Citizen survey results reveal few, although some, surprises
BY PRU SOWERS
KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER
Despite complaints from one Key West City Commissioner that the $17,000 citizens survey didn’t reveal any new information, other city officials say the results will help in the budget process this summer.
“Now we have a citizens survey that we need to review against the strategic plan to see if we hit any of those marks and whether we need to make any adjustments in budget planning,” said City Manager Jim Scholl.
Scholl and city commissioners heard a presentation of the survey results at a special meeting June 30. The first-ever scientific survey of how Key West residents rank the quality of life and city services here was sent to 1,200 residents, asking them to fill out a five-page questionnaire. A total of 367 people sent the survey back, a 34 percent response rate. Although Commissioner Billy Wardlow complained about the low number of completed surveys, saying city staff could have done as good a job without spending $17,000, Damema Mann from the National Research Center, which conducted the survey, disagreed.
“The typical range we see for this type of survey is between 25 and 40 percent so Key West was well within the norm and actually at the high end of the response rate,” she said.
Residents gave their highest approval ratings to Key West as a good place to visit, the abundance of opportunities to attend cultural and music activities, and the city’s openness and acceptance of different lifestyles. The lowest marks were given to available housing options, including affordable quality housing, public parking and the cost of living in Key West.
“Less than one in 10 residents gave’ excellent’ or ‘good’ ratings to those items,” Mann said about affordable housing, parking and the high cost of living. “Those were all lower than the national and custom benchmarks, as well.”
Neighborhood and downtown area safety received high marks. And 47 percent gave a “good” rating to the overall quality of city services. The highest rated municipal service was the fire department, followed by emergency medical services, drinking water and the police department.
The lowest rated city services were the amount of open space on this densely populated island, code enforcement, street repair, and land use, planning and zoning.
“Some of the lowest rated services had to do with housing in Key West,” Mann told commissioners. “Housing options and affordable, quality housing were rated as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ by less than one in 10 respondents.”
Affordable housing, and the lack thereof in Key West, came up repeatedly in the survey results as the area where residents were most concerned.
“Our calculations indicated that 60 percent of Key West residents are under housing cost stress, which is the highest level of housing cost stress we’ve seen in any of our other communities in our database,” Mann said.
“I’m not all that surprised at the ranking of the issues. We all knew affordable housing was a major crisis in the city,” said Commissioner Jimmy Weekley. “What surprised me is that they were willing to have their taxes increased if they knew it was going for affordable housing.”
Scholl said that is one of several pieces of information contained in the survey results that he will be taking into consideration as he continues preparing a draft budget for the 2015-2016 fiscal year, beginning on Oct. 1. Another piece of the fiscal puzzle revolves around street repair, which 90 percent of the respondents ranked as an important issue. Commissioner Teri Johnston pointed out that the Key West street repair budget essentially stays at the same level each year and perhaps that should change.
“Clearly this report says we need to move that up in the food chain,” she said, adding, “There are a whole lot of opportunities in [the survey results] that I see. I’m really glad we have this report right before we go into the 2015/16 budget cycle.”
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“Politically Correct” does not mean “Illegal” (or even wrong):
Has Politically Correctness gone too far?
http://www.merriam-webster.com/ defines Politically Correct as
adjective: agreeing with the idea that people should be careful to not use language or behave in a way that could offend a particular group of people
noun: conforming to a belief that language and practices which could offend political sensibilities (as in matters of sex or race) should be eliminated
politically correct defined for English-language learners: agreeing with the idea that people should be careful to not use language or behave in a way that could offend a particular group of people
Wikipedia says : Political correctness (adjectivally, politically correct, commonly abbreviated to PC) is a pejorative term used to criticize language, actions, or policies seen as being excessively calculated to not offend or disadvantage any particular group of people in society.
Freedom of Speech is still a guaranteed Right of the people in the United States, according to our Constitution. Making a statement that is “politically incorrect” may be hurtful, hateful or rude, but we still have the right to make that statement, legally! What is the correct response to someone that makes a politically incorrect statement? It seems that our society has gotten to the place we think these statement should be illegal/banned or even worse.
Your paper published a personal opinion from Roger C. Kostmayer calling out the other Presidential Candidates, especially those with a Hispanic background for not pouncing on Donald Trump for calling Mexican “Illegal Aliens,” rapist, drug runners, killers, etc. I am not defending what Mr. Trump said, but his right to say it. It is his opinion and he has a right to say it.
I personally see no requirement for any other Candidate to respond to it, no matter what their background is. If I was one of the Presidential Candidates with a Hispanic background I would really be upset by Mr. Kostmayer’s ill thought out accusations. Isn’t it actually a form of racism or at least racial profiling?
Jeb Bush’s children are not “Latinos” – they are Americans. I am reasonable sure that if Mr. Bush said anything about Trump in any language other than in English, we would have heard about it.
Mr. Cruz was born in Canada to an American mother (Irish/Italian) and a Cuban born Legal American.
Mr. Rubio was born in Miami, Fl to Cuban born Legal Americans.
As for Mr. Kostmayer’s charges of “Racist slurs and hate speech”, are they? Trump said nothing about ALL Mexicans, nor was there any message about “hating” anyone except maybe Criminals that are in our Country Illegally. At least, that what I heard. One of my elderly mentors told me when I was young, “People hear what that hear, not what you say.” That seems to be what is happening in our whole country today. We have gotten to the point where “we hear” something, jump to conclusions and do not even bother to find out what was really “said”. .
My personal opinion is that we need to shut the Borders and send the illegals back to their country of Origin.
“What surprised me is that they were willing to have their taxes increased if they knew it was going for affordable housing.” Jimmy Weekly
What tax increase are they/we talking about? Property Taxes? The tax those needing “affordable housing” think they do not have to pay? They have to pay it in their Rent! Higher Taxes means less NOT more affordable housing. Taxes on wages means less money to buy housing.
Therefore, this statement makes no sense to me.