Plano Star-courier > News
City gauges public opinion: Citizen survey conducted for first time since 2008
By Bill Conrad, bconrad@starlocalnews.com
PLANO -- Residents who wish to share their feelings about city services now have a quick and convenient way to do so.
Beginning this week, city staff are mailing surveys to random Plano households asking about everything from how satisfied residents are with public safety, to how they feel about the city's recreation centers. Residents who do not receive mailed surveys can go online to fill out the survey, said Karen Rhodes-Whitley, the city's director of budget and research.
"We used to do a survey every other year, but due to the economic conditions surrounding the recession we decided to hold off," she said. "The last one we did was in 2008. We are going to get a random sampling of 400 completed surveys."
The survey will take about 10 minutes to complete and will include a series of questions which ask residents how satisfied they are with various city services. The company contracted to conduct the survey asks these same questions to residents in all of its surveys, so Plano officials will know how their services stack up with not only other cities in Texas, but those in other states as well. The remainder of the survey is made up with questions submitted by different departments within the city.
"Since we had not done a survey in four years, we thought it was important to hire an outside consultant so we would be able to benchmark with other cities," Rhodes-Whitley said.
Residents who complete the survey online will not be included in the 400 surveys compiled by the consultant, but Rhodes-Whitley said the city staff would analyze the online results on its own.
The online survey can be found at www.planosurvey.org. All surveys results will remain confidential. The results of the survey will be shared with the city council in April.
Beginning this week, city staff are mailing surveys to random Plano households asking about everything from how satisfied residents are with public safety, to how they feel about the city's recreation centers. Residents who do not receive mailed surveys can go online to fill out the survey, said Karen Rhodes-Whitley, the city's director of budget and research.
"We used to do a survey every other year, but due to the economic conditions surrounding the recession we decided to hold off," she said. "The last one we did was in 2008. We are going to get a random sampling of 400 completed surveys."
The survey will take about 10 minutes to complete and will include a series of questions which ask residents how satisfied they are with various city services. The company contracted to conduct the survey asks these same questions to residents in all of its surveys, so Plano officials will know how their services stack up with not only other cities in Texas, but those in other states as well. The remainder of the survey is made up with questions submitted by different departments within the city.
"Since we had not done a survey in four years, we thought it was important to hire an outside consultant so we would be able to benchmark with other cities," Rhodes-Whitley said.
Residents who complete the survey online will not be included in the 400 surveys compiled by the consultant, but Rhodes-Whitley said the city staff would analyze the online results on its own.
The online survey can be found at www.planosurvey.org. All surveys results will remain confidential. The results of the survey will be shared with the city council in April.
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