Noozhawk wants to talk to locals who grew up on the South Coast, from Goleta to Carpinteria, about how the high cost of housing forced you to leave or consider leaving your community.

We know that so many people who grew up here have not been able to buy homes or find an apartment to live in. In some cases, you may have moved to Lompoc, Santa Maria, Oxnard, Ventura or other places on the Central Coast.

Others have moved out of the area altogether, choosing places such as Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Utah and Idaho. Or Colorado and Texas.

It’s a sad situation when the people who grew up here aren’t able to stay and contribute to the community they and their families helped shape.

We’ve attached a Google Form that we hope you will fill out to tell us your story. We may use the information and contact you for our reporting on Santa Barbara County’s housing crisis.

We’re going to be engaging our readers on other housing-related topics, including how multiple families and individuals live in apartments together to share rent costs, affordable housing limitations, landlord evictions, and much more. We’re also open to your ideas.

Ultimately, we hope our series will create a community conversation about ways to increase housing options for people who live and work here, and send a message to policymakers who make decisions about housing development.

Please take a few minutes to fill out the Google Form below and tell us about why you left the community you grew up in.

Thank you for your help.