City Council Study Session Agenda and Packet 2008 08 12

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City of Louisville Citizen Su August 2008 When a table for a question that permitted o~~ly a single response does not total to exactly 100%, it is due to the customary practice of rounding percentages to the nearest whole number. Comparing Survey Results Because this survey was the fifth in a series of citizen surveys, the 2008 results are presented along with past ratings when available. Differences between years can be considered "statistically significant" if they are greater than five percentage points. Trend data for Louisville represent important comparisons and should be examined for improvements or declines. Deviations from stable trends over time especially represent opportunities for understanding how local policies, programs or public information may have affected residents' opinions. It should be kept in mind that survey methodologies changed over time; and that such changes might contribute to any differences in results across survey years. National and Front Range normative comparisons also have been included in the report when available (jurisdictions to which Louisville was compared nationally and in the Front Range can be found in Appendix F.• Jurisdictions Included in Benchmark Comparisons). Selected survey results were compared to certain demographic characteristics of survey respondents and are presented as Appendix C.• Comparison of Responses by Respondent Demographics. Comparing to Other Survey Results Certain kinds of services tend to be thought better of by residents in many communities across the country. Where possible, the better comparison is not from one service to another in Louisville, but from Louisville services to like services provided by other jurisdictions. National Benchmark Database NRC has been leading the strategic use of swweys for local governments since 1991, when the principals of the company wrote the first edition of what became the classic text on citizen surveying. In Citizen Surueys.• Hoty to do them, hoav to use them, what they mean, published by the International City/County Management Association (ICMA), we not only articulated the principles for quality survey methods, we pioneered both the idea of benchmark data for citizen opinion and the method for gathering benchmark data. W'e called it, "In Search of Standards," and argued for norms. "What has been missing from a local government's analysis of its survey results is the context that school administrators can supply when they tell parents how an 80 percent score on the social studies test compares to test results from other school systems..." NRC's database of comparative resident opiruon is comprised of resident perspectives gathered in citizen surveys from approximately 500 jurisclictions whose residents evaluated local government services. Conducted with typically no fewer than 400 residents in each jurisdiction, opinions are intended to represent over 30 million Americans. NRC has innovated. a method for quantitatively integrating the results of surveys that we have conducted with those that others have conducted. We have described our integration methods thoroughly in Public Administration ReZ~iety, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management and in our first book on conducting and using citizen surveys. Scholars who s specialize in the analysis of citizen surveys re€;ularly have relied on our work (e.g., Kelly, J. & Swindell, D. (2002)). Service quality variation across urban space: First steps towards a model of citizen satisfaction, Journal of Urban Affairs, 24, 271-288.; Van Ryzin, G., Muzzio, D., Immerwahr, S., Gulick, L. & Martinez, E. (2004); Drivers and consequences of citizen satisfaction: An application of °- the American Customer Satisfaction Index Model to New York City, PublicAdministration Aevieiv, 64, z 0 0 N O rt of Results