Snowbirds find work

SNOWBIRDS-WORK -- Jerry Larsen helps Anna Perciasepe search on Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2007, for light bulbs at The Home Depot in south Fort Myers, Fla. Larsen and his wife, Lois, work six months at The Home Depot store in Fla., and the rest of the year at the home improvement chain's outlet in Mentor, Ohio. (Gannett News Service, Todd Stubing/The Fort Myers (Fla.) News-Press/File)

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Wire Services BY LAURA RUANE

GANNETT NEWS SERVICE

FORT MYERS, Fla. - Not all of Southwest Florida's winter residents come just to play. Some, including Jerry and Lois Larsen, work here, too.

The Larsens - he's 65; she's 62 - work six months at The Home Depot store in south Fort Myers and the rest of the year at the home improvement chain's outlet in Mentor, Ohio. This is the third year where both of them worked at both stores.

They don't need their part-time jobs to make ends meet.

"We have to do something; we're hyper," Lois Larsen said.

A University of Florida study estimated 818,000 snowbirds descended on the Sunshine State during the peak of the 2005 winter season. Their behaviors are harder to track than those of tourists, who typically stay in hotels and pay county bed taxes.

No one has put dollar figures to the economic impact of Florida's snowbirds, although bureaucrats and businesspeople believe it is substantial.

The Home Depot employs a number of people like the Larsens, "but we've never really kept count of it," said Don Harrison, spokesman for the chain's southern division.

Some other businesses offered estimates:

* CVS pharmacy: More than 1,000 are in a snowbird employment program, out of a 170,000-member work force companywide.

"It's really taken off: Three years ago, it was zero," said Steve Wing, CVS director of government programs.

Hourly clerks, pharmacists and even some store managers participate in the snowbird program.

For the first time this winter, Wing's pharmacist-brother, Jim, will leave a Cincinnati CVS to work seasonally at a store in Fort Myers.

"The equipment is the same. You don't have to worry about training someone," Steve Wing said. "You do have to learn new people, new faces."

* Bealls: As many as 15 percent of workers at the south Fort Myers department store are snowbirds, said Dave Dodson, a Bradenton, Fla.-based division vice president. That percentage might be applicable to most company stores in Southeastern and Southwestern Florida, Dodson said.

* Lee Memorial Health System: The region's biggest hospital operator this year will use about 160 "travel nurses" who work one or two 13-week stints. These are nurses employed by an outside agency that finds them affordable rental housing while they are here.

A smaller group, no more than 25 Lee Memorial employees, are in a summers-off program, said Jon Cecil, chief human resources officer. They don't get paid during the summer furloughs, but benefits continue. Many of the hospital's volunteers are also snowbirds.

"I don't know how we'd do it without them," he said.

Why do snowbirds work? The director of Boston College's Center on Aging & Work doesn't know of any study that prioritizes the reasons. However, Marcie Pitt-Catsouphes noted two motivators.

"There are people who need the income or who want a little extra income security," she said, "and there are those who appreciate the non-monetary value of work."

Many people, Pitt-Catsouphes said, "feel working helps them stay healthy and alert."

Cycling between jobs and leisure works for the Larsens.

Jerry, an electrical engineer who oversaw the construction of a nuclear power plant, works in The Home Depot's electrical department. Lois, who owned and operated a travel agency for 19 years, works at the customer service counter.

From mid-April to mid-October, they handle the same tasks at the Ohio store.

Up north, they work fewer weekends so they can be available for cookouts with nearby family members. Here, they don't mind working different shifts or weekends.

Said Jerry: "When we're down here, every day's a weekend."