As a Rust belt town of 65,000 people in eastern Indiana, Muncie may not be the most exciting place in the world. It doesn’t have beaches, year-round warm weather or much in the way of cosmopolitanism.
But for Laura Rivas, a cybersecurity engineer formerly of North Miami Beach, Florida, Muncie is perfect.
Before she moved there in 2022, life in Florida had become unbearable.
Climate crisis-strengthened hurricanes and flooding meant her homeowner’s insurance was skyrocketing.
“The climate has gotten so bad – every hurricane season was worse than the last,” she said recently. The insurance companies “couldn’t afford [to operate in Florida] any more”.
Miami has been dubbed “ground zero” for climate risk and sea levels along Florida’s coast have already risen by as much as 8in (20cm) since 1950.
Shortly after receiving a notice in the mail in 2022 that her homeowner’s insurance would rise to almost $3,000 monthly, she saw her stepfather interviewed on local TV. His own property in Fort Myers had been destroyed by a tornado.
Rivas made her mind up right then – it was time to go.
Now, she owns a sizable three-bed home in Muncie, works from home and is excited to go ice fishing this winter.
“My mortgage and homeowner’s insurance are $600 a month, total,” she said. “Five times less than my homeowners’ insurance for a home half the size in Florida.”
Rivas isn’t alone.
Thousands of Puerto Ricans have fled devastating hurricanes on the island in 2017 and 2022 for new lives in Buffalo, New York, where a thriving community is adding to the former Rust belt city’s human tapestry. Californians fleeing wildfires are moving to Duluth, Minnesota, a city on the shores of Lake Superior that was once described as being “climate-proof”.
Planners in Detroit, Cleveland and beyond are looking at how to upgrade their infrastructure ahead of a possible growth of climate-induced migration.
“It’s probably no coincidence that the majority of our movers to the midwest originate from Texas, California and Florida – states that are disproportionately impacted by climate change,” said Evan Hock of MakeMyMove, an Indianapolis-based company that partners with small cities across the country to offer incentives to remote workers to relocate. It has helped about 1,000 people from Colorado, Seattle and elsewhere move to small towns and cities in Indiana, Iowa, Missouri and elsewhere in the midwest.
“Many movers who relocate from the increasing heat of the south tell us they are happy to experience all four seasons and look forward to a winter that provides a break from the heat,” he said.
Still, this summer has shown that there is no escape from the effects of the climate crisis, regardless of location. The last week of August across the midwest saw record high temperatures. Cities such as Cleveland, Detroit and Ann Arbor were battered by intense storms in June and August. Last year, much of the region was blanketed in smoke for days from Canadian wildfires, fueling rounds of air quality advisories.
“Mental stress following flooding events can cause substantial health impacts, including sleeplessness, anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder,” one government report on climate change in the midwest found.
Then there’s the infrastructural demands that an influx of people – housing and transportation to name two – and a growing population would place on communities.
“We still don’t know who will come and when they will come, and even if they will. But there’s a concern that the most vulnerable people in midwestern cities may be left behind again,” said Derek Van Berkel of the University of Michigan, who is strategizing with other researchers for an expected growing incoming population to the midwest and Great Lakes region in the years and decades ahead.
He and a team at the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences and Assessments (Glisa) project have done a survey which found the public is rather accepting of climate migrants even if some cities do not appear to want them.
“Because they are not often at the table to make those decisions, they’re the ones who potentially have to endure the fact that their area is gentrifying, or their tax rates are going up and they just can’t afford living in their community any more,” Van Berkel said.
For Rivas, some of the downsides of life in eastern Indiana include having to spend a little more on the specialty fruits and vegetables she likes – as well as longer delivery times. It’s also a little difficult meeting new people, and she says she’s keenly aware of the potential consequences of gentrification on locals. Despite having grown up in Chicago, she says the winter winds are also a major downside for her, though her wood-burning stove helps with that.
But one surprising upside is how Rivas, who has a Kamala Harris sticker on her phone, has connected with her Donald Trump-supporting neighbor. “We agree to disagree sometimes, but he’s helped me with a plumbing problem, and we connect over gardening,” she said.
In recent years, Muncie, whose economy was built on automotive and glass industries in the 20th century, has been rebounding. A local university has proposed a $200m revitalization project encompassing the campus and surrounding residential neighborhood west of downtown.
She also makes regular trips with her partner to card shops in Indianapolis, an hour’s drive west.
Furthermore, Rivas has grown a mullet hairstyle that many closely associate with non-cosmopolitan America.
“I’ve always wanted one since I was a kid,” she says. “Now, I’m finally in the place where it’s acceptable.”
