Tucked away in the western North Carolina mountains, generations of children have spent summer weeks at Eagle’s Nest Camp hiking, whitewater canoeing and rock climbing. But while the camp founded in 1927 may be isolated from the busy pace of modern-day life, its impact on nearby rural communities is far from disconnected, part of the state’s booming outdoor economy.
Serving more than 200 students through the summer camp and a fully-accredited semester-long boarding school for 10th- and 11th-graders, Eagle’s Nest has 30 full-time employees and hires another 60 staffers during the summer. The camp in the Pisgah Forest community of Transylvania County sources much of its food from local farmers, said Noni Waite-Kucera, longtime and outgoing executive director of the Eagle’s Nest Foundation. And employees are always running into town for other supplies.
“Multiply that by all the camps in the region, and all of a sudden, you’ve got thousands of young people spending money in the community, which really does add up,” said Waite-Kucera, whose grandfather co-founded the nonprofit camp and whose mother was the foundation’s first executive director. “And then there’s parents who come and stay, and some parents will even stay for the whole time their kids are here at camp. There’s just lots of ways this money is trickling out.”
Indeed, summer camps like Eagle’s Nest have long helped fuel North Carolina’s rural economies. A 2011 NC State study, commissioned by the N.C. Youth Camp Association, found that camps in four Western North Carolina counties, including Eagle’s Nest, produced $365 million in total economic impact to the region and created 10,335 full-time equivalent jobs. According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Statistics, outdoor businesses generated $14.6 billion in value added for North Carolina in 2022.
But as Eagle’s Nest and outdoor businesses help drive rural economies, they also aren’t immune from their challenges. Finding U.S.-based staff to work in the summer has grown increasingly difficult, so the camp has been turning more to international staff during the last couple of years.
And while the camp has provided housing for some staff on campus, finding additional affordable housing is a particular hurdle for Eagle’s Nest. With remote workers flocking to the region post-pandemic, the median house price in nearby Brevard was $690,500 in May 2024, up from $442,250 in March 2020, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. And construction prices, even for simple structures, have doubled in the past decade, Waite-Kucera estimated, totaling about $300 per square foot. “We were losing teachers because we couldn’t pay them enough to live here,” she said.
In fall 2022, the camp bought six acres with a house and barn that had been converted into a rental, providing needed housing for staff. The loan that helped make the purchase possible came from First Citizens Bank and was augmented through the NC Rural Center’s State Small Business Credit Initiative Loan Participation Program. The program partners with lenders to put additional capital into eligible deals. Sometimes that can mean a larger loan for the borrower. Sometimes that can mean they have to put in less cash upfront.
Nicola Barksdale, First Citizens’ manager of business banking for western North Carolina, said the bank considers how a client will use the loan when weighing applications. This loan was one of the first they made through the loan participation program.
“If we can lend to a client who is going to be supporting affordable housing, that is definitely something that’s on our radar,” Barksdale said.
Waite-Kucera would love to build more, but prices need to come down.
“We’ve got folks who are really pinching things together to make it work right now,” she said. That race to secure housing is critical not just to ensure their workers have affordable places to live, but to ensure that the camp can continue what it’s done for decades — nurturing a love of nature and community in young people with the mentorship of top-notch teachers and, in turn, supporting the local economy and community.
“The kids who are coming through programs such as ours and other quality programs are going to make a huge difference in the world,” Waite-Kucera said. “These are our future leaders … people who care about the environment, who care about people from all walks of life.”