and Bashessupermarkets which are more significantly
more expensive than fries orwe don't have a Costco. We don't
have a Trader Joe's yet. Wewant one very much. We have Sprouts.
I love shopping at Sprouts.It's expensive. We have natural grocers
(28:16):
and we have a Whole Foods. So.
So you have a. Have prettymuch what we have except for the
Costco, right? Yeah. So okay.And yeah, it's funny how a Safeway
or a Fries could havedifferent prices in different places.
Safeway, it is different herein California than it is back home
(28:39):
in Phoenix. It's a little bitmore here.
Oh yeah. And gas over there. Wow.
That's another thing. Howabout gas? That's an average gas.
Yeah, gas here is higher thanthe average for sure. My, my wife
lives part time in SouthCarolina and their costs are like
in the. She'll say oh, gas hasgotten up to 250 and I'm like oh
(29:01):
well it's four dollars here agallon. We're in the I think three
dollar a gallon now. Rightnow. So it's pretty low here but
we tend to be on the higherend because gas has to be trucked
up here. I when I'll travel toPhoenix to go to the airport sometimes
or whatever and I'll get alittle bit here and then I'll have
a big four wheel drive truck.So I'll tank up down there for sure.
(29:24):
And yeah.
All right. So a little bitmore than the national average or
Phoenix area. Yes, but that'skind of expected if they have to
make the truck up.
Right.
So okay, how abouttransportation? Do you have any transportation
(29:48):
other than your own vehicle?
Yes, we have some really goodoptions here. We have the Mountain
Lion Lion. Mountain lion bussystem. Originally was really forward
thinking. They were poweringthem with natural gas and now they're
switching over to electric.And we have lots of routes here in
town. It's very affordable. Ithink a one time thirty day pass
(30:12):
is around the thirty dollarrange. A one way ticket is $1.25
each way. So people, a lot ofpeople use the bus. It goes all over
town, all the way out towardsmy side of town, past the mall. NAU
students have free publictransportation on campus. There are
buses, NAU buses on campus. Soa lot of students use that. A lot
(30:34):
of students come here withoutcars. They use their one wheels or
their scooters. And a lot ofbiking here. We have very good dedicated
bike lanes all through townand people are respectful of that
here. I have tried to be abike commuter in other towns, very
unsuccessfully. Especiallywhen I moved back to Atlanta for
(30:55):
a little while, it was like,this is dangerous here. I ride my
bike as much as I can. I, nowthat I'm getting older, have an electric
bike. E bike.
That's what I'm getting.
Yes. Wonderful. Because mycommute is 15 miles one way. So I
used to ride my regular bike,but now I'm. Yeah. And it has bigger
tires for the snow. But wehave the mountain lion bus. I think
(31:17):
it's really quite good.They're changing to electric. I'm
very glad for that. And it's apretty walkable city if you're in
town. When I lived in town, Iused to ride my bike or walk pretty
much everywhere. And workinghere at nau, I would just ride my
bike here and then walk fromthere. So between the buses and walking
(31:38):
and biking, I think it's quiteeasy to get around in Flagstaff now.
If you live out of town likeme, it's more of an effort, but.
And sometimes even I'll put mybike on the rack, take it to where
the bike lane starts near themall and just ride from there. And
that's a great kind ofalternative. So the buses are convenient,
they're clean, they work well.The routes seem to go very smoothly,
(32:03):
so I have lots of friends whoride it.
So if you're in the city ofFlagstaff, can you walk like everywhere?
Pretty much.
Pretty much, yeah.
And how convenient is the airports?
Okay, so the airport, we haveone here in town. It's a small airport,
regional airport. And lots ofmy friends who have jobs, they have
(32:25):
to travel for use thatairport. Many of the rest of us don't
so much because it adds quitea lot of cost. My older family members
definitely want to fly intoFlagstaff, though. It's much more
convenient for obviousreasons. It's right here in town.
It's on the south side oftown. So that airport, they. We had
free parking until veryrecently. Free long term parking.
(32:48):
You could park there forever.So just now they started charging.
So people are kind of upsetabout that. We didn't even have charges
for downtown parking untillast five or ten years. I don't know,
recent. So people are allupset about that. But, but the airport
that, you know, our flightsget canceled some because of weather,
mostly in the winter. And it,you know, it takes virtually no time
(33:11):
to fly from Flagstaff toPhoenix, but it adds quite a bit
in. It depends on the tripyou're taking and how far in advance
you book it. We only haveAmerican Airlines here now. In the
past, we've had United, we'vehad different airlines in combinations,
but right now it's justAmerican. So many of us make the
(33:33):
trek to sky harbor in Phoenix,which is about two hours, two and
a half, two to two and a halfhours depending on traffic to get
down there and parking and allof that. But there's also a shuttle
that runs from Flagstaff tothe sky harbor airport. It's very
convenient. My wife is comingtomorrow and she's riding the shuttle.
And it saves us, you know, thedrive back and forth. It costs less
(33:58):
actually, and it's veryconvenient. It's, you know, it's
just very convenient. You cansleep on that shuttle and.
It let somebody else do the.
It's not door to door, butit's close. So the shuttle works
well. But the, the airporthere is. It's a good thing to have,
but it's expensive.
Yeah, I would assume. Okay,now let's get into some talk about
(34:22):
arts, culture and lifestyle,which is also one of your things,
I'm sure. How would youdescribe Flagstaff's arts and culture
scene that theaters,galleries, music venues, retirees
might enjoy?
So I know a lot about NAUbecause I've worked here for 30 years
and I'm in the School ofMusic, so we have a very active performance
(34:45):
series. The faculty here atthe School of Music is always doing
concerts. Very, you know, wehave a very active schedule during
the school year. In thesummers, it's less active here on
campus, but there's stillthings going on in town. In town
we have Flagstaff Symphony,which I Play in. Very active. We
have a concert tonight,Valentine's Day concert. And the
(35:09):
orchestra stays really busy.Across Northern Arizona, we do less
run outs than we used to do.We used to go up on the Navajo Nation,
we used to go to Sedona. Westick closer to town, but we still
do serve our regionalcommunity here. We also have an orchestra,
Northern Arizona, which is acommunity orchestra that performs.
We have the FlagstaffCommunity Band, performs all over
(35:32):
the place. Very active withthem. Lots of music here. Downtown
Coconino center for the Arts,the Orpheum Theater has. I saw Brandy
Carlisle there, wonderfulintimate venue. And Indigo Girls,
I saw them there. We also hadthe Pepsi Amphitheater, which is
our outdoor amphitheater inthe summer and wonderful space to
(35:53):
perform. I've performed theremany times and then watch people
perform. It's a beautifulspace. And so there's lots of music
going on downtown at private,not private venues, but restaurants
and smaller venues as well.Lots of live music going on. And
for art galleries, we havequite a few on campus that are active.
I have one right upstairs fromme, from my office. And in town we
(36:16):
have the first Friday art walkevery month. That's a lot of fun.
A lot of times they'll havemusic going at those events. Everybody
walks around to the differentgalleries, looking at things and
enjoying that scene here. It'snot quite the scene that you get
in a similar place like SantaFe, but it's. There's definitely
an art scene here. Yes. And wehave a lot of participation from
(36:41):
our native community here, sothat's really interesting as well.
So theater, we have FlagShakespeare Company that has collaborated
with the symphony. We havedance groups, we have modern dance
groups. Human Nature DanceCompany. I have gone and seen some
really interesting things wayout in the woods, way out in the
(37:01):
desert that have been put onby these very interesting performance
art companies and or dancecompanies. So a lot going on here
for the arts and culture insuch a small town. There's a lot
of intersection with naturehere. Try to get outside and play.
I've played at the Observatorymany times. Played out in the woods
before and had lots of peoplecome. So, yeah, that's kind of a
(37:25):
neat thing that we do here.It's in the realm of performance
art, I guess, but it justfeels like celebrating nature. So
it's pretty fun. And then wehave some festivals related to the
arts and culture here. You'veprobably heard about our Picking
in the Pines. It's thebluegrass festival that happens every
fall. I always miss it becauseit's the first week that NAU starts
(37:46):
back. We have a big countyfair. We have a huge county here
in Coffee, Coconino County.And the fair is wonderful. Lots to
look at there and see lots ofanimal stuff and art stuff, food
stuff, all kinds of things. Wehave our folk festival that happens
every year. We have a wool andfiber festival, which often there's
music at that folks come offthe nation and they bring their sheep,
(38:11):
and there's all kinds ofshearing demonstrations that go on.
There's often music anddifferent cultural things happening
at that event as well. It's areally neat event. We have had classical
music festivals in the past.We don't have one this year yet.
I think that's beingreformatted. There's a Horizon series
in the summer that happens,that brings in national artists from
(38:34):
all genres, not justclassical. And then, you know, things
spring up here and there thathappen. In fact, we had a lot of
outdoors activities here,including running events. And at
the running events, we had aBeethoven 5K. So, you know, some
of us went and played forthat. Played. And I ran at the. Oh,
I'm trying to think of whatit's called, the Prayer Run on one
(38:56):
of the observatory trailshere. And they had Hopi artists out
playing their instruments outon the trails while we were doing
the run. And that was really great.
Well, no wonder why you'rethere for. You're living there for
30 years.
That's right. Hopefully I livea long time because of this. Yes,
it's true.
Yeah, you will. It's great.That is wonderful. So how about the
(39:19):
dining scene? Flagstaff hassome good restaurants.
We really do. And I wrote somethings down, so I'm going to turn
to that. We are kind of knownfor our Mexican food, and there's
lots of really good places. Wehave a lot of craft beer here. Several,
you know, several breweries. Imean, really good beers that have
(39:40):
won a lot of international andnational awards. We have gourmet
burger places here. We havelocal food places here. So I guess
I'll just name off some of theplaces that I asked my friends about
when I was preparing for this.So the Tinderbox is wonderful. It's
a wonderful place to eat.Shift is another one downtown. These
are so far. These are allgoing to be downtown. So Soba is
(40:03):
a ramen place. Martin's is avery famous Mexican place. We have
a vegan place called RedCurry. Josephine's is a wonderful,
more fine dining place. It's areally quaint house. It's an old
historic home and it has allthese little nooks and crannies of
places to eat. It's wonderful.We have the Himalayan Cafe, which
(40:26):
is Himalayan food. There's aplace called the Tourist Home, which
is very good on the south sideof town. And then the Beaver Street
Brewery and LumberyardBrewery, both wonderful. There's
many other breweries. MotherRoad is another one to mention. My
favorite pizza place is calledPizzicletta. It's connected to Mother
Road Brewing. There's anotherrestaurant called Proper, which is
(40:49):
very good, locally sourcedmeats. Satchmo's is a New Orleans
style restaurant place.
Wow.
We have a very historic placecalled Macy's Coffee House, which
is wonderful. It's a Europeanstyle coffee house. I always take.
Anyone who comes to town, Itake to Macy's. It's wonderful. We
have Salsa. Bravo. Which is akind of a famous Mexican place. It
(41:11):
was featured on that. The showabout divey restaurants. I forget
exactly what it's called. Itwas featured on there. That's it.
That's it. It was featured onthere. It is good. And it's not very
expensive. And then we havethe Gourmet Diablo Burger. It's a
gourmet burger kind of aplace. We have some sort of finer
restaurants. The Atria is oneof them. We have all different things.
(41:32):
And then a lot of people fromhere, if they really want to go have
something really historic andfine dining, we'll head up to the
El Tovar restaurant at GrandCanyon and have a nice lunch up there
with a view of the GrandCanyon. It's wonderful.
It sounds great.
Yeah.
Sounds like. Yeah. There's noshortage of restaurants.
There's such great restaurantsfor such a small town.
(41:53):
Yeah, it sounds wonderful.Awesome. Okay, so let's get into
the LGBTQ community. Howwelcoming is Flagstaff now? I know.
I believe on the HRC MunicipalEquality Index, they scored 100 if
I'm not mistaken. So does thecity have a reputation for inclusivity?
(42:18):
Absolutely. I feel the mostsafe living here of anywhere I've
ever lived. I lived inMadison, Wisconsin. I lived in Boston.
Now, granted, that was morethan 30 years ago, but Seattle, very
inclusive community. Some ofthat might be due to the fact that
I work at nau. It's a verysafe space here on campus. Even now
(42:39):
in our kind of challengingtimes, we have a lot of support here.
And so we have an LGBTQcommission here on campus. And we
talk about community issuesall over Flagstaff, but especially
related to nau. So I feel verysafe Here in this town, I always
have. I raised my two childrenhere with my ex wife and never had
(43:00):
a spot of a problem with ourkids. Our kids never had issues.
When we would go home to visitrelatives in the Atlanta area, something
would always come up when wewere there. Now, granted, we were
visiting there too, so maybepeople just got cut to the chase
and asked us questions or askthe kids questions. But there were
issues when we went there, andmy kids would always be like, wow,
(43:22):
we didn't realize. So here. Ifeel like it's extremely inclusive.
The city of Flagstaff makes areal effort with our Pride festival
here. You know, I know it'snot allowed anymore to fly trans
or LGBTQIA plus flags, butdefinitely the city of Flagstaff
always flew those flags, andit felt just extraordinarily welcoming.
(43:46):
Lots of city officials andpolice involved in our Pride Festival.
And the Friends of Flagstafffuture takes those issues into account
with our community resilience.So I think it feels very safe to
me here, for sure.
Is there an LGBTQ community center?
(44:06):
There is not. We havestruggled with that for a long time.
A lot of us were trying tokind of get something going in town,
and it seems to be reallyfocused on the NAU campus, and that's
where it seems to be. Youknow, we have an inclusive. What
do they call it, the IMQcenter here on campus, and I guess
(44:26):
we just sort of gravitate tothat, but there isn't one here in
town.
Okay, how about a seniorcenter? Is there a senior center?
There is a senior center. Ihave never been to it. Not quite
there yet. Maybe not quiteyet. I feel like when sometimes,
yeah, there's a senior center.I don't know too much about that,
actually. I have. Do havefriends who take part in the activities
(44:48):
there. So we have a communityrecreation center that has senior
things that happen there aswell, our aquaplex. And I know friends
who go and do things there.
So, yeah, as far as the LGBTQcenter, it doesn't surprise me at
all. Especially a small town.Usually it's center around the. The
college and the university. Sothat's great. All right. Is there.
(45:15):
So Flagstaff is the size wherethere wouldn't be any type of gayborhood,
so to speak. Correct.
We really don't have a gayborhood.
Everything is integrated.
Yeah, I. I think there's alot. I know a lot of women who live
outside of town more rurally.Maybe it goes along with the culture.
(45:36):
More of my gay male friendslive in town and they have their
Community. It isn't like it'sseparate, but it's.
What do you think that is? I'malways curious. My lesbian friends
always prefer to live in therural area.
Right.
And the gay guys want to livein the city.
That's right. They have nice.They have nicer interior barriers
(45:58):
than we have in their homes.
I'm like, what's up with that?
Right. It does seem to be thatway here, for sure. It just seems
to be a stereotype about us.That's true. So, yeah, we're kind
of crunchy. I don't know. Iknow lots of women who live out in
town. Out of town and live inthe country. Of course, I know plenty
of folks who live in town too.So there's no gayborhood. Really,
(46:23):
though. But it's all friendlyhere, as far as I know. In fact,
I live in a rural communityoutside of town. Been more challenging
for me with kind of. I mean,honestly, kind of rednecky people
and. But people have beenaccepting of me, and I've been. I
don't hide. But it's harderfor me out in this rural community
that I live in than when Ilived on the west side of Flagstaff
(46:46):
rurally. And it was moreinclusive there, for sure.
Okay. All right. Is there anythis. So there's no kind of gay bars?
There aren't. But almost everybar downtown is gay friendly. We
definitely go throughdifferent stages of bars. We had
a gay bar here a few yearsago. It closed very suddenly. It
(47:07):
was very packed all the time.Every time I ever went there. Drag
shows, everything. It was somuch fun. Really well done. I don't
know what happened. It was acafe and a gay bar, and it was just
great. And then it just closedall of a sudden, so we loved that.
There's quite a few placesdowntown where you go in. It's just
no big deal. And it's verycelebrated, so. But nothing specifically
(47:30):
dedicated. We do have dragshows at the Orpheum. We have drag
shows related to NAU events.We have dance parties, LGBTQBTQIA
dance parties. We have allkinds of events that are. Some of
them more sober events andsome that are at bars and clubs downtown.
(47:51):
How do you get invited to orhow do you get. How do you know what
gay events or LGBTQ events aregoing on in town?
So for me, it's usuallythrough friends, but there's also
Facebook. Quite a bit oftraffic on Facebook groups. There's
some new folks who are doingsome things. There's a new event
(48:14):
called Stitch and Bitch atBookman's. And it's just a place
like some people do crossstitching or they do some kind of
craft, and they inviteeverybody to come to Bookman's. And
you just hang out in theevening on a Tuesday night or something.
And it's supposed to be awonderful event. I really want to
go to it. I haven't been yet.You can do a puzzle. You can just
(48:36):
sit and talk to people andhave a cup of coffee. They have a
cafe there, so that's great.And I found out about that through
wondering if it's calledQueers of Northern Arizona, something
along those lines on Facebook.For sure. There is a meetup group
here. I'm not involved withthat, but I know of it and I find
out things through our LGBTQgroup here on campus. They send out,
(49:00):
you know, event announcements,so it's mostly online. I'll hear
about it. I'm in the Flagstafffront runners as well, which is a
running. A queer runninggroup. I know you guys have that
in Phoenix, too. Yeah, I'vebeen pretty involved in that. I hurt
my back very badly and thencouldn't go. But sometimes I would
just show up and walk with mydogs. And in the summers, you know,
there can be 15, 20 peoplethere. So for Flagstaff, that's a
(49:23):
big group. And we do differenttrails, and it's great. And their
allies show up as well. It'sreally. That's been kind of my social.
Biggest social group I've donein the last few years. But there's
more things that involve justgoing out at night. And for younger
folks, for sure.
Sounds good. How about let'sget into crime and safety?
(49:46):
Okay.
So I'm assuming Flagstaff is avery safe place.
It's a very safe place. And Ilooked up. I'm going to turn back
on my page here to look upwhere I found the crime statistics.
So we have quite a bit lesscrime than a lot of folks across
the country. We are at 59 per1000 residents is our number for
(50:08):
crime, so that's a very lownumber. We do have some issues with
homelessness, which I'm notnecessarily saying is related to
crime, but they. In the crimereport, they include that. So I guess
I'm including it here. Ourcity and county have done really
great job dealing with thehomeless issue here by housing people.
(50:29):
They've been renovating hotelson Route 66, on old Route 66, these
old retro hotels that they'rejust fixing up and housing people
in there. And it's Wonderful.Because, you know, too, people can
freeze out of weather here forsure, living out in the forest or
start fires.
Yeah, it's the same as. Idon't know how they do it here in
(50:49):
Phoenix in the summer. I'lltell you. I've seen people just laying
on the streets and sure, I'vegiven them water and a little baggie
of goodies.
Right.
Just so they could survive.
Yeah. The heat related deathsare going up. So, yeah, we have a,
an organization calledFlagstaff Shelter Services and they're
(51:10):
really been spearheading thisissue with renovating old sort of
rundown hotels and reallyfixing them up and having people.
And I think it's just been.That's wonderful for community. Yeah.
So we've had a lot ofassistance in that regard. And so
our crime is really quite low.We have a little bit of gang activity
in an area called Sunnyside.It's kind of on the east side of
(51:32):
town. It's kind of central tothat area. I've never seen anything
related to that. I haven'tseen a lot of graffiti here. None
of that sort of thing. I don't.
I would assume there's verylittle violent crime as opposed to,
you know, like.
Very little violent crimehere. I'm terrible. Nobody knows
(51:53):
where I live. That's good.Half of us don't lock our doors and
I didn't lock my car door tillin the last five years. I mean, literally
here on campus. I mean, that'sterrible. That was dumb of me. Nothing
ever happened. But inFlagstaff, there's so many people
who are just like, oh, yeah,we just do the Flagstaff thing. We
just. And people never used tolock their bikes. I mean, just. I
(52:16):
do now, but, you know. Yeah,we don't. We just. It isn't. It just
especially rurally, it isn'treally like that. You worry about
like maybe a baby bear comingthrough your doggy door or something
like that, but I worry aboutcoyotes in my yard. No, there isn't
a lot of violent crime at allhere. In fact, you probably heard
about our, the situation lastsummer where a fellow killed his
(52:39):
wife and it was national news.It was a big deal in Arizona and
nobody could believe ithappened here. So, yeah, we don't
have a lot of that.
Yeah, that's good. That'sgood. Everybody loves to retire to
a safe place.
Yes.
Do you know the crime rate asin comparison to the national average?
(53:00):
Oh, you did mention the statistics.
It was 59 per 1,000 perthousand. Yeah.
Okay. So, yeah, that is prettylow. Yep. Are there any other specific
safety concerns retireesshould consider? Consider when moving?
I guess, just make sure youdon't get attacked by a bear.
Right. I would say fire is thebiggest thing, really. And that's
(53:24):
not even in the just having aplan, knowing how you're going to
deal with that issue as asafety concern. Otherwise, it's an
extremely safe place to live.I hike by myself all the time. I
mean, my mother worries aboutme, but I have had some wild animal
encounters and I've loved themall, but they haven't felt really
dangerous, so. So they'reusually afraid of us, including the
(53:46):
mountain lion that I ran into.So lucky.
That's great. Mountain lion,right. I'm a city boy. I'm like,
the most I see is squirrels.
Right.
Okay, very good. So some finalthoughts. If somebody is considering
retiring to Flagstaff, whatwould you say are the biggest pros
(54:07):
and the biggest cons?
I would say that by far thebiggest pro is nature here, outdoors,
staying active, being active,being around a lot of active people.
As an example, when I wasstill able to run, I did a lot of
like semi competitive runninghere. And there's always a group
(54:30):
for 70 and then 80 year olds.Like you'd have 80 year olds out
running the race and doingpretty well. They've lifted a whole
lot. I mean, just stayingreally active. You know, when I was
in the Atlanta area, the, youknow, we'd have an over 50 and that
would be it. But in Flagstaff,you get a lot of really active older
people. So if you enjoy thatkind of thing, you're going to fit
in here. Just nature and beingable to be in proximity to outdoors.
(54:55):
So many different kinds ofoutdoor spaces. So I would say that's
the biggest pro to here. Andthe climate, even though it's changing,
is very pleasant. It's beenvery pleasant in the summers, for
sure. In Arizona, I would sayit's the place to be. Be to be summer.
Yeah.
We always try to get away, youknow, and everybody says in Phoenix,
(55:16):
oh, you want to go to Flagstaff.
That's right.
It's so much cooler. It couldbe 30 degrees cooler.
That's right, yeah. And Iwould say the negative would be the
cost of housing. It's just themain thing here. While it's a big
investment, if you plan to buyand then sell and maybe go somewhere
a little less expensive, it'sa great. Real estate is a great investment
(55:41):
here, but it's expensive toget in. So, you know, and if you
want to rent it Sounds likeit's not that bad, is what you were
saying. I had heard frompeople it was expensive, so I would
say just the cost of livinghere and the cost of housing, but,
you know, what we get for itmakes up for it in my right.
You get what you pay for.
Yeah, you do.
What's the one thing thatwould surprise people the most about
(56:05):
Flagstaff after they moved?
You know, it surprised me whenI moved here that how much I go other
places when I'm tired of theweather. So say I'm tired of the
cold. I go down to Phoenix fora day and. Or I just go to Sedona.
I mean, Sedona is 30 to 45minutes away, depending on where
(56:27):
you live in flag. And it's 15to 20 degrees cooler, and it can
be fairly miserable here. Andyou go have a pretty nice day down
there. So that was surprisingto me. And all the cool things around
Arizona there are to do thatare within a short drive. Phoenix
is two hours, you know, northof Phoenix, Cave Creek, that whole
(56:48):
area. I know that pretty well.
Yeah.
That's less than two hours forme to get to. And I run down there,
and then I come back in thesame day. So it's. And all the camping
I do here, I've gone so manycool places that are just completely
different. So in the winter,you have all these places you can
go when it's cold and snowy uphere. And in the summer, up here
is great. And then there's theWhite Mountains. You can go enjoy
(57:11):
cool weather out that way, andit's not crowded at all, and so it's
wonderful. I love that aboutArizona. I never. I didn't know that
about that before I came here.
So, yeah, it is surprisingthat there's so much to do and there's
so many different places andmicroclimates. So if you can give
(57:31):
one piece of advice to ourLGBTQ retirees thinking about moving
to Flagstaff, what would it be?
If you like being out in abeautiful climate with a beautiful
view, almost everywhere youare here is a beautiful view. It's
the largest contiguousponderosa pine forest in the country.
You'll love it here.
(57:51):
And it's a college town, soyou have.
Your culture is very liberal.There's lots of queer people here.
And I, you know, when Ithought about. I got on your podcast
and started looking around andseeing how much cost of living was
less other places. Thecommunity here is just. It wins out
for me. And it's just thepeople and the way the people fit
(58:14):
into the landscape.
It's sounds like you foundyour forever home.
Yeah, it's pretty great.
Yeah.
So.
Well, thank you, Nancy. Andthank you so much for joining us
and coming to the podcast.It's really been educational. I love
speaking to you. I think wekind of hit it off and I, I look
(58:35):
forward to speaking to yousometime very soon.
Same. I hope you'll come visit.
I will.
Call me up.
Okay, I will. Thank you.
Take care. Okay. You too.
Bye. Bye. Bye.
Thank you for listening to theWhere Do Gays Retire? Podcast. If
you enjoyed today's episode,please subscribe to our podcast and
(58:56):
consider making a donation byclicking the coffee cup on any page
at www.wheredogaysretire.com.each cup of coffee that you buy costs
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